Hello and welcome to SEO is not that hard. I'm your host, ed Dawson, the founder of keywordspeopleusecom, the place to find and organise the questions people ask online. I'm an SEO developer, affiliate marketer and entrepreneur. I've been building and monetising websites for over 20 years and I've bought and sold a few along the way. I'm here to share with you the SEO knowledge, hints and tips I've built up over the years. The SEO knowledge, hints and tips I've built up over the years. Hello and welcome to SEO is not that hard. It's me, ed Dawson, your host here, as usual, and today I'm asking the question can SEO make me a millionaire? Now, I'm actually not asking this question because I got this question from keywords people use. I've been just playing about with looking at what questions people ask about SEO to get inspiration for the podcast. You know I use my own tools when it comes to looking for content to create and to find the questions people are asking. You know that's why we built Keywords People Use to find those questions for our own projects, as well as making it a tool available for other people to use for their projects, as well as making it a tool available for other people to use for their projects.

But this one, um, this one stuck out to me, um, when I just did a search for search engine optimization and, yeah, one of the questions was can seo make me a millionaire? And, quite simply, there's a simple. There's a simple answer to this question and there's a long answer to this question. We'll go with a simple answer first. The answer is yes, it can, but there is a but, okay. So, in terms of can it do it? Yes, I mean, I know plenty of people that have used seo in their businesses to make themselves millionaires. Um, you know I myself I've been in this game long enough that you know, with any business, if you're in it long enough, you can, you can make it, you can make money, basically. So, yeah, we've, um, I've generated over the last 20 years, you know, several millions of pounds. Okay, pounds, dollars most people be thinking in dollars. So one pound is 1.3 dollars at the moment. So if I say a million pounds, then that means 1.3 million dollars. Um, yeah, we've created several million pounds. We've earned several million pounds from our businesses, primarily through seo. Over the years, we've sold sites, businesses, for seven figure sums, so we've had those lump sums as well. So, yes, you can do it. I've done it. I know plenty of other people that have.

But there is a but to this, okay, and the but is one? Well, several buts really. First one obviously is will seo make you a millionaire overnight? Unlikely, okay, um, I know there are plenty of people out there that will promise you riches and use this one ai hack or trick to make millions or make tens of thousands overnight. You know, if you think, if I make ten thousand in a day, then it's only you don't need many, only hundred days. You've got a million dollars. You know? Um, no, uh, it's very, very unlikely that you will use SEO to make yourself a millionaire overnight. But can you make yourself a millionaire over time? Yes, you can build products that use SEO. Those products will increase in value. They'll become an asset that you can eventually sell, or you can run those assets and run enough income off them to make that much money over time. Okay, you'll spend some of it, you'll earn some of it, you'll save some of it. But, yes, it's doable, but it needs time, Okay.

Second thing is SEO in itself, just learning SEO in itself. Will that make you a millionaire by yourself? No, okay, you can learn SEO. You can build a team of people that do SEO. You can build an SEO agency. You could become a millionaire. Okay, you can make a lot of money over time, but that's just doing SEO.

Most people who make SEO make them money and make them become to that life-changing level of money and not just an income. Um, I'm going to actually have a product around it, okay, so it's actually. You could argue it's not the seo that's making you the millionaire. You could say, no, actually it's the business, it's the product. So in my case, obviously with broadbandcouk, it's where the original source of our income and wealth came from. That's what we built up, that's the asset we built that in the first probably 10 years that was, our entire income came from that, and then, obviously over time, we sold that for a big lump sum of money just over three years ago. So that wasn't SEO that we sold. We sold broadband to people. We were a broadband pricing comparison site, worked with merchants, we generated leads for them and any leads that turned into a sale we got paid. Okay, so essentially, really, that we were a lead generation business and we used SEO to generate those leads. We used SEO to pull people into our website, which we then, you know, used our copywriting skills or development skills to then help them find the broadband supply that they wanted, and then, when they went and signed up, we got commission. So was it the seo that made us the money? Arguably no. Okay, because you can't just do seo without a website. Okay, if you're just doing seo and you're working for clients, which is a fine business model, but it's harder to scale. Now I'm not saying you shouldn't do seo for other people. Um, I have plenty of people who've made really good money, built really good businesses, off being that kind of professional services business. Um, but if you don't want to have that kind of business, which comes with its own complications and running an agency is probably which I have done um, I worked in the agency world before we got into the affiliate world. Then that's another, so it's another podcast to talk about that um. So it's yes, find a business model comes with its own challenges. Won't cover them now. So for everybody else who isn't going to do seo for other people, you can't just do seo for yourself. You've, obviously, you have to have a product that you're doing the SEO on. So, whether it's display advertising, whether it's affiliate marketing, whether it is e-commerce, whether it's digital products, you have to have something that you are selling. Now you might be someone listening to this who has already got a business. You may be, say, a plumber, and you are listening to this because you want to get more leads into your business. So you're wanting to build your website up and get more people come to your website, who will then ring you up to book your services and employ you. That's why you're here to make SEO. It's not going to be the SEO that makes you a millionaire. It's going to be the business that you're running, that you're applying that seo to. That actually makes you the millionaire. So this is why my sort of original answer was can seo make me a millionaire? It's yes, but so so it's part of it's part of the. It's part of the whole package of how you have to build a business. Seo is part of the package. Now, can it be a cornerstone? Yes, in my instance, seo has been a cornerstone.

So when people you know you meet people for the first time say what do you do and you know if I'm looking for the quick answer I just say I help. Well, what do I actually say? I sell things online. Okay, that's the quick five. Second answer. And when people are just trying to get the measure of you, you know, if you, if I went, somebody said what do you do, say I'm a farmer, right, okay, you know what they're doing, but you don't know exactly what kind of farm they've got. You don't know how big the farm is, you don't know what they're doing in farming. They might say they're a farmer, yeah, um. So in my case I say I sell things online.

And then if people want to know more, then I say, well, what we do is we get sites to rank in google and then we, we work with with others, with other businesses, we send them leads and we we get paid. That's in a nutshell, without explaining, because not many people know what an affiliate is. If you're just in general conversation, if you come across most people they won't know what an affiliate is. So you have to explain that affiliate relationship as quickly and easy as you can. Then, if I guess more, then I'll talk about software as a service, obviously with keywords people use and going to in that way. But fundamentally, you know, do I say SEO is what I do to people in the first instance? I don't say that.

To me, seo is a cornerstone of everything we do in the business, so SEO is really, really important. So if I was to say what's my skill if I was talking to myself or talking to somebody new the industry well, I would say SEO is my skill, but it's not how we make money, because you have to have a product. You can't just have SEO, you have to have a product. Even if SEO is the product, then you are selling professional services to people. Okay, yes, just just knowing SEO by itself and doing nothing with it will not make you a millionaire. It won't make you a penny. Okay, you have to. You have to do something with it. You have to take action with it. You have to implement it on something, and that's the key thing.

So if you're listening to this and you are just interested in learning seo, but you've got nothing to apply it to, it's not going to make you a penny. You've got to apply it. So you've got to get a client who you can sell your seo services. Go on the agency side. Or you've got to get a product. You've got to build something that you can monetize for you to make any money out of it.

So can SEO make you a millionaire? What's my answer now? I think my answer now is no. Seo can't make you a millionaire, but SEO can help. Whatever product or service you're selling make you a millionaire, and that's the big difference. So, anyway, I hope you enjoyed that. Maybe it's giving you something to think about. Um, and yeah, I look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Take care till then.

Before I go, I just wanted to let you know that if you'd like a personal demo of our tools that keywords people use, that you can book a free, no obligation one-on-one video call with me where I show you how we can help you level up your content by finding and answering the questions your audience actually have. You can also ask me any SEO questions you have. You just need to go to keywordspeoplesusecom slash demo where you can pick a time and date that suits you for us to catch up. Once again, that's keywordspeoplesusecom slash demo and you can also find that link in the show notes of today's episode. Hope to chat with you soon.

Thanks for being a listener. I really appreciate it. Please subscribe and share. It really helps. Seo is not that hard. It's brought to you by keywordspeopleusecom, the place to find and organize the questions people ask online. See why thousands of people use us every day. Try it today for free at keywordspeopleusecom To get an instant hit of more SEO tips. Then find the link to download a free copy of my 101 quick SEO tips in the show notes of today's episode. If you want to get in touch, have any questions, I'd love to hear from you. I'm at channel5 on Twitter. You can email me at podcast at keywordspeopleusecom. Bye for now and see you in the next episode of seo is not that hard.