Can you learn SEO (Search Engine Optimization) at home with YouTube videos? Common sense says yes, but the experience will teach you “NO!” This is because the information you read online is inaccurate many times. Not only that, but it is consistently wrong throughout. The fact is that SEO is a very big subject with several opposing and complementary forces that are difficult, to sum up in a YouTube video or article. People online are teaching SEO like it is a painting course when in reality it is more like an economics and day-trading course mixed with a big-data analyst course. When you want to find out how to learn SEO at home, here is what you need to do.

Identifying Good and Bad Content

Beginning your journey is incredibly difficult because of how SEO works. So, in order to help you identify good sources of information from bad, here are some things you need to know.

Google doesn’t operate using rules. Things like backlinks, keywords, and duplicate content are still a factor, but they are not rules. They are like the pickles on a burger. They are helpful, but not necessary. 

Google uses big data and machine learning to make its decisions. It is constantly processing how people interact with search engines and websites. They use that information to guess what you want and then they give it to you.

Google uses personalization and generalization. You could search for exactly the same thing as your twin who lives down the road, and you will get different results from Google because each is personalized to you. However, if an advertiser sees that your twin likes something from down the road, it may show you the same content to see how you react.

How Does This Help You?

Knowing this helps you choose between good and bad SEO teachers. The bad ones will give you a checklist of SEO factors and treat it like a standard basic static rule. They will give you definite numbers, like ten keywords per article, or six tags per video. Good teachers will introduce you to the SEO infrastructure and then give you the information you need to carve out your own place on Google.

In short, bad teachers will tell you that to sail a boat you have to move a sail and tighten a line. Good teachers show you how to sail by explaining how the boat, water, and wind work together. 

Find a Paid Course

Think about it honestly. If all those free courses honestly knew how to get your website to the top spot on Google, wouldn’t they charge you for it? Why give away such a valuable piece of information? If you want to know how to learn SEO at home, you need to join a paid course like the one offered by the SEO Academy. You then need to work and improve what they teach you so that it applies to your business, your target audience, and your SEO campaign goals. That is the only (and best) way to learn SEO at home.