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Secret #1: There are NO Secrets.

The three most important components of ranking well in a search engine are:

1) Other websites relevant to your industry linking to your website. But buying, building, or exchanging links can be a very tricky business (because if you don't control the links carefully or grow links incorrectly - you can be penalized or banned by the Search Engines). Inbound links are the single most important, and by far the most significant factor, in your organic search ranking. Everything else pales in comparison!

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2) Great content, written by someone who knows your industry and customer very, very well. The kind of content people find so useful they would tell others about it. Beware of those selling you content. Duplicate Content Filters by search engines do not like duplicate content - neither do website visitors. When writing content, make sure its very useful information written by an expert - most likely you or someone in your industry.

3) Scale of Site. Meaning the more pages of well-indexed pages you have, the better. It is not uncommon for well-ranked websites to have hundreds of pages of content. And duplicate content is penalized so the content must be unique throughout.

There are many competent SEO consultants out there. The ethical ones will tell you that they have no "secrets" that other competent consultants don't.

* Also, who is hosting your website? On what kind of server setup? Do you have your own IP address? If you don't know, you need to!

Secret #2: Paying More Does NOT Mean You Will Rank Higher

The pitch of ranking highly for a lucrative keyword in Google or Yahoo with a consultant's "secrets" or "link purchasing" management sounds seductive, but no vendor can ever guarantee results, even for moderately competitive terms. Think about it this way - there are more vendors advertising "guaranteed top positions " or "warranty SEO " for their services than there are actual tops spots for any given keyword in Google or Yahoo. Hmmm.

Also, anyone can buy links themselves if they are so inclined. Do a search for "website links" in Google and plenty of vendors selling links show up, including eBay. You can buy links direct and know which sites are actually active as well as ensure quality control. You don't want Google or Yahoo to think that you're part of a "link farm." That could be very damaging to your rankings, and links are something you will want under your control for numerous other security reasons as well.

Recently the major search engines have been monitoring how quickly you grow your inbound links, and their algorithms penalize websites that suddenly have a large amount of links showing up in a short period of time. Proving once again that organic SEO is a long-term marketing strategy while Pay-per-Click provides near instant gratification.

And this is ultimately what the search engines want, because their users (including you and me) want to see research-oriented sites in the organic rankings and merchants in the sponsored sites (Pay-per-Click). So ask yourself the most critical SEO question - "Am I willing to invest in my website so it will be one of the most useful sites in my industry?" This is ultimately the key factor for your Organic ranking.

And let's not forget now that on both Google and Yahoo, for most keywords the top listings are sponsored listings, not Organic listings. Proving again, the best way to get your website off the ground is through a combination of long-term SEO and near-term Pay-per-Click advertising. And with Pay-per-Click, you can start as small as you want and grow bigger gradually over time with the help of Website Analytics software (software that analyzes your website traffic - beyond what the search engine's consoles tell you).

Secret #3: Organic SEO Alone Rarely Builds Successful Online Businesses. It is Usually a Combination of Expertly Managed Pay-Per-Click And Long-Term SEO.

There is no such as thing as free advertising on a search engine. Whether you decide to learn SEO yourself or hire a consultant, think of the time and money it takes to write helpful articles, learn HTML, imbed forum posts in your pages, build numerous product and/or topic pages, write Blogs, maintain RSS feeds, SEO Press Releases, build or buy back-links, build an affiliate network, - as well as the months upon months it takes to get ranked for even moderately competitive terms. Highly competitive terms can take years to rank organically.

The other mathematical reality of Organic versus Pay-per-Click efforts is that after investing in SEO, let's assume 6 months from now you finally get ranked #2 for a moderately competitive term. But it's likely that there are a total of 25 to 50 keywords/phrases that make up 85% of the total online sales in your industry. So if you just rely on SEO, not only will it take months and months to see any traffic at all, but you may be too narrowly focused on a single term while your smarter competitors take down the majority of the potential online sales through smartly targeted Pay-per-Click campaigns that take advantage of Website Analytics Software, CRM, and Email Marketing.

You can start as small and localized as you want with Pay-per-Click ads, expanding only when you see results with Website Analytics software. The ultimate online leaders in most any industry make as much or more revenue from their Pay-per-Click advertising than from organic rankings because they get immediate results and can get traffic from a wide variety of lucrative keywords/phrases, not just one.

But if you're running a Pay-per-Click campaign without Website Analytics (such as those offered by LeadMarket & others) - You're Wasting Your Money!

Secret #4: Now is the Perfect Time for Small Businesses.

Search engine marketing is geared to give an advantage to small businesses. Larger companies can take days, maybe weeks to approve of new ad copy and keyword strategy while small businesses can change their ads on the fly leveraging feedback from Website Analytics software. And for numerous reasons too lengthy to go into here, it is often neccessary to run a Pay-per-Click campaign in order to launch a successful SEO campaign, as they are highly symbiotic.

SEO is NOT an impossible feat, even for moderately competitive terms. This though, also does NOT mean that a small business can realistically hope to get ranked #1 in Google for "mortgage." It does, however, mean you may get well-ranked for "real estate in Riverside," and do quite well.

If you see a niche opportunity or think you have a distinct competitive advantage offering something that the bigger players don't, a combination of SEO and Pay-per-Click advertising with a good software infrastructure (Website Analytics, Email Newsletter, and CRM) should get your website the revenues it's not getting today.