Source Jockey

Almost a year ago, I wrote a post against commercialized Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  I’m bringing it up again because I have had a few clients complain that they are not getting the site visits they expected.  Some have asked to add keywords in metatags, and others have simply asked what they are doing wrong.

First and foremost: Metatags are out.  Google officially does not use them, and from what I can ascertain, Yahoo and Bing do not weigh keywords very high when performing indexing.  I personally do not really care about the other search engines, but it’s likely that they have also come to the same conclusion: metatags are worthless devices for determining the actual content of a page.

So my advice?  Don’t focus on metatag keywords, descriptions, etc–set your sights on the REAL problem: you don’t have enough interesting content on your site.  Sure, you might have some neat content every month (hell, that’s just like my blog), but without a constant flow of new, original content, no one is going to care about your site enough to link to it.  The more the search engines perceive (yes, I’m personifying search engines) that you have a popular web site, the more they are going to steer people towards them.

And all this fuss and muss about the difference between organic and sponsored results?  Bull.  Pay for advertising on the search engines. Sure there are people out there who don’t click on sponsored results–but if they search for “Pasadena real estate lawyer”, and your web site “John Doe and Associates: doing Real Estate Law in Pasadena since 1492″ shows up, they’ll consider clicking on it.  Maybe they won’t–maybe they will–but you’ll be damned sure they won’t click on it if they can’t see it on page 12 of the search results.  Right?

So what should you take from this?  Update your site regularly with interesting, engaging content.  If you’re a personal trainer, write a paragraph a day about a new exercise or routine.  Don’t think of it as much as a blog as it is news.  Pay for advertising–when you’re they only shop in town, you don’t need to let people know who you are–but when you’re one of hundreds, you have to stick out.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 27th, 2010 at 3:40 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.