I know, many of you reading this have likely obtained some form of post secondary education. Some of you may have great jobs as a result and not agree with this statement, some of you probably are on board and feel though that you have been “ripped” by the system and over-paid for your education.

One thing that you cannot argue is the fact that conventional Universities are charging way too much money for their education.

What better way for me to analyze this problem and case my point than to take a local University in Western Canada (University of British Columbia) and reveal a course that is a concept that we are all familiar here with at Wealthy Affiliate; Search Engine Optimization.

I just caught wind of an “online only” offering, called “Search Engine Optimization”. (you can check it out here)

This is a 6 week course that runs from the dates of May 20th to July 8th, 2014. I think as I dig into the University type of education that is out there, it is going to add a lot of perspective as to what is really going on and how these companies (yes, they are businesses) that we are supposed to trust are gouging us.

The Course is Delivered How? OMG!

It is completely online. It is using free services like Google Hangout and Google Talk (really?!) to run the course. They have no dedicated platform for offering the training other than a Google Hangout and some dialogue with Google’s instant messaging platform, Google talk.

I am surprised actually they just didn’t run this as a Facebook group, it would have been much more relevant to the audience in this day and age so they could post “selfies” while taking the training.

What is going to be taught in this $2,000 SEO Course?

So if you are paying $2,000 for a course, you are going to be expecting to getting a pretty advanced education right? Well in this case, you would be DEAD WRONG.

Here is the breakdown of the topics that are going to be taught within the “accelerated” course:

(1) Key word selection - never seen it spelled this way in the industry, this by all means should be referenced to as "keyword research". I imagine they are using an ineffective tool like keyword planner for this one

(2) Key word placement - very rudimentary stuff, a one liner would suffice for this portion. "Put the keyword within your title, somewhere within the first couple of paragraphs of your content, and then write naturally (with the reader being your focus)." There, saved you $2,000!

(3) Refactoring website content - Rewriting your content from scratch is the best form of refactoring. Anyone with any knowledge of SEO knows that if you try to "fine tune" your content, you are going to be in for a long road in the SEO world.

(4) Evaluate results by running a captive search engine to improve a site's search rankings (huh?) - This makes absolutely no sense and is technical speak trying to fool folks with obviously no SEO knowledge.

Learn techniques related to key word selection, key word placement, refactoring website content and other optimization methods for search engine optimization, and evaluate results by running a captive search engine to improve a site’s search rankings

The keyword training on "low hanging fruit" here at WA is likely much more advanced than the entire training on keywords that will be taught within the course and is all someone really needs to know if they truly want to understand how to rank under keywords.

Are the "teachers" of these courses going to be the "experts"?

That is yet to be determined and they are definitely not selling the course based on “who is teaching” nor do most post secondary programs. Why? Because those that can’t do, typically end up teaching (there are definitely exceptions to this though).

I can recall a business course I took in college. I asked my teacher what her past experience was in business. She told me about her failed attempts at opening a few different boutique "retail shops” and the fact they both failed and went bankrupt. She had actually never achieved success.

I wondered why I would ever want to "learn" business from someone that didn't understand how to create or grow a successful one. It was a complete oxymoron.

That is why you can truly benefit from getting help from those that have experience REAL LIFE success here at WA. Not only are you getting help from people that have been there done that, you are getting help from folks that are at every level success and that are “in the trenches” creating success online.

When it comes to SEO (something so integral to an online business) you want to learn from those that are succeeding with their own campaigns, those that are actually ranking, and those that truly understand the most important metrics (the ones that most others don’t know) that lead to rankings.

I can assure you that THIS WILL NOT BE TAUGHT in this course. Why? Because they don’t have that level of experience, the teacher comes to work to get paid their salary and is likely teaching from a manual. If they were so great at SEO, why wouldn't they be doing it for themselves.

Some quick perspective, Wealthy Affiliate vs. University! (6 weeks vs. 6 years!)

$2,000+ for a 6 week “university” course. To the unsuspecting and those that have been “programmed” to spend lots of money on training within institutions like this, it probably seems like an OK investment. I am investing for my future right?

I guess. Chances are people that take this course will not end up with adequate knowledge, they will have an inexperienced teacher or someone who doesn’t have the “in the trenches knowledge” and the community in which they are going to have access to are also complete newbies, so no community support.

To put this ONE course into perspective of what you are getting here at WA (which is 100x more), you could have a 6 YEAR membership for the same price you could get this ONE 6 week course!

6 years of current and trending training, 6 years of expert help and support, 6 years of earning while you are learning, 6 years of building a successful business online, 6 years of websites/hosting on a state of the art platform, 6 years of access to a platform that has 10,000’s of active discussions/blogs/training resources every month, and 6 years of constant innovation, evolution and improvements!

Or a 6 week course...and one that offers no “credits” or value towards an actual degree.

Also, SEO is only good if you...

• Understand how to set-up your website for SEO
• Understand the intracies of keywords and have access to the right data (like Jaaxy.com and the WA keyword tool)
• Have the ability to build websites and host them on a high speed platform
• Have access to network with other successful folks
• Have the ability to query folks and get instant responses when you need it
• Have reliable and proven video training
• Can get help from experts.

All of these are not included within this “University" SEO training. Now if anyone can tell me that this isn’t a complex hoax and another prime case of universities taking advantage of I would love to hear about it. Also, if you agree or have had similar experiences with “high ticket” education, I would love to hear about it.

PS. Hope this put some perspective as to the value you get here as a Premium member and it is only increasing by the day (as we continually evolve and improve the community here).