The Truth about What SEO Really Is

As entrepreneurs, we are all familiar with the term SEO, but do we understand what it is?

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is an evolutionary form of marketing your business digitally in order to reach a higher ranking in search results, rather than paying for ranking by using an SEM (Search Engine Marketing) approach.

The problem with SEO is that everyone claims that they know what SEO is and how to create SEO rich content. The problem with this idea is that “one does not SIMPLY get to the top of Google”. As smart as you may think you are, the employees at Google ARE smarter than you, and know the approach that you are trying to take in order to get higher rankings. Since businesses think that they can “one-up” Google, Google is creating harsher guidelines in efforts to enforce quality and promote a better user experience.

SEO is quality. Google has made it very clear that they do not want slapdash content infiltrating websites, with no effort in structure. SEO has forced content writers to really understand the desires of searchers and deliver what they want…answers. Search Engines have provided numerous tools to help your content writers create quality content that pertains to your industry – use them! These resources are free and at your disposal, why would you not use them?

SEO is organized. The writing process can be somewhat scattered; one thought leads to another, which leads to rambling about a completely different topic. SEO requires websites to have a natural process for navigating through their site to discover answers to their search queries. Make your site and your content uniformed and informative. It is better to have one great idea than 100 bad ones.

SEO is opportunity. Before the birth of algorithms and the panda/penguin/pigeon updates, SEO was not fair. The World of SEO has made clear guidelines on what is rewarded and what is penalized, making your true efforts more difficult, which is good and bad. The implementation of SEO guidelines has been bad for the websites that practice ‘black hat’ tactics and keyword stuff their website until it ranks first in 10+ keywords, but good for the little guy that has been willing to put the time and effort into creating real, quality content to inform their customers about their product/services/company. SEO allows great content to be found, that would not have been seen before the updates.

While some SEO marketing companies are still contributing to the mess that will get websites violated by Google, most SEO companies have revised their approach on creating high quality links and SEO rich content. If you have any questions regarding SEO tactics or have questions about your website’s current stance in the SERPs, please contact Tandem directly at JLaratro@Tandem-Interactive.com.