---
title: '"No One Visits Page 2 On Google?" Debating Common SEO Myths'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=iC95JElqP8A'
video_id: 'iC95JElqP8A'
date: 2026-07-28
duration_sec: 660
---

# "No One Visits Page 2 On Google?" Debating Common SEO Myths

> Source: ["No One Visits Page 2 On Google?" Debating Common SEO Myths](https://youtube.com/watch?v=iC95JElqP8A)

## Summary

In this video, a panel of SEO experts convenes to debunk widespread myths in the search engine optimization industry. They address misconceptions about the need to pay Google, the importance of technical SEO, the role of backlinks, and the viability of small sites competing with established authorities.

### Key Points

- **Small companies can rank** [00:18] — Small companies can rank by targeting longer keywords and creating high-quality, specific content, such as an aggregator piece comparing cleaners.
- **More traffic isn't always better** [00:46] — Traffic volume should not be the sole goal; the right traffic (e.g., specific problems and content) is more valuable than sheer volume.
- **Business value over traffic volume** [01:14] — Assign a business value to each blog post; a low-volume keyword can be highly valuable if it reaches the right audience and promotes the product effectively.
- **Technical SEO is overemphasized** [01:30] — Technical SEO removes barriers to performance but does not actively build engagement. Content quality outweighs technical perfection for most sites.
- **Cannot pay Google for organic rankings** [02:24] — There is no direct payment to Google for organic rankings. Paid ads can indirectly influence engagement through brand exposure, but not via a direct payment.
- **Content quantity vs. quality** [03:28] — Fewer high-quality pages generally rank better than many low-quality ones. Quantity without quality is ineffective.
- **Backlinks still matter** [04:22] — Backlinks remain a strong ranking signal; they correlate with traffic and are essential for authority, though low-quality paid links should be avoided.
- **Buying links for brand building** [05:57] — Some argue buying links for brand placement (e.g., legal directories) can be beneficial, but it is not for direct link value.
- **Technical SEO important for small sites** [07:03] — Technical SEO is crucial even for small sites; all top-ranking sites actively improve technical aspects regularly.
- **Competing with authority sites** [07:56] — Competing is harder but possible, especially by leveraging new features like video and YouTube to level the playing field.
- **Page 2 rarely visited** [08:36] — Most users do not click past the first page, but SEOs often do, leaving hope for pages on later pages.
- **In-house vs. agency debate** [09:18] — Both have merits: in-house builds institutional knowledge, while agencies bring proven strategies and easier budget approval.
- **SEO vs. ads** [10:16] — SEO is a smarter long-term strategy, but ads are easier to prove and get short-term results. Click-through rates are lower for ads.

### Conclusion

The experts agree that many common SEO myths are misleading, but that SEO remains effective when focusing on high-quality content, technical fundamentals, and ethical link-building without direct payments to Google.

## Transcript

Google we brought together top SEO experts to expose some of the biggest myths in the industry I wish I could pay Google only big companies can rank on the first page of Google bust it if we s like in generally
to rank generally you can rank with smaller size but for longer keywords and if you're able to publish like an amazing aggregator piece that compares cleaners for instance that might be really really valuable content that a
small company could be able to spend that time and spend the resources really being able to do that and just focus on just backing clears more traffic equals more sales that's so situational in general
yes uh in many cases no I yeah you don't want more you want the right traffic commodity content is a dime a dozen on the internet you want specific problems specific content and if you hone in on that you can you can really cever some
gains even on our blog like we don't just go off of traffic traffic value whatever uh we literally have a business value to every blog post that we assign and and because yeah something might be like this is a keyword volume of 50
want to even bother writing that but if it's the right people and we're pitching the product in the right way that's can be super valuable for us only techsavvy people can do
misconceptions in SEO a lot of people over index on the technical Parts because they feel like if they can fix some broken links or something something they can control and understand and see changing they'll get amazing SEO results
I normally think of like technical SEO as just removing barriers to good performance it's not actively building anything that people will care about once you start to get some momentum don't get me wrong like somebody with
technical like knowhow can probably come in and do more advanced strategies but no I don't think you need to be technical to do LCA some some of the most successful people I know are doing minimal SEO just publishing pages on
their WordPress blog and just doing the very basic something they learned on good content I always think is more important than getting the SEO perfect behind it and I think that's how Google feels too so yeah you need to pay Google
feels too so yeah you need to pay Google to rank high in search results to rank high in search results [Music] I wish I could pay Google there's no money that's being
paid to Google you know to rank high in the organic search results historically I've been a very very cheap person when it comes to marketing and managed to get millions of page views from Google and I did it with very little money it's a
question of if you have the right knowhow the right time to continue and do SEO over a long time Horizon you still can get good results from it paid ads do subtly influence search results like just from a pure impression
click-through rate standpoint if you see a brand show up and then you see the same brand show up again that's going to help you indirectly through engagement help you indirectly through engagement metrics but yeah you can't directly pay
metrics but yeah you can't directly pay the librarian to go get your book The the librarian to go get your book The more pages you have the better you'll
equal better I think we generally see larger sites still do well but it's uh the opposite like there are some shared signals and stuff and I would say fewer
quality pages are generally going to rank better but if you do have more pages like you can rank for more things so the more content you post the better so the more content you post the better your
more quantity quantity quantity game Google is expecting if you just spat out a bunch of content and it sucked then there's no reason why it should or would
rank it's like less is more less focus on doing something that is quality and not just for quantity's sake backlinks don't matter in
thoughts links will always matter every experience I've ever had of any website links always help it's a link from an external site that says to everybody and their dog hey this piece of content that you posted is actually really really
content nothing happens and you build you know 10 decent contextual links and after that point and you know if you look at any chart in Side Explorer
you'll see that the links in the traffic go up almost exactly together it's it's a good product or something to back it up it's still that great way for the mention and for when you're doing it correctly to be able to organically say
yeah this this rules we should Index this and we should rank this really well I mean they matter a lot less in some ways I I think Google ignores a lot more links than than we realize but you still need links you shouldn't buy
need links you shouldn't buy [Music] the other way no I prefer not to buy back Lings I prefer I think you can
marketing campaigns that are much more effective cost for dollar but I think there are some good placements out there in digital PR where you can buy placements that's that most backlinks I think that are paid for suck but I think
you you can get a good good value yeah I'm not going to say like do it for the link value but digital PR contents syndication sponsorships like these are all valid reasons to again not necessarily buy links for the sake of
back links but it's it's normal thing in doing business my favorite thing today is buy links to build your brand not point at your content but you know I work in legal in the United States and it's some of the most competitive like
keywords people are biding $3 $400 a click I think it's impossible to rank without paying for backlinks and when I say paying for backlinks sometimes what we do is we look at like the first page of Google for a Target keyword and we
see like what are all the legal directories that are there right so I always advise my clients that they should be on those legal director iies being on those legal directories they need those websites to link back to them
because all their competitors do and sometimes these links are like $300 $400 a month just to be on that directory there are some types of links that are basically saving yourself effort and time you know like getting nap citations
trick question right I mean like you're not going to go to Fiverr and buy links I have bought links on Fiverr as well and it did not go well they did not go no technical SEO isn't important for
small sites oh my God come on you're you serious I don't know which way to go I think it's less important than it used to be that is an absolute fallacy I've talked to a lot of folks people who had
no idea what they were doing and just staring the website out from scratch and being like Oh we are get all of our referrals through word of mouth and like I just don't really see like my website or SEO being important and then their
whole side is no indexed everyone who's ranking on top is you know actively improving their their website and and from a technical perspective every day every week every month and if if you know you are not doing it good luck
competing with everyone else you'll probably have 10x or like 5x more optimize the website well it's impossible to compete with authority
sites what made you hesitate it's probably the hard it's ever been to probably still can but it's definitely not as easy as it used to be I think yeah I agree I think with certain queries like best running shoes you have
a new site and you're going up against like Runners world yeah chances are you but I also think that there's opportunity for small creators with Sur features so things like with videos when you create videos with YouTube then you
on a Level Playing Field as everybody else SEO is always a game of um trying to take advantage of whatever is available and at some point the advantage does close up but you can still make hay while the sun is shining
still make hay while the sun is shining I think I agree nobody visits the second I think I agree nobody visits the second page of conditioned to just refine their search after they see they don't get what
they're looking for I think Google is so hellbent and so good at trying to match search your intent resolve queries immediately with all the search features they have now ai overviews featured Snippets all the carousel features that
yeah if it's not resolved straight away within the even fold of the page it's not going to be resolved but you know who does go past the 10th result seos who does go past the 10th result seos all day long yes I'm in position 67
right there's hope it's better to build an in-house team than hire an SEO agency are going to kill me I knew we proba different so what do
you do for a living I love building in-house teams I think you can work have longer engagements and really dig into the in-house team just because you develop institutional knowledge a better
working on better communication sometimes you just want to hire an agency that already has the track record and The Proven strategy to execute it's a lot harder to actually get resources to hire someone in house than it is to
hire like a a partial contractor or an agency completely different budgets and that yeah maybe we just have our in-house teams that hire hire for specialty reasons yeah yeah I I typically would favor in-
house but uh yeah the agencies have their uses SEO is more effective than [Music] ads but I think we might be coming at this from the same way I think long term it's the smart strategy short term it's
hard to prove Effectiveness to the sea level you know Executives you can prove just ran a big data study for this that yall will see on the HS blog and the clickthrough rates are not there for pay
not nearly what SEO gets best you're looking like 20% the paid side just happily turn that around when that study comes out okay okay if you want to learn free SEO course for beginners right here on YouTube tube