Ranking IS guaranteed

Well, it's not, but I'll explain.

I'm somewhat sick of people saying "rankings are not guaranteed".

And, if you apply precise logic, then no, they're not guaranteed.

But, if you apply that same logic to everyday things, like driving your car, you could also say that "it's not guaranteed that you'll arrive at shopping center that you're about to drive to" - because according to that logic, nothing is guaranteed.

Why do people afford more skepticism (or indeed, pessimism) to SEO than driving to the shops?

It's actually remarkably similar.

I'm happy to say that I'll get to the shops if I start my car, drive onto the correct street, stop at the lights if they're red, then drive along the road and move my car in the direction it's supposed to go. I have a significantly high degree of confidence in arriving at my destination - such that I don't even consider it likely that I won't arrive. And because of that, I do arrive!

I take exactly the same approach to SEO.

I know that I need to 'start my engine', and follow all the other rules that I've found to be pertinent, and that if I do so, I have a more-likely-than-not chance of arriving at my destination - a top 3 ranking on Google. I don't always arrive, but in the vast majority of cases, I do.

I suggest that the problem for most people is that instead of driving in an orderly and sensible manner when it comes to SEO, they try to be street-racers, and they crash and burn quickly, instead of arriving safely at their destination.

"Don't forget the 30 day tollgate"

Haha yes on the way too the destination there is a 30 day waiting period before you can arrive.

tony_d said:

Why do people afford more skepticism (or indeed, pessimism) to SEO than driving to the shops?

Click to expand...

I believe that the reason for this is quite simple: driving has established road rules and licensing exams that consumers can recognise whereas SEO is currently what I like to refer to as a "cowboy industry". Let me explicate this further.

Right now, any college student with a computer and an Internet connection can call themselves a search engine optimiser. Is it appropriate? Of course not because there's more to being a SEO than that, but because there aren't any industry standards that consumers can easily identify, it's hard for them to discern between a shoddy company and a genuine company, and this is where the cowboys come in with their #1 ranking guarantees to take advantage of consumer ignorance to make a quick buck. You see, after hearing the same or similar guarantees with no results, it's only natural for consumers to become pessimistic about SEO services over time if they repeatedly have the same negative experiences. This is tantamount to multiple people at different stages of your life telling you "I love you" only for them to abandon you shortly after. Eventually, you'll inevitably be sceptical (unless you're one of those overly-optimistic people) the next time you hear the phrase.

This is just my two cents.

tony_d said:

But, if you apply that same logic to everyday things, like driving your car, you could also say that "it's not guaranteed that you'll arrive at shopping center that you're about to drive to" - because according to that logic, nothing is guaranteed.

I'm happy to say that I'll get to the shops if I start my car, drive onto the correct street, stop at the lights if they're red, then drive along the road and move my car in the direction it's supposed to go. I have a significantly high degree of confidence in arriving at my destination - such that I don't even consider it likely that I won't arrive. And because of that, I do arrive!

Click to expand...

You're absolutely right about this, although even if you do everything correctly, there's no guarantee that you'll make it to your destination as you cannot control the actions of the other drivers nor do you know anything about the current state of their mental health (e.g., are they feeling particularly suicidal and inattentive over a divorce today?).

Using a similar analogy to your own, when I was 12, I knew that if I walked to school on the sidewalk, crossed in the zebra crossing when appropriate and looked both ways before crossing the street, I would arrive at school safe. However, what I didn't account for was the variable of the drunk driver who decided it would be a great idea to try to run me over while I was on the sidewalk. Luckily for me, I was not injured as I swiftly avoided the truck enough for it to only brush against me.

Because of this, I'd find it more appropriate to compare SEO guarantees to guaranteeing someone that they'll win a competition (although even this analogy isn't perfect since with SEO, you can easily target low competition keywords when you're starting out to build the website up and make it more competitive). You can do everything right, but you never know if one of your competitors will decide to target the exact same keyword as you (although I still like your analogy ).

Zwielicht said:

I believe...

Click to expand...

Don't take it too literally

The point I make is simply that peoples prejudiced, biased, and plainly wrong beliefs cause them to misjudge what is possible.

I believe your driving analogy is good one. Everything in life is a gamble and by gamble I mean not certain and is odds based, except we choose not to see things as gambling because they are so statistically likely that we accept that they will happen. So for that reason, I don't regard SEO as a gamble in the way that you suggested that you don't with driving.

Other than the money, the main reason that I enjoy SEO is because it's predictable and can be done successfully with applied logic. It's predictable because it involves manipulating a mathematical formula where the variables are unknown and interact with each other in unknown ways but through experimentation, logic and learning they can for the most part be determined and used in my favour.

To approach SEO subjectively and not logically as you said with 'prejudice' and 'bias' would be so demoralising and frankly irresponsible to your customers/your own income, that I can't imagine functioning in SEO if you didn't know rankings were guaranteed through the persistent and consistent application of a set of rules and principles. Most of those rules and principles are on this very forum and with moderate intelligence you can reasonably easily succeed, which I find extremely heartening.

Now I believe the reason people fall down in SEO is out of ignorance. The Dunning-Kruger effect is rife in the majority of comments on this forum and spotting it is key to your own survival when you first get started. Until you get over that initial sharp learning curve of realising that there are 'known unknowns' and 'unknown unknowns' and you are able to find out the 'known unknowns' through experimentation and logic, it can be a rough ride.

Every single "thing" in life has outcomes we can't control, including driving and SEO.

Imagine if you jump in your car early Sunday morning to go grab a coffee at Starbucks. On your way, a driver that is shit faced and coked up from a night of wild partying blows a red light at the intersection, t-bones your car and kills you instantly. Completely out of your hands.

Now, let's flip it to SEO. You are doing everyone right. Posting great content and earning links naturally. All is good...until some fucking asshole spends $20 via fiverr and ruins you. Same as the drunk driver above. Kills you without you even seeing it coming.

I'm gonna go the other way on this one. Say you go to the doctor and you need to be started on some treatment. Sure if it's something basic like a minor infection (like a low comp KW), your expectations should run high that it'll get taken care of. But if it's something like cancer (let's say a GBM just to really take the other end of the spectrum here), well a cure is most definitely not guaranteed (in fact it'd be the exception, not the norm). It's not that the doctor did a shitty job if you didn't get cured; he/she did the best he could with where medical science is at currently. I see SEO the same way. You could do everything right, but there's a significant component of all this that remains out of your hands.

Do many sellers use this as a CYA (cover your ass) statement to throw in the face of frustrated customers? Yes. Does it make the statement itself inaccurate? No.

netmoney1 said:

Every single "thing" in life has outcomes we can't control, including driving and SEO.

Imagine if you jump in your car early Sunday morning to go grab a coffee at Starbucks. On your way, a driver that is shit faced and coked up from a night of wild partying blows a red light at the intersection, t-bones your car and kills you instantly. Completely out of your hands.

Now, let's flip it to SEO. You are doing everyone right. Posting great content and earning links naturally. All is good...until some fucking asshole spends $20 via fiverr and ruins you. Same as the drunk driver above. Kills you without you even seeing it coming.

Click to expand...

Yeah, but it doesnt stop me from going to Starbucks on Sunday morning.
And thats kinda my point.
I'll still get there 99% of the time, even accounting for coked-up variables.

tony_d said:

Yeah, but it doesnt stop me from going to Starbucks on Sunday morning.
And thats kinda my point.
I'll still get there 99% of the time, even accounting for coked-up variables.

Click to expand...

SEO is guaranteed otherwise those knowing seo wouldn't be continuing to create sites and rank them.

There's a random chance 1 site out of 20 will flop but that's seo and google, random.

What I think you try to say is seo is guaranteed because is not random. Ranking is the result of doing a series of exact processes (processes known by those successful) so is not random.

By not being random it is certain aka guaranteed.

I hope I'm not too logical for a friday afternoon

I think it's all the shifty seo services people waste money on that gives way to these. I know I did first time around. I never stop learning, but I do grow and know a bad choice by doing my homework on the provider and asking the correct questions. Just like anything in life we have to think for ourselves.

It's about time someone says it.

SEO is like fishing.

If you are experienced enough, hungry enough, it's just a matter of time before you reel something in. You might have to change your line, change your bait... or restart the motor. But eventually you'll catch some seaweed, or a snapper, or a bluefish.... or if you're real hungry - you may catch a whale.