Google SEO Starter Guide [pdf]
I would love it if Google published an official answer to the perennial client question: "Why can't you get my site to the top of the SERPs for [insert competitive keywords here]?"<p>My answer is usually along these lines: "Your site is competing for placement with many other professionally-built sites. If I'm doing my job properly, and so are the other web developers, none of us is or should be <i>entitled</i> to top placement. Also, placement depends heavily on factors that are solely in <i>your</i> control as the site owner, such as the quality of the content."<p>But when web devs say this, clients sometimes think we're just trying to shirk responsibility. So I would be really happy if I could point them to an official statement from Gogole that conveys roughly the same message.