Menu
The 3 Cardinal Sins of SEO
The Art of Search is a new and powerfully illustrated book about SEO and the management strategy behind a #1 rank. The far-sighted book presents a heavyweight SEO management strategy based upon ancient wisdom, from which can be distilled the 3 cardinal sins of SEO.
Do you know your enemy?
If you're thinking that Google is your enemy then you're wrong. Although you need to come to know how Google thinks you don't need to know how Google works in order to get your website to the top of the search engine rankings and start winning new business.
The website doesn't exist for you, it exists solely for the benefit of, and is therefore owned by, your Customers. You have to build a website for your Customers and not for you.
SEO cardinal sin #1 (playing the victim)
The first mistake most owners of a website make is in thinking that a search engine rank is something that's done to them instead of realising that a search engine rank is something that has to be earned. Google is not your enemy, Google is your friend, your ally, an equals sign and a complex mathematical equation written to differentiate a good website from the bad and the ugly.
Google is the equals sign in a web design formula that your Customers are the other side of. It's a sin to think that you can get to the top of Google by filling your website with irrelevant content.
SEO cardinal sin #2 (algorithm obsession)
The second mistake is getting hung-up on how the search engines' algorithms work and not obsessing about giving the Customer what they want.
Never, ever, forget that it's the Customer and not Google who buys products and services from you.
Businesses fail to earn their websites #1 rank on Google because they are unwilling to explain their business proposition from someone else's perspective - they're unable to think like a Customer.
The Art of Search® is a book that is going to change the way you think about your website. Available to learn from in paperback and as an E^book download, The Art of Search will bring you closer to your Customers than you ever thought possible - so close that you'll be able to hear them think.
When organisations create a website they tend to fall into the trap of mapping the divisions and departments of their business using their organisational chart.
What businesses need to do is to put their business into context, to explain what they do using the language of the Customer, to describe who they are, what they do, how they do it, why they do it, where they do it and when they're doing it with the kinds of words that Customers would search with.
When you build a website in this manner you'll begin mapping your organisation and articulating your business proposition - you'll soon come to realise that your website isn't an org chart but an exoskeleton.
SEO cardinal sin #3 ("it's all about me!")
The third and final mistake is to write a website about you rather than to build it around you.
Most organisations have a website but only a small proportion actually use their website.
Your website is not an accessory or a trinket to be kept in the boardroom out of harm's way, your website is not a plaything of the marketing department - your website is a powerful fighting force and now is the time for you to use it and get it blooded. When your Customers search Google they search for answers to their problems. If all you do is use your website to document you and your business then you'll never be found by Customers searching to resolve their queries.
Your Customers aren't equipped with the answers, that's why they search.
Google's job is to present links to websites that match the words Customers search with. To stand any chance of being found on Google the answer is simple and it is to write about your Customers situations, hang-ups, beliefs, woes and dilemmas.
There's no secret to SEO
Getting your website to the top of Google is an art, not a science and doing the 'techy stuff' can only get you so high for so long. Remarkably, you can get your website to the top of Google and secure its dominant position using strategic wisdom written over 2,500 years ago.
Written in plain business English, and available for download from Apple Store and Amazon, The Art of Search is the SEO management strategy 2,500 years in the making and the essential business read for anyone responsible for managing digital content in business.
@theartofsearch