There is a lot of dubious and false information and claims about Search Engine Optimization. Search engine company
executives are not very forthcoming about their algorithms because they do not want you to try to "beat the algorithm"
and they do not want competitors to steal their algorithms. Search engine "help" pages for Web masters are often
deliberately vague about consequences of negative practices or imply that they have more control over results than they
do. All this is directed at protecting proprietary information and trying to get Webmasters to make "natural" "organic"
content. Search engines don't like SEO practices because to some extent, even the "white hat" practices fool the
algorithms and distort results from their point of view.
This leaves the anxious Webmaster in a state of chronic uncertainty. When your whole livelihood depends on knowing
the unknowable, like the ancient farmers and huntsmen, you develop superstitions. If Joe Smith, AKA "Top Nerd" in the
forums, sneezed at his computer and the next day his Web site dropped 50 places in search engine listings, a lot of
Webmasters will soon be taking cold pills, firm in the belief that sneezing is bad for search engine positioning.
Search Engine Optimization lore is also cranked out by SEO service company gurus who are trying to sell their wares,
or attract attention with an unexpected and counter-intuitive statement. "Calories don't count" sold a lot of books
because it was unexpected, and because everyone wants to believe there is a magic way to stay then and still eat lots of
strawberry shortcake, ice cream and cherry pie. "Metatags don't matter" can be a very attractive belief. Who wants to
waste all that time coding title and description tags? Of course, if you read the fine print or listen to the rest of
the lecture, you might find out that the statement was not "meant in that way." Not everyone reads the fine print.
You probably have heard
some of these claims and you may believe some of them. . Some claims might have been true at one time. Some claims are
probably generated
by hoaxers and pranksters, some are generated by unscrupulous or ignorant Search Engine Optimization companies, and some of the Search Engine Optimization rumors are just due to
uncertainty about how search engines work. Some are just misunderstandings by amateurs. Some of these
claims used to be true, or might be true of some search engines, but not others. We are mostly concerned with Google,
which at present provides about 60-80% of the search engine generated traffic. Some of these rumors are
certainly false, others are very dubious propositions.
One SEO "expert" had the nerve to admit that they had invented the notion that there was an
optimum page size of 250 words. This sort of hoax is not a victimless practical joke. It is malicious and can cost
people many thousands of dollars and many man-hours of wasted effort. One motivation for inventing an "optimum" is to
proliferate pages in a project that pays by the page. A more general motivation for deliberating inventing fake claims
about Search Engine Optimization that are published in fluff articles is to deceive others, and turn one's own services
as a "consultant" into "indispensable." The consultant who invented the lies is in a good position to know what really
counts. At least, they can identify and disregard their own SEO inventions. Does this mean we can't trust any claim
about search engine optimization? Probably not, but it means we have to treat all of them with skepticism - especially
if they contradict our own experience and do not make much sense.
Here is a list of SEO claims, superstitions and lore , with details in the links, and a quick evaluation of each one. Obviously, this
will need to be updated from time to time. Note that "Status" is my own evaluation. Obviously, someone believes
even the claims I am pretty sure are bogus, and they may have had different experience than I did, perhaps with search engines other than Yahoo
or Google. "Not supported" means that my examination of top positioned web pages for different keywords did not bear out
the claim in Google or that other tests did not bear out the claim. If you have information about these claims or have
heard additional superstitions, please write to me at ami.iss(at)gmail.com.A useful article about
these superstitions is here:
http://www.desme.com/blog/archive/2008/06/25/seo-myths-or-misunderstood-techniques.aspx. I found the article after
I had completed much of the list below.
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All materials are copyright 2008 by Ami Isseroff. All rights reserved. These pages may not be reproduced in any
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