1. SEO is Dead

This is among the greatest SEO Myths that should be buried. It is annoying to hear people say that “SEO is dead”. What they do not understand is that SEO will continue to live as long as search engines are around. Every time a keyword is entered in search engines, users will see pages that are related to that particular search term, which is called SEO. When ads surface, they are used for PPC marketing, which is another strategy to gain conversions.

The Truth

Certainly, SEO is not dead as others says. It just continues to change and update every now and then. When comparing the past SEO methods with the present SEO tactics, there are many improvements.

It can be annoying when a strategy used for all SEO efforts is not successful and does not deliver the expected results. However, SEO is a huge domain of both conventional and new strategies that make it foolish to declare that “SEO is dead”.

2. Valuable Content Will Automatically Rank

The popular phrase “content is king” is not totally correct. If it were, then those who spin the same content over and over again should rank on top in search engines.

However, it does not happen that way.

A lot of spammers use this strategy to get high ranking on search results but it is useless. As a matter of fact, there needs to be some changes like Valuable Content plus Great SEO Strategy leads to a Higher Position.

The Truth

While it is true that search engines value fresh, valuable content, this does not necessarily mean that there is no effort needed for content to crawl and index on its own. Later, the crawler will find out about the content and index it but it is certainly not enough.

To draw search engines, crawlers need to be assisted to discover recently published content. Creation and submission of a sitemap to Google will help its bot efficiently crawl all active pages on a domain, meaning, Google will know where every page is positioned on a website and the pages that they should not add in the SERPs.

3. Links are not Needed

Some people say that “link building is dead” while others say “link building is dangerous”. In reality, though, links are crucial and will continue to be one of the most important ranking factors. There are people who avoid Google penalties so they do not like to have anything to do with link building and instead of SEO, use PPC.

You must have heard it many times that “link building is dead” or “link building is dangerous”.

Such reasons brought about this myth.

The Truth

Link building should be an essential part of SEO strategy, if not the major one. However, there should be real links relevant to the website and value added to the web. Creating low-quality links is risky. Improving a website’s ranking by means of low-quality links will make link building surely dead. Therefore, it is best to develop a great network for building backlinks as well as make use of informative, high quality content that gives value to readers and persuade other sites to link with this content.

If you are a blogger or running your own business, then you would know that getting a Google penalty on your website is one of the most significant setbacks that you can get. It can significantly drop your traffic, and today many websites get penalized for violating Google’s guidelines.

It is reported by Matt Cutts, that Google takes every month over 400,000 manual actions. Google penalizes many websites with the use of algorithmic updates like Penguin and Panda. It is a known fact that only 20,000 webmasters submit a request for reconsideration.

Why you got penalized?

Before finding the solution, you must find out the reason for which you got penalized. There might be several reasons for it, and if you see a sudden traffic drop, then you should check that if Google’ e every guideline is being followed.

Some of the reasons for which you might have gotten penalized have been mentioned below:

You might have used low-quality links or backlinks. Backlinks from the website that violate Google’s guidelines might be responsible for your penalization.
You might have hidden some text from the users using CSS.
You might have used links from adult or gambling websites.
You might have used duplicate content.
You also need to identify what type of Algorithmic penalty you have got. You can do this by noting the periods. You need to note down the time your website lost traffic, and the time the Google updated their search algorithm.
How to recover from penalization?

Now there are many ways you can recover from this penalization. It is reported that 95% of all the Google penalties are linked to the website’s backlinking profile. So you should first remove all the bad and cheap backlinks that you have been using on your website.

Now you might need to see if your website has suffered from a Google Penguin update. As if it has suffered from a Google Penguin update you might need to have a look at your anchor text distribution. This update usually penalizes those websites that over-optimized their money keywords.

Another significant issue is regarding the promotion of your business and website. Google is seriously against, sponsored content that quickly passes the PageRank. If you desire of promoting your business services on a blog, then you should use a nofollow attribute so that your rankings can be safe.

If you have a website that is entirely based on content, then you might have enabled comments for your content. You know that not every comment is a genuine comment, so you need to get rid of those spam comments. Everyone hates the spammers, and Google knows this. If your website has many spam comments, then your website might get penalized.

Another critical factor is “niche”. Google gives much importance to relevancy. So if you have links from other websites that are unrelated to your niche, then this is a lousy indication about your website to Google. This will quickly get your website penalized.

Well, these were some of the primary reasons as well as remedies for the penalization. These solutions can help you get your website’s ranking back.

For any business, getting the most leads is one of the most important goals. Due to the stiff competition, it may be difficult for you to choose a method that can give you the best results. Given below are 5 digital marketing strategies that can help you with your lead generation. Read on to find out more.

1. Search engine optimization (SEO)

SEO is one of the primary ways to get access to your target audience. These techniques allow you to improve the rankings of your site for your desired keywords and phrases. Plus, it helps your target audience look for your site when they enter relevant keywords in the search engine.

According to statistics, 75% of online searchers don’t go to the second page of search results, such as Google. Therefore, it’s important that you get your website ranked to show up on the first page of search results. Given below are three important areas that you need to focus on when it comes to search engine optimization.

• Link building
• On-page and off-page optimization
• Keyword selection

2. Pay-per-click advertising

PPC is short for Pay Per Click advertising. It’s another effective way of generating leads. These paid advertisements show up at the top of a search engine’s search results page for given phrases and keywords.

Basically, PPC makes use of keywords, such as SEO in order to help you determine the keywords that you should target to make your campaign effective.

3. Content marketing

This is another effective strategy that can help you with your lead generation. It attracts credible leads and allows you to improve your visibility on the web. As far as content marketing is concerned, you may have heard the terms online guides, infographics, videos, articles, and so on.

The idea is to offer valuable information through your website. Make sure that the content you post is in-depth and helpful.

4. Email marketing

With email marketing, you can earn $44 against each dollar you spend. In other words, your ROI will be up to 4400%. While email marketing is decades old, it is still one of the most effective ways of generating leads. It allows you to reach more people and generate lots of leads.

First of all, you need to put together a subscription list. This can be done by adding simple signup forms to your website pages, such as pop-ups, footer, and header. Make sure you don’t buy email lists as most of the users won’t show interest in the products and services you offer.

5. Social Media

You should create your presence on social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. On these pages, you can post updates about your products and services. Plus, you can post articles and blog posts as well.

In short, if you follow these 5 strategies, you can generate a lot of leads in a short period of time.