Is Search Engine
Optimization Dead?
 By
Ken Evoy,
CEO SiteSell Copyright © 2007
I Hate To Say, "I Told You So," But... Ken's Blog Way
back in Oct, 2005, I shared The Tao of CTPM with the LED Digest mailing list,
a list that I subscribe to and still enjoy. I elaborated in that post
about why I thought Search Engine Optimization (SEO) was doomed. Sure enough,
Google has become a whole lot smarter, which means much less
manipulatable. All the predictions are happening and will continue
to intensify.
A trickle of support has grown into a torrent of consensus that SEO is indeed
on its last legs. The term "SEO" is being redefined away from
"the almighty algorithm" and SEOers are either... " understanding the sea
change that is indeed happening (recent example " sticking to their SEO guns
(their days are numbered) " pretending that they always knew "content was
king" all along (of the prominent ones, only Jill Whalen can truly claim
that position, but I have seen several detractors changing their message
to "content is king") " redefining themselves as "SEM" ("Search Engine
Marketing").
The term "Search Engine Optimization" is self-defining. It means doing something
on-or-off your Web page/site to actively cause higher rankings for certain
keywords. The C T P M /"SEO is dead" approach is visitor-focused, not
engine-focused. In other words... "Keep it real, create good content, and
good rankings happen -- you don't actively try to make them happen."
The smarter Google gets, the more accurate that statement becomes. And results
happen from the bottom up... first the long-tail of keywords generates traffic,
then progressively more competitive terms passively start ranking well.
Finally, the most competitive keywords rank well... naturally. It's
almost mystical (which is why I called the book "The Tao"). But the
logic, and the repeated success of thousands and thousands of SBIers, is
simply irrefutable.
The bottom line is that between Google constantly getting smarter, the increasing
complexity of off-page criteria, personalization, Google Universal and upcoming
true semantic search and Artificial Intelligence, SEO is quite simply
doomed. Unless.... unless?
Unless you redefine "SEO" as meaning, "Keep it real and write to please
humans." SEO is simply... moribund.
All the best,
Ken Evoy
Ken Evoy's
Blog
About the Author:
Ken Evoy is the CEO of SiteSell Inc. He is the author of many FREE E-books
about online marketing including
Make
Your Site Sell,
The
Affiliate Masters Course, and
Make
Your Content PREsell and many others. SiteSell's flagship product
Site
Build It! has been used by over 100,000 customers to not only build
Web sites but to build successful online businesses.
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