Jill Whalen is a pioneer in search engine optimization. Nicknamed the First Lady of Search, Jill founded the site HighRankings.com in 1995.
In her presentation for Webstock, Jill diffused some of the most common SEO myths, including:
1) PPC ads will help organic rankings. Wrong.
2) PPC ads will hurt organic rankings. Wrong again!
3) you must have a keyword-rich domain. Nope.
4) you must have keyword-rich page URLs. No need.
5) heading tags are necessary (H1, H2 etc.). Not at all.
6) the keywords in your meta keywords tag need to be included in your page content. It is actually better to use the keyword tag to include misspellings and other keyword varieties that you don't have in the visible text on your pages.
7) using keywords in comment tags will hurt your rankings. No.
8 ) page copy must be a certain # of words. Jill actually made up the 250 word limit a few years ago and it's stuck, but there is really no set limit to please search engines.
9) that you need to bold/italicize your target keywords within the page. No point.
10) that you must use a specific keyword density. No. Jill says that keyword density tools are ridiculous!
11) that you must optimize a page for a single keyword or phrase per page. Waste! Instead, try to optimize each page for 3-5 phrases that are related, so that your copy reads better than repeating one phrase over and over.
12) that you need to optimize for the long-tail searches. You don't generally need to optimize for these - engines will find them on their own.
13) duplicate content will get your site penalized. There is not a penalty as such, but engines will filter out duplicates in lieu of the original copy (or what they think is the original).
14) your HTML code must validate to W3C. Not true. Google doesn't even validate!
15) your navigation must be text links not images. Surprisingly, graphical navigation is fine as long as you use ALT tags.
16) you can't use Flash. It's fine to use Flash, as long as it is one element of your page, not a complete Flash site.
17) certain design techniques are black hat. For example, Javascript code is legitimate, not just used by black hats.
18) that Google's link: command is accurate. It's not a useful tool. Use Google Webmaster Tools or the Yahoo link command instead.
19) that reciprocal links won't count. From the right site, reciprocal links are fine, even very helpful.
20) that pages are ranked in PageRank order in search results. They're not. Google Toolbar PageRank is not accurate anyway so ignore it.
21) you must be in DMOZ or Yahoo Directory to get good GG rankings. It's just not true. Jill says the Yahoo Directory is not worth the money these days.
22) that you need to submit URLs to engines. Provided you have a link to your site, you will be indexed.
23) that you need a Google Sitemap. This is not needed for the average site. It won't change your site rank.
24) that you need to update your site frequently. Not necessary.
25) frequent spidering helps rankings. Not true!
26) that you need multiple sites. Won't help in the engines and creates more maintenance work.
27) that you need doorway pages. That's so 1995!
28) that a #1 ranking will always lead to more traffic/sales. The good rankings need to be for keywords and phrases that people are actually searching for.
29) that an SEO company can place pages in certain positions. Not possible, unless they're using PPC or sponsored spots.
30) that your rankings will tank if you stop paying the company. Rubbish!
31) that they have a "proprietary method" of SEO. They're lying.
32) that they have a "special relationship" with Google. They're still lying. Google has no relationships with organic SEO companies that Jill is aware of.
33) that they can increase your rankings without doing any on-page work. Run away!
So we should keep these myths top of mind while designing and optimizing our websites.It is said that Jill's presentation was by far the best. It was concise but covered all the important aspects and it was delivered confidently. I even learned a few things. Also said that the audience clearly enjoyed it as they paid close attention and a few attendees approached Jill after the session to ask questions and say thanks, always a good sign. Great stuff!
