Two days ago I posted how I helped a private client get near the top of Google.Co.Uk for her most profitable phrase. The work I performed took about 8 hours in total, and yet it has greatly increased sales.

Then I strongly recommended that most small business owners forget about their search engine positions! Have I lost my marbles. No.

Here’s why I contradicted myself:

If I had instead said “put all your effort into getting on the first page of Google for your most important search phrases”, most business owners would look to outsource that activity, because they neither have the time, specific knowledge or inclination to do it themselves.

Unfortunately the return on investment of outsourcing that activity to SEO (“Search Engine Optimisation”) agencies would probably never be recovered. The industry is full of sharks, and this has been hammered home to me on so many occasions I’ve lost count.

I’ve heard countless stories of how people have paid so called “SEO Experts” thousands to get them high up on Google and other search engines… and then seen absolutely NO results.

The last time this happened was just last Tuesday. I had a phone call from an old client from years ago — about 12 months ago he paid a SEO company to get him onto Google — they made all sorts of promises, he paid them thousands of pounds… and a year later he’s nowhere to be seen on Google.

Ruddy shocking. It’s one of the main reasons why I decided to write my book.

The real SEO experts don’t sell their time to other people.

During my last talk at an exclusive 3-day marketing seminar, I asked the room how many people “had paid someone to get their site on Google’s fiorstpage”. A lot of hands shot up.

Then I asked anyone who had got a first page position on Google — and lots of extra sales as a result — to leave their hands up and for everyone else to put their hands down.

Only one person left his hand in the air.

Because he IS an SEO expert — in fact, he used to be one of the people who called companies up and made promises to get them at the top of Google!

And here’s something highly unusual… he really CAN do it! Reliably and consistently get to the first page of Google for any keywords he wants.

Have a guess at what he does these days.

No, he doesn’t do search engine optimisation for other companies (sell his time) anymore.

He simply took his skills and now runs an e-commerce web site that turns over more than £10 Million pounds ($20 Million dollars) annually, and that has thousands (no joke) of first place keyword positions on Google.

It makes a lot of sense doesn’t it.

If someone really can leverage Google results, they can simply take that skill and knowledge and made themselves a lot of money.

I sat next to this SEO expert one lunchtime and had a very insightful chat into how he gets such amazing success with Google and other search engines.

Would you like to know exactly he does it?

I’ll tell you at 4pm next Monday afternoon (14th January).

WARNING: It’s going to be a password protected post, so you’ll need to be signed up to this blog to read it! (You’ll get an email from me on Monday that contains a password so you can see the post.)

Have a great weekend!

-Ed.