Why Does SEO Take So Long?

It’s  important to understand that Google is wary of website inbound links that gain too much popularity, too quickly.

Having a comprehensive game plan always works better than silo-ed efforts, even if you use outside firms, have one coordinate the activities of the others.

Internet Marketing is an on-going process, not a one time setup, major changes to how sites are ranked and found change dramatically every year. Too much is at stake to miss out on the internet marketing dance.

Analyzing Your Competition Takes More Time than You May Think

Unless you’re selling a product or service that is less than a month or two old, you will have competitors who are already ranking well in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).

Simply getting on equal ground with them is a task that can take time.

In most markets, your competitors have spent a decade or more building both their websites, and links to those websites. A thorough competitive analysis will take into account every link that leads to every competitor result that shows up on the first few pages of results that rank for your desired keywords.

• Link tools like Majestic SEO can be helpful in developing an understanding of where the ground is.
• Search marketing competitive analysis tools can also be used to help you assess the level of competition in your domain.

When you see large numbers of first page keywords and SEO traffic value in the millions, then you know that competition is going to be fierce. In many markets with entrenched competitors that have been competing for some time, a strategy of optimizing longer-tail terms that will be able to compete within specific industry niches and sub- niches is often the best approach to take.

Google Rarely Trusts Speed

At one time, you could create hundreds of links literally overnight and reap the benefits. The benefits usually didn’t last, but then you could do it again. And again and again, until you either gained the traction you wanted or got banned from Google’s search engine.

These days, all it takes is a slight portion of unnatural-looking links headed your way in a short period of time to put you on the penalty box with Google. Google may not remove your site from its index entirely, but it may apply such a heavy penalty that you won’t really know the difference.

But Google has gotten very good at detecting “link spam”. In fact, some would say it’s gotten a little too good. And while it’s just fine to share your content on Facebook and get as many links as possible in as short a period of time, too many links in too short a time can trigger a manual review.

Good SEO Takes Fine Tuning Along the Way

Once this work is thoughtfully undertaken, you or your provider will then have to deal with the fact that Google does not stay the same. And neither does Bing and Yahoo!

The way search engines rank sites can change overnight. These changes have brought many profitable websites to their knees, knocking out six-, seven-, and even eight-figure businesses literally overnight. The most dramatic of these updates are known as Panda and Penguin, although there have been others.

Good information from good systems and SEO know-how is often the difference between “sink” and “swim” when it comes to the business you conduct online.

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