Know Velocity

Most people find it is relatively easy to learn the simpler concepts in search engine optimization. Almost the first thing you learn is to include “keywords” in your page titles and page names, and then to obtain links to your pages that use those “keywords” in the link anchor text. If only that were all there is to it. You’ll find some Web sites talk about SEO as an art but there is more science than art to search engine optimization. The Art of SEO is pretty weak compared to the Science of SEO.

You can tell the difference between SEO Artists and SEO Scientists by the fact that people who preach and teach the “art of SEO” are paint-by-numbers specialists. They use formulaic approaches in their Web marketing solutions and don’t do a very good job of analyzing data. People who favor the “art” approach to SEO usually draw poorly supported conclusions after looking at a lot of data that doesn’t really tell them anything.

In the scientific approach to search engine optimization, you use SEO theory to test ideas and as a guide for constructing tests and analytical methods. The guiding principle behind SEO theory is that the searchable Web is an ecosystem that operates according to fundamental rules that cannot be subverted. All attempts at bending or changing the rules really follow the rules.

When people recognize the value of SEO theory they acknowledge that you have to challenge the leading “comfort” solutions offered by SEO industry blogs. These “comfort solutions” make people feel good but they really don’t work for most Web marketers. It takes an exceptional marketer to recognize that SEO theory looks beyond the preconceived notions that “SEO art” tries to support with its paint-by-numbers approach.

Filed at 4:38 pm under Marketing + More, SEO + More, The WWW
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