The Myth of Search Engine Optimization

It was a dark night, as most are. On the 12th of January, my Internet connection on the phone said to meet him at the Apollo Diner, a greezy spoon in the Vietnamese section of the Italian neighborhood in the French quarter. “Sit at the table closest to the bathroom in the back.” he said flatly. I could only suspect… he had a bladder problem.

I followed his instructions taking the table closest to the unkempt brown stained mahogany doors marked “His” “Her’s” and “Unsure,” of which I was a bit unsure about myself.  Which is unusual, as I am unusually sure about myself; most of the time, to be sure.  But this time, I wasn’t so sure.

He said on the phone to bring “Three Large,” and he would get me onto the first page of Google.  Before I could ask what and how large, he disconnected and left me speaking into a dial tone.  It was like being married again, but having less to clean up — especially after a double-bucket night of Kentucky Fried Chicken.  Or KFC as they like to be called now, since “fried” stuff has such a bad image.  Yes, it’s much healthier now that it’s called KFC.

I’ll be Frank with you, although the rest of my friends call me Jeff. Not everyone can be on the first page of Google.  Or the second, third or fourth pages either.  And if you make it to the fifth page, well… who cares.

No one searches to the fifth page anymore — those days are gone… quit living in the past.  The Internet, it turns out, is the home of the Short Attention-Span Theater.  No one reaches the fifth page on a search. They type in a new search term and search again.

So all the thousands of SEO articles you’ve read?  Yep, just so much blah blah….

And to all the hundreds of thousands of people and firms trying for the first pages of the search engines: Bah, Humbug: did you really believe in those myths — and that they could get you there?  Except for the first 40 firms who actually placed, you’ve wasted your time and money.  You could have sent that money to me and it would have been better spent.  Well, better for me anyhow.

But wait, there’s more…

Now that you know the myth about SEO, and that SEO doesn’t really matter all that much, what does matter?  Well, the fact that my secretary has the softest blond hair and pale blue eyes seems to matter. She reminds me of my wife.  In fact every time I get a little too close to her she reminds me of my wife.  But here’s what does matter in online marketing, what you can do to be effective, and how to actually get on the first page of Google.

So, when SEO doesn’t matter, what matters most:

PPC.  Pay Per Click.  Advertising at it’s best.  Taking over the number one slot from brighly colored packaging at the grocery store, and the number two slot of the yellow pages as advertising at the most appropriate moment.

1. What matters is a wise selection of keywords. This brings focused, targeted traffic to the specific pages of your reader’s interest.  Your ads appear to those interested parties who are ready to buy.  Well, in theory anyhow.

2. Compelling ads = a good number of quality inquiries.

The better the ad, the better the response, and for the best written ads: a more focused the audience.  The best ads = the maximum number of inquiries from the highest quality of inquirers.

3.  Good testing. Real time online testing is fast and easy. The ability to test in real time is what makes web marketing so efficient.  In traditional mailings we wait for the mail to be delivered, opened, filled out — then wait for the response to dribble in over the coming weeks.  The Internet?  Test in hours, even test in minutes. Rapid testing yields to a faster ramp-up to higher quality ads, placements, inquiries and conversion rates.

Don’t forget: Split testing, optimization tools, bid management, keyword ranking, geo targeting, day parting, copy testing, PPC optimization and reporting.

Like so much ga ga, these tests are for the big guys.  I guess we’d all do this if we had money to burn, of if we could hire some of those geeky guys that we made fun of in high school.  Yea, they’re getting us back, now – aren’t they?  Like the Native Americans. We bought Manhattan for 24 bucks, and now they own every casino in America.  They’re paying us back, too… aren’t they. 25 dollar tables on a Saturday night.  Where’s the love in that?

4. Great landing pages. The more exciting your site, the more likely visitors will stay.

5.  Sticky web sites. The more time people stay on your site, the more likely they will become a customer.  Your customer.

6.  The best offers. Give visitors exposure to your good, better and best offers.  Driving people deeper into your site = greater conversion.

7. Drive phone calls. Call me old fashioned, but I like all the above to… drive visitors, customers and prospects to a phone call.  Unless your website closes everyone, every time – I’d offer a big phone number on every page.  Then YOU close customers.

Hauh!  Phone calls!  Remember them.  It’s the old marketing part of me that just won’t let go.  Like the free love of the 60’s, the music from the 70’s, drinking and driving – some things you just never grow out of.

With live customer contact you can get a real vision of what customers like, what they want, what they like about you, your site, your products, your company. Find out if there’s a problem with ordering: colors, products, delivery.  You can find out why they left your site without placing an order last time.  And you can show them a real side of great customer service.  Just ask Verizon or Comcast.  OK, maybe those weren’t such good examples.

– Jeff