It’s a Whole New Ballgame!
For those of us who create websites, no longer do we write text to please our clients, or even to please our readers. No, we now write text to attract the search engines. Every word we use now is calculated, analyzed, and determined by the effect it will have on SEO or search ranking. A client recently emailed me to say that we didn’t need a couple of paragraphs I had so cleverly worked into the home page text and to remove them. Not one to argue with a client, I did so but explained that those paragraphs were there for the benefit of the search engines. I’m sure he wondered what I meant but he did not ask and I sadly resigned myself to his inevitable poorer ranking.
» Why didn’t I pursue the issue further with him? Trust me, some clients get intimidated by anything they are not familiar with and assume it is for the purpose of charging more. Of course, it wasn’t but you get my drift. Of course, I have other clients who allow me free rein and assume I know what I am doing, which thankfully, I do, judging from the great rankings I’ve been getting my clients. But when I read text on websites now, I have to admit I am suspicious of the content as not truly speaking to me but rather speaking to Google and leaving me scratching my head in befuddlement. At least when I write text online, I try to accomplish both the task of communicating with the reader while at the same time satisfying the parameters for best search ranking. What I find ironic now is when I am writing advertising copy for a newspaper ad, I am suddenly free to write exactly what I mean to say without the encumbrance of considering what ramifications there will be with the almighty search engine. Yes, after a whole career in this business, things have changed and I’d better get used to it…unless the search engines get wise to us webmasters and dream up a whole new algorithm to throw us a curveball! You know, it wouldn’t be the first time.
Tags: a whole new ballgame a whole new algorithm, website text to attract search engines, write text for best search ranking
June 19th, 2010 at 2:27 am
Excellent post. Just found it on Google. tks for the useful info. Keep up the great work
July 1st, 2010 at 10:42 pm
I love your website! did you create this yourself or did you outsource it? Im looking for a blog design thats similar so thats the only reason I’m asking. Either way keep up the nice work I was impressed with your content really..
July 11th, 2010 at 3:54 pm
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