To be clear, I understand what SEO is (Search Engine Optimization for
those of you who are where I was three months ago). What I don't
understand is how it works.
In April I did Robert Lee
Brewer's platform challenge. SEO was a topic and one of our tasks was to
google ourselves. The results were a bit scary. My blog was nowhere to
be seen and my first hit was a MySpace page I hadn't touched in years. I
deactivated the MySpace account and tried to forget about those awful
results.
I did really well until a fellow challenge
participant Googled something and then was lovely enough to let me know
that my blog showed up on the first page of results. Yeah! (And thanks,
Monique)
So, I couldn't resist and had to do another Google search to see if my results improved.
The good news is that my blog now shows up on the first page of results. Number six.
The
bad news is that my first hit is to an SAP community network site.
What? To be fair, I am a member of this site. It is the forum location
for a popular web-based analytic tool that I use in my marketing work. I
created a login back in 2008 to post a question to the community. That
was the one and only time I have logged on to this site.
Can
someone please explain to me how the best search result for my name is a
random site I am a member of, but have not posted to in almost 4 years?
(banging head on desk)
And that's why I don't worry
about SEO. Am I glad that my blog is doing better in the search engine?
Sure. Am I going to worry about adding in tons of key words and phrases
so my blog gets better results? Nope. Cause stuff like the SAP site are
going to pop up and make me batty.
So what about you?
Do you worry about SEO? Do keywords keep you up at night? Are you
opening another browser window to Google yourself? Busted.
Yes, I totally opened another window and Googled myself. Busted! :) I hadn't done that in a while, and your post reminded me that it wouldn't hurt to see what pops up. I was surprised to see so many images there! That's new...
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I don't worry about this, either. You can put keywords in your blog's meta tags (and you should, imo), but the only thing that's really going to make your blog rise to the top is time and traffic. So, yeah, I think you're going about it the right way. :)
It drives me bananas as well. I don't worry so much about my blog, since it's more or less just an online journal. But I write for Yahoo Voices (a content mill- ugh!) and have tried all the tricks of the trade to get people to freakin READ what I publish there to no avail. I put many hours into those articles and usually get about 100 hits. And that's after I personally post links to it on twitter and facebook. Very little traffic is coming from search engines.
ReplyDeleteWish I could crack the code, but there are people out there whose sole job is to help increase traffic to sites. I can't compete with that.
That is strange. My search shows my website and then my blog as 1 and 2, so I'm happy about that. There are some random ones that pop up for me too though. I have no idea why. Maybe it has to do with the site's popularity, too?
ReplyDeleteHi Sarah,
ReplyDeleteSEO's can be difficult to understand. The best way to explain it is to direct you to another's blog. Please check out http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2011/12/what-you-need-to-know-about-seo.html for a good FAQ on SEO's.
Auzy
Ha, just Googled myself and apparently there are more Nickie Andersons out there than I realized! Both my blog and Smashwords page show up on the first pages of results, though, so I'm pretty happy with that.
ReplyDeleteI'm with you -- I'm not going to tear my hair out to try to improve my SEO. The best things you can do for SEO rankings are the common sense ones, anyway -- hitting social network sites, and making sure that your blog has fresh & relevant content. The only extra thing I do on my blog is tag all of my posts, which does seem to draw some extra hits.