New to SEO, I have some question regarding link building, keyword analysis, and more.

Hi, I have very basic knowledge about SEO, and I am looking for some answers to these questions:

1. Let's say there are three websites A, B (mine), and C (all of them on different hostings). I ask the owner of website A to link to my website (B) and in return, I'll link to his website (C). We don't do this on a regular basis and I won't immediately link to his site, we'll plan in such a way that it'll look random. Will I get caught? If yes, how soon?

2. How exactly Google knows if a link is paid? Condition: The link is not in the sidebar (or the sponsored section), and both the websites belong to a particular niche, and the content is relevant.

3. I have a website, say, AppleBallCat[.]com. When I search "Apple Ball Cat" on Google, it doesn't show up. Yes, I am entering my domain name as is, and it still doesn't show up. It's been more than two months now and I don't see any crawl issues, but it never shows up. I have to type in "AppleBallCat[.]com" and only then it'll come up in the search results.

4. We can't see the keywords that bring organic traffic in Google Analytics (privacy issue?), but the Search Console shows them. What's happening here?

5. Google penalises websites that use the content of others, right? And, I just keep hearing from people to write unique and good quality content. I think it's impossible to write unique content. Just search "SEO guide", Every guide looks so fucking similar. How exactly Google figures out the uniqueness of the content? The way I see it, your content will be similar to someone in some way or another.

   I am not talking about copy pasting here. Let's say you read five articles and after it wrote one on your own. The content will not be a verbatim copy, but it isn't new or unique in any way. Isn't this copied content?

6. In order to increase page speed, you need to reduce HTTP requests. How do I do this if I am using a CMS (Wordpress, like everyone)? Right now, there are 51 elements/requests, and I read somewhere that it should be below 20. I have absolutely zero technical knowledge.

7. Keyword density doesn't matter now, right?

8. What's the deal with thin content? Do I really have to write 10,000 words long articles like Neil Patel in order to look legit to Google? What if my content is good and answers the question in only a few words.

   Also, I read somewhere that there is some positive correlation between content length and links. Is this why everyone is writing such long articles to answer basic questions?

9. What do you think about the future of SEO? I think it'll probably be dead, and content writers will be making a shit ton of money.

10. Posting on online directories, forums, and comment sections don't work, right? By that I mean they are all "nofollow".

11. Over optimization = Spam?

Thanks

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