You want to get high in the web search rankings on certain keywords.
One good way is to put those keywords into your website’s coding and then saturate your website content and blogs with your targeted keywords. Only then will the great Google bow before you.
Well, we all know what happened with this approach. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) experts started “stuffing” their webs full of keywords to achieve rankings. This made for some very awkward, unreadable content and awful search results. This is cheating and Google’s main job in life these days has been to stop the cheaters.
Cheating to the 10th Power
There has been so much cheating on the web over the years that today we have reached the tipping point. Google is completely fed up. It’s not so much what you do right that gets you ahead in the Google rankings – it’s the cheating you don’t do, that moves you to the top. Violate the rules and you will be penalized, ignored or even blackballed for spammy, unseemly internet behavior.
Yes, it is wrong to purchase 300 inbound links from an island in the South Pacific. It is wrong to place duplicate (or stolen) copy in your blogs and in the multiple websites you own. Please do not stuff anything into your web. Do not hire that “black hat” SEO guy who operates out of his guard dog surrounded bunker in North Dakota. In fact, do you need an SEO guy with all the mystical tips and tricks at all anymore?
So how do I trick the system?
It turns out that the best way to trick the system these days is to be sure not to trick the system. Here is a radical approach: provide clear, concise, relevant information on your website and blog posts. Fill in all the meta-information but don’t over-do it. Build, don’t buy links. Update regularly. Let your web age like fine wine. Be loose and natural.
Hire a Waiter
Do you need a marketing savvy, crafty SEO expert anymore? Maybe not. You might be better off hiring an English or Philosophy major currently waiting tables at your local Applebee’s. A person who is a digital and social networking native can be taught, even how to place meta-information into your web’s code (see Orbit’s NextStep Workbook). SEO and Social Networking are going together, hand in hand, down the future marketing path to help grow your company. Multiplying your sales effort, consistently and persistently to both new and most importantly, existing customers is the value that you can’t afford to miss.
Brand well and prosper!
Andy Cleary