SEO takes place on your website.

To some degree this is correct. Your site can be optimized by changing meta titles, meta descriptions, adding relevant content and header tags, etc. However, there is so much more involved. Think of an iceberg. You only see about 10% of the berg, while there is 90% under the surface that is not visible. This is the same for SEO work. There are a lot of things you don’t see in SEO, such as link building, article submissions, keyword research and coding.

Companies can do all the SEO work for under $1000.

Unless they are going to do a whole lot of work for free this isn’t true. This amount simply doesn’t pay for all the necessary things that need to be done in a quality and successful SEO campaign. If you’re going to get SEO work done, please don’t fall for these false claims and quick traffic schemes. Look into finding the right SEO company for your needs and your budget.

SEO stops when my site is optimized.

This is a big mistake many people make. SEO work is an ongoing process.  If you stop doing SEO work, you will soon feel it in decreased traffic and income. Once you’re fully optimized and ranking well in the search engines, keep it up! If you don’t, your competitors will, and you will find your site slipping in the SERPs.

“My friend is going to handle the SEO…”

As nice as this would be, you’ll find you won’t get the results you want unless your friend is willing to log a number of hours. SEO is a full time job. To get the best results, it requires constant monitoring and updating. Most times this is more than friends are willing to do. There is so much to learn, and the industry is changing all the time! Look at SEO techniques 10 years ago compared to today, and you will see what I mean.

White Hat SEO Techniques

Although Google does not disclose the search algorithms, they are clear about ethical SEO techniques and what can and cannot be done with SEO on a site. If you decide to mess with these rules, Google can and will red flag you. This means you won’t be showing up on Google for a few months, which completely defeats the whole purpose of SEO work.

This has covered a few basic SEO misconceptions. SEO really can be your best friend, just make sure you get it done correctly! Never be satisfied with your SEO work, as there will always be something that can be improved or needs to be done.

Cybercriminals have adopted SEO tactics (both ethical and unethical) to get their websites on the first pages of search engines. One of their favorite strategies is to use misspelled keywords such as: “Obbama” or “Goggle.” Here’s how it works: When people type in the misspelled keyword the results may include a malicious website listing. When users click on an infected search result, artificially bolstered by SEO, they are redirected to a Web page where a pop-up warns their computer is infected with malware. The message then tries to persuade users to download fake antivirus software for a fee. If users buy the fake software, they have unknowingly provided their payment card number to cyber thieves, and are also at risk for identity theft.

Criminals also install rogue software once you reach their site. Rogue security software relies on social engineering. It defeats the security built into modern operating systems and browser software, and installs itself onto victims’ computers. Most of these programs have a Trojan horse component that misleads users. The Trojan may be disguised as:

• A browser plug-in or extension
• An image, screensaver or archive file attached to an e-mail message
• Multimedia code required to play a certain video clip
• Software shared on peer-to-peer networks
• A free online malware scanning service

It’s wise to take an extra glance at the listing before clicking on a search engine link. Google makes this easy by showing the URL under each search result. In recent times, victims might have noticed the .cn suffix on the end of each domain name, a signal that the website might be in China and could include unexpected content. This is not a foolproof strategy. Computer criminals sometimes deploy a technique called “Google cloaking,” which can display a different URL than the one you’re actually visiting.

Keep up with security patches. The latest form of attacks relied on vulnerabilities that allow a website to install software onto a visiting computer without the user’s knowledge. Fully patched systems warn potential victims by displaying a pop-up window inviting them to download software. This doesn’t guarantee that you won’t be infected, but it can help.

Bad websites can use good SEO tactics to reach the top of the search engines, and the results can be ugly. But if you’re vigilant, you can avoid these problems before they happen.

When I tell people what I do for a living, nine times out of ten they don’t understand what I’m talking about. This made me wonder how many web site owners understand the benefits of search engine optimization. The change can be remarkable for a web site when fully optimized. Did you know that the majority of all web site visits originate from a search engine? It’s easy to see why achieving high rankings with the search engines would be critical to the success of a web site. Yet, surprisingly, only a small percentage have been developed and/or optimized for the search engines.

Optimizing your site is just the first step, and results won’t appear overnight. It will take a little while to get to the front page, even when everything is done right. The work you do on your site will have a direct impact on the time it takes your SEO campaign to get you ranked and to stay ranked. There are a number of technical reasons ranking may take a while. For instance, directories need time to approve web links and search engines must find new links and re-spider new pages.

The benefits of ranking well far outweigh the time and hard work required to optimize a site. Your intention should not be to trick the search engines into thinking your site is the most relevant. Instead, focus on actually making your site the most relevant.