Common Search Engine Optimization Myths

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Dispelling Common Search Engine Optimization Myths
by Ryan P. Allis, CEO of Virante, Inc.

Common Myth #1: Getting Listed = Success

You may have heard that being listed in the search engines is a very effective way of attracting visitors to your website. Well, this is only half-true. Simply being listed is not going to do a thing for you. Instead, your goal must be to be listed in the top few listings on a number of specific and related keywords that you target.

Simply having your site listed by the search engines will do you no good if your site shows up three hundredth or three thousandth in the results of the popular keywords you wish to target.

This is not to say, however, that submitting your site to be spidered by the search engine crawlers is pointless if you do not have hours and hours to invest in obtaining top rankings. Nearly every site with some content will, even if just by chance, show up in the top listing of one or more obscure searches, perhaps providing you with a few dozen or a few hundred visitors per month. So, if nothing else, I would surely suggest spending about ten minutes submitting your website to the search engines. However, do not think that just because you've submitted you will have a chance to show up in the top rankings for the most pertinent keywords.

Common Myth #2: Proper Meta-tags are the Holy Grail

Many people believe that meta-tags are the most important variable in obtaining top placement in the search engines. There could not be a more inaccurate statement. Meta tags were once quite important in ranking algorithms. However, even then criteria such as body copy and number of incoming links were much more important.

Further, recently support for meta tags was dropped by a number of search engine spiders. In fact, the only major search provider that presently even takes meta tags into consideration is Inktomi, which is the provider for some of the listings on the MSN search portal. Until this support is dropped, it will still be a good idea to have meta tags within your <head> tag. However, do not think that just by having meta tags on your page you will be guaranteed to obtain a top ranking for your targeted keywords.

Common Myth #3: You Must Submit Your Site to the Search Engines to Become Listed

Many people believe that their site will never be listed unless they submit their site to the search engines. This is simply false.

You see, search engines compile their data using software called spiders (also known as crawlers). Every minute of every day, these spiders are visiting websites and using their respective ranking algorithms to build the massive databases that the search engines use to rank each website for each keyword.

Besides following the submitted list of sites to spider, the spiders follow the links on each website it visits. Therefore it is possible for a spider to find and index (the act of listing your site in its database so it will show up in search results) your website without ever submitting to the search engines (putting your website in line to be spidered) assuming there are other sites linking to yours.

This is not to say it is a bad idea to submit to the search engines. For newer sites, this will ensure that your site is listed. My point is simply that you should not be fooled into paying someone to submit your site to the search engines before you have had a chance to ensure it is ready to be submitted.

Common Myth #4: You Must Pay a Submission Service to Submit Your Site to Search Engines

There are many companies that offer a website submission service. There is absolutely no reason to pay anything to use a service such as this. You can do this yourself for free. Further, using these services too early will do more harm than good.

Here is a summary of the above.

Being listed in the search engines means little. You must aim to obtain a high ranking for your targeted keywords. Unless both your on-site and off-site attributes are optimized for the search engines, you will not be able to obtain good rankings on competitive keywords.
Meta-tags are not as important as they once were. MSN Search is the only major engine who even takes the meta tags into consideration. As such, it is a good idea to have them, but do not expect to be listed in the top of the search engines without optimizing the truly important factors such as incoming links, domain name, and body copy.
You do not have to submit your web site to the search engines to be listed. While it is a good idea to submit your site to reduce the time, if there are other sites linking to it, it will be spidered.
You should not use a paid submission service. Simply use a program such as WebPosition Gold or submit your site via the Add URL link on each search engine. Nine of the top ten search engines presently allow you to submit your site to be reviewed without paying a listing fee.

This article is an excerpt from Appendix A of Obtaining a #1 Ranking in the Search Engines. You can learn more about the guide here.

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