Let's have a little chat about a "nasty" three letter acronym that we hear so much of currently. Yep, you got it, the oft-dreaded S-E-O. Everyone probably knows today that it stands for search engine optimization, but less are perhaps aware that webmasters began optimizing content specifically for search engines back in the mid-90's. So it has been around for a while. But it's very fashionable right now, and when you admit to others over lunch that you have never formally introduced SEO-type tuning to your website, you will invariably get a concerned look and a slap on the wrist from one person or other. He or she almost invariably being a marketer or so-called web design guru, in some agency or other. You end the lunch feeling convinced (or pressured) that you have no choice but to shell out at least $5-10K to upgrade yourself or your business will die.
Like a lot of things in life, people are often sold on the idea of needing to hire someone to solve a problem. Especially when that problem presents itself via Darth Vader-like doom and gloom acronyms such as SEO and RSS and XML and so on. We have to be a little more adventurous in attempting to understand what they really mean, and not be fooled by those who use them as actual money makers for their business, not yours! Even as someone not that comfortable with web design and content management, you can do a great deal of SEO-type fine tuning on your own, at zero cost. It's all about helping the search engines do their job, and well. If you take even an afternoon and tweak (or add) your metadata, results can be achieved. Play with the various attributes so that you feel the data really describes your pages and site well, and honestly, so that they will be nicely indexed by search engines. One doesn't need to learn all about algorithms, for example, to be able to improve your site's performance. Additionally, guess what? In many cases, one does not even have to agonize too much at all over such technical issues, because as always, people, it's always about the content! The part of the black box that you don't hear so much hue and cry about, due to the fact that it should be done for free. You know who you are, you know what your business is, and what you are selling, so no one should be better than yourself in writing great web content that has a respectable density of well chosen keywords, nicely (and naturally) sprinkled throughout the website. One does not want to overdo the keyword density, but my general rule is that if it all reads quite beautifully and you don't find yourself reading the same buzzwords over and over, then you are closing in. It's also a myth that you must be the first result on a Google search page, or you will die. If you do a lot of the work yourself, and you are showing up on the first page of results, you are doing well. We here at EU went from being totally unranked, to coming up as the first 7 or 8 results on a Google search for us, all down to doing things ourselves. With a constant eye towards and endless commitment to: content. A little killer content goes a long way to feeding those lovely spiders a deliciously nourishing bite, for which they reward you handsomely.
One has no need to be herded around like sheep, by people who want to make money out of you. If you are in a large organization, fine, go ahead, use that budget and get others to do a full tune-up of your web presence. If cash is tight, it's even more reason to adopt a learning curve approach, and do the more straightforward tweaking yourself. The thing that is most hilarious to us is the wealth of peddlers out there who cry about how urgent your need is for SEO, social media, marketing software, and yet they themselves don't practice what they preach. Beware of this species. Would you go to have your wisdom teeth yanked out by a dentist who is a huge supporter of doing so for his patients, but his wife told a friend of yours that he still has his own? Would you go to a pharmacist to take the magic pill for youth and anti-aging, but they don't really know what's in it, or how it works, and they resist taking it themselves? Pay a company to design a new logo for you, and you don't even like their own branding logo? It's ridiculous! If you do decide to go the consultant or agency route, it's super easy to find out how competent or experienced they are at using the precise service(s) they are trying to sell you. Search for them on the web! Go see their website! In 5-10 minutes flat, you will see how good their SEO is or isn't, and how 2012 their content and social presence are. If you are being pushed to let them organize your FB page, set your business up on Twitter, and even create a blog, yet there are zero interactive social icons on their site, and a blog that hasn't seen a new post since Oprah's last show? Delete. Move on. Don't spend a penny of your hard-earned money.
When it comes to a lot of this, we have an extremely useful resource at most of our fingertips. The whole idea of a big company spending stupid money to set their CEO up on FB and Twits and making a blog is just laughable. It can be done while asleep, almost. For those who want to do it, faster, cheaper and better than with many so-called gurus? It's in your own homes, people! The kids! Teenagers today grew up with all of this, were almost breastfed on it, and they can set up and do very cool things for all your needs. Okay, it might cost you a new laptop or a flatscreen for their bedrooms, but that's a real bargain, right?! Get the basics done for you in no time, and then play with the various tools to make them work for you.
Just remember, people. Web design, content management and social media are not brain surgery, nor some massively intellectual affair. It's effectively all about "communication": a basic skill that we humans all have, and use everyday. If you don't hire people to write letters for you, or do emails, take telephone calls, or write reports for your work? Then you shouldn't need anyone to do your basic marketing. Of course, I am in general referring to smaller business and people building personal brands, and it's an entirely different thing for a Toyota or Air Canada. But we can all be better at communicating and marketing ourselves, without spending thousands of dollars that feel way, way better sitting under the pillow at night. - Kevin Mc & Cristina
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