My Five Hubs on Page One of Google: Does SEO Matter?

Ranking on page one of Google is the dream of all Internet writers. Once you’ve reached that exalted place, untold page views and monetization riches follow. So, like all savvy Internet writers, I studied Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and recently implemented those techniques to try and propel my writing to the top.

© 2011 by Aurelio Locsin

Example

Let me illustrate with just one of my hubs that is consistently ranked second on page one of Google, out of 4.6 million results. (My other four page-one hubs parallel this example.)

Do a Google search on Highest Paid Accountants in the USA. The following title should appear: Show Them the Money: the Highest Paid Accountants in the USA.

I did nothing special to this article other than to write a title that I thought would get hits. (Other job articles with similar titles are nowhere near the top page of Google.) I did publicize this effort on three foreign job forums, but I’ve done that with other articles that have not ranked at all.

SEO Techniques for Page One of Google?

This article has no SEO techniques applied to it. Those techniques theoretically position the keyword, like Highest Paid Accountants in the USA, in strategic locations throughout an article so Google will find it. In this hub, the keyword is only mentioned in the title and nowhere else. This fact is true for the other four articles that rank on page one of Google.

All these hubs got to the top accidentally.

I have diligently rewritten several other hubs to SEO standards to try and raise their positions. They have remained buried in the back pages of Google, where they started originally. Their hits or clicks have not increased.

Results

My example has so far produced the following statistics:

Total number of Hubpages views: 101 (in one month, which is the age of the article)

• Total all-time Adsense impressions: 4
• Average impressions per day: 3
• Total clicks: 0
• Estimated earnings: 0

Analytics page views: 73

• Page views from forum posting: 34
• Page views from Google: 20
• Page views from (direct): 9
• Page views from Facebook: 9

(As an aside, this hub used to have Amazon affiliate ads, but since Amazon cancelled all California affiliates two days ago, I removed the ads. They never brought in a single sale.)

Despite being on page one of Google, my hub gets most of its traffic from the forum postings. Page views from Google come in second, while views from direct typing and Facebook are tied. Interestingly enough, I don’t have a Facebook account, so the mention on that social site must be from a visitor.

In comparison, my most visited hub, Model Train Resource: N-Scale Track Plans to Inspire Your Own Layout Designs, has 219 Hubpages page views and 257 Analytics page views. About 84 percent of those views comes from posting in model railroad forums. Only about six percent comes from Google, where it is lost in the search results. This model railroad article has also brought in the most Adsense cash.

Conclusions

A lot of expensive books, courses, gurus and websites tout the advantages of being on page one of Google. This is supposed to bring loads of traffic, lots of clicks on affiliate ads and tons of cash.

But it looks like forum postings and social networking are what bring the traffic and money in.

In other words, being on page one of Google doesn’t make a damn bit of difference.