The more and more that people understand about search engine optimization, and how search engines work, the poorer the quality of the content written on the site becomes. There’s a particularly poignant graph that talks about a person’s perceived knowledge in a subject based on the experience in said subject. We perceive our knowledge increasing at a rapid rate until we really start to get into the nuts and bolts of a subject, and we realize that there’s so much more available to us than we thought.
Many of us are outdoorsman – hunters, fishers, campers, mountain bikers, etc. We all have hobbies and interests that lead us outside and into the environment. However, the level of knowledge we possess about fishing, while we might consider vast and extensive, pales in comparison to some of the many doctorate students and professors in marine biology less than 10 miles away at Auburn University.
In a similar fashion, one of the most easily recognizable and most common mistakes that new websites managers or web marketers commit is the idea of keyword stuffing.
The idea is simple – “I want search engines to know I do business in Chicago, so I’m going to put the word ‘Chicago’ in every sentence.” This shows that the website manager has, at the very least, a basic understanding that search engines put a lot of stock in the content of the website, but it also shows that the manager believes that he/she is able to steer, or even trick, search engines into ranking them better for a keyword that they might not even honestly qualify for.
When you write, pick a TOPIC that is relevant to your market for search engines, but write the content itself like someone will actually read it. Write for people too.
So, what do you do?
Here’s an example of poorly optimized text due to keyword stuffing: “Our roofing services in Auburn, Alabama, provide Auburn, AL residents with some of the best roofing services in the entire Auburn, Alabama area. If you are in need of roofing services in Auburn, Alabama, then give us a call at our Auburn office:Â 334-555-5555!”
Do you see how that reads? Anyone reading that paragraph knows that you’re just trying to stuff the words “roofing services” and “Auburn, Alabama,” in there as many times as possible. Yes, search engines are computer programs, but they aren’t as dumb as you think.
This practice was really popular in the early stages of YouTube. If a person wanted to get a bunch of views for their video of the cat, they would use tags like “Paris Hilton, Kobe Bryant, Chocolate Rain,” or any other tags that were popular in the off chance you’d see their video. Almost every search engine out there has wised up to this practice, even if you actually do offer roofing services in Alabama.
The Point
The best rule of thumb is to write content for people too. Although most people that come to your website will not go to your blog, the ones that do need to be entertained, and stick around for longer than a few seconds. When you write, pick a TOPIC that is relevant to your market for search engines, but write the content itself like someone will actually read it. Write for people too.
Are you a business that is looking for the best search engine marketing available? Contact V3 Media Group today and talk with us about all that SEO can do for your business’ website!