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Is most pay for Search Engine Optimization offers basically worthless?

I started a blog 1 1/2 years ago about education. With about two to three lengthy entries a week. When I google my site, I get about 2,500 'hits.' I believe it's the content that has mostly been responsible for this. I never used one of those companies that offers SEO services. I have another blog that is a photoblog. Almost no written content, nearly all photos. After 10 months, I get about 15 'google hits' and I even tried one of those SEO companies. Why are people hung up with SEO when if their site is of little interest, it doesn't really matter if it gets listed. To me it's like starting a huge advertising campaign for a lousy product. I don't see how it would help 'sell' the item. Opinions?

Public Comments

Yes. If you provide information that is high quality or funny people will go to your website. Don't waste money on SEO. It doesn't do anything. Good luck.
Search Engine Optimization can make a company extremely profitable. If your websites has ads or sells product it is extremely important to get ranked in the top ten. You stated the most important aspect to a website "quality content". Start a website that you have a passion about and it will show with the "quality content" contained in its pages and have a high ranking in a few weeks. Seo companies can improve ranking with key words and key phrases and by pinpointing the content needed and pictures. I find that lay out and design aesthetics along with content will have return visitors. Most SEO companies do not make websites visually appealing. Most individuals with some research can do their on SEO and improve ranking.
You have a valuable point. You should understand the value of your niche before optimizing. I use a tool that brainstorms. It evaluates the keywords ant the amount of traffic that those keywords get. If you have a valuable niche it is important to know which keywords people use. There is also a system to analyze too much emphasis on keywords in the content. It is very helpful to have assistance trough the process. GREAT TOPIC!
Yes fresh content will always get you more traffic, but there are a few more tactics you can use. I found the tool below and use it quite regularly, it finds the best high ranking blogs which allow comments, you can post in these blogs with a link back to your site or blog, these backlinks can increase page rank and traffic.