Guaranteed #1 Ranking On Google??
The other day I had a client ask me to phone a company he had signed up with that guaranteed him the #1 spot on Google for $99/month. He asked me to go through the 20 minute phone call with the company and provide them the answers to the questions they had. After gently reminding him that no one can guarantee #1 Google ranking and that tried and true SEO services are what work, I suggested he make the call and promptly cancel the monthly fee. Apparently he had been contacted by a telemarketer, got wrapped up in the hype of the call, and made the purchase.
There is certainly a trend for SEO companies to promise a “100% Guarantee” of #1 ranking in Google search results and a profitable trend it is. In the scenario above, the SEO company would have a nice $99/month coming in for which they would have allowed my client to set up an AdWords account with their help and pay even more for pay per click advertising to achieve the top paid spot.
No One Can Guarantee #1 ranking on Google
Here is a great post on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) which comes straight from Google Webmaster Tools. Towards the middle of the page it is clearly states, “No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google.” It then goes on to say that, “Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a “special relationship” with Google, or advertise a “priority submit” to Google.”
Why Can’t You Guarantee a Ranking On Google?
The search algorithm Google uses to rank websites is as secret as the formula for Coca Cola. Furthermore, unlike the famous Coke mix, Google is constantly changing the algorithm to improve its effectiveness. To be precise, Google has not made the algorithm public and therefore, a lot is left to speculation and methods known to yield results. If the actual formulas are secret and constantly changing, how can a company offer a 100% guarantee of ranking #1 when they are not even 100% sure of all the factors that are working to rank your website?
Paid Versus Organic Search Results
It’s worth mentioning here that you can actually buy your way to the tippy top of Google with paid ads. Google reserves the top portion of their results page for paid advertisers. If you outbid everyone else in the market for your specific keyword, you will rank at the top. This can be a great method to use but you should be aware of the cost before you get started, you can burn through a lot of cash if you don’t properly plan an AdWords campaign.
Then What Does Tummel.Me Do?
Although the algorithms are complex and there is an ocean of content on the internet, the grand scheme of SEO can be explained fairly simply and if you can understand the overall concept then you can understand what we do with our SEO and Local Search services.
Search engines attempt to provide their visitors with the most relevant results possible according to the search query used. They do this by analyzing the relevance of the content and the relevance of that content to the community.
Yeah, that’s kind of it in a nutshell and I can distill it down to a few simple bullet points. Keep in mind there is a bunch of technical stuff to each of these but this really represents it.
- Write content that is relevant to the topic
- Structure your website to make it easy for search engine spiders to index your content
- Engage the community to build credibility and social relevance to your content
I certainly don’t want that to seem oversimplified but it does give you the 30,000 foot overview of it. Within each of those items there are specific things to make sure you’ve done and that’s what we are here for.
If a company guarantees you the #1 spot on Google or any of the other major search engines, RUN! If you want help with a real SEO strategy, contact us.
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