Tag: good SEO

Fire Your SEO: Here is Why and How

Should You Fire Your SEO?
Should You Fire Your SEO?


Do you think you need a search engine optimizer? Let’s get serious. Your company is not a hobby, and you’re not working to build it only because the work is fun. Companies – smart companies – want to receive profit from their investment of hard work and money. Profit is what companies use to pay the bills.

It would be unwise to throw away your profit on SEO services just because you hope it may work out – someday. Don’t pretend to be shocked if I tell you that’s exactly what a lot of people are doing every day. I see it all the time that companies test the water and shakily hand over their credit card to the next SEO that gave them a good pitch. Other companies have all the skill they need for success, but they fail to use it.

I will give you some good pointers on how to select a good SEO, the basic components of their role, and even why you may (or may not) be able to handle much of it without their help.

Before I continue, I want to note that I do not sell SEO services (but I’m still in recovery). I am just here to share what I know from a lot of well-earned experience. Unless you are ready to pay me a huge salary plus a significant benefits package, don’t worry – I’m not looking at your checkbook.

SEO be damned, I’m going to tell you the truth you may not want to hear. It may sting, but it also may save you a lot of time, money, and frustration. I’m not just out to knock search engine optimizers, either. There are a lot of very talented SEO out there who just don’t want to talk to you because you’re trying to compare apples to airliners. As I tell you this, be mindful that it’s your business on the line, so if you’re getting this wrong, your company is the one that suffers.

SEO is a Double-Edged Sword

Don’t get me wrong about the value of good SEO. If you’ve got a good SEO, by all means, hang on to them. They are probably making you a lot of money. The problem is that statistically, most SEO are not very good at the job. Good ones are few and far between. It takes a lot of knowledge and experience to be really good at SEO. The best ones are also very well connected, and you don’t buy that for a few thousand bucks.

A truly qualified search engine optimizer can make an amazing difference in your business, but search engine optimization is a sword that cuts both ways.

Let’s make no mistakes about this: A legitimate attempt to reach your online audience can multiply your business, but an uncommitted and ill-considered effort can send it the other way … fast, and in more ways than you may realize. Rather than paying an inexperienced SEO who is still learning, you may do better to handle it yourself. It is true that a bad SEO can cost you a lot more than you pay them. Seriously – if you doubt me even a little bit, read about “Google Panda, Google Bowling, and How Bad SEO Can Kill Your Business“. If you’re trying to get by the cheap way, it’s like hunting for the cheapest root canal … it’s likely to hurt.

Do You Really Need Your SEO?

What makes you believe that you need a search engine optimizer? Think about that really hard. If you don’t have the right answer, based on the right strategy, it may be time to fire your SEO.

If your answer is that you have a legitimate business case for it, like most companies do, that’s great. Examine the business need carefully, choose your provider wisely, and make a strong commitment. Be sure that they understand your goals, and that they can provide a realistic forecast based on their work.

You should be prepared to pay them for that forecast, too. Otherwise, you are likely to make some huge strategic marketing errors. If you’ve chosen wisely, it will be worth every dollar you spend for their market research. If you get a good one, don’t expect to get their research for free. I’ll tell you why if you read that link I just gave you.

You should understand that even the best search engine optimizer will fail to bring you optimal results if you “kneecap” them with short budgets, “not enough time”, or other excuses. One of the worst things you can do is to make excuses because you are just too afraid to implement things they recommend based on their solid research. That frankly just pisses them off.

The mathematical confusion of SEO destroys a lot of companies’ efforts. They struggle to grasp that a twenty percent effort will not yield one fourth of the same result as an eighty percent effort.

Understanding the math of SEO, and how it pertains to your specific business needs will matter more than you likely realize. I’m not kidding, and I’m not making this up. I’ll explain more about the math of SEO return on investment in a moment.

On the other hand, if your answer to why you need SEO services is that you’re trying it out because you are hopeful it will eventually have an impact, I have a suggestion: Fire your SEO immediately! Don’t pay them another dollar until you have a better answer. Hope alone does not create profit, and it can lead you down a really bad path. If you’re just “testing the water”, take your money and use it elsewhere in your business. There are sharks in that water!

Reaching a usefully measurable result with search engine optimization does not happen from “testing the water”. There is a bell curve (a gaussian function) at work, and it does not work in favor of minimized efforts.

The Profit is Higher on the Curve!
The Profit is Higher on the Curve!

In case you never heard of The Pareto Principle – a widely used economic principle – it is worth the effort to understand it and apply it to your marketing.

Why to Fire Your SEO: Three Things You Should Know

SEO creates a lot of mixed reactions. If you ask a room full of business people about their experiences with SEO, you are likely to hear everything from extreme delight to extreme dismay. These few points are important to know if you want to avoid the dismay.

SEO is Not High Tech! I know that search engine optimization may sound very tricky and technical – and it is in some ways – but the technology aspects of SEO are only a small part of the “magic” a search engine optimizer actually does. I suggest reading “Search Engine Optimization is Not a Technology Job!” If you wonder if it is just one person’s opinion, be sure to read the comments to see what other professionals had to say.

If your SEO has ever led you to believe that their work is largely a matter of technical things, or that you don’t have the time or intelligence to understand what you are paying them for – Fire Them! No, wait … don’t fire them … incinerate them, because they are like zombies, and you don’t want them coming back to try and eat more of your brains again later.

Good SEO Are Smart Cookies! You should understand that you don’t just pay an SEO for what they do – you pay them for what they know, and for what they research on your behalf. If you want the best SEO results, you will need to hire some very talented and creative people.

Here’s the kicker: If they are smart enough to help you, they are also smart enough to help themselves. You should read further to understand “Why Good SEO Don’t Seek Your Business“. If you get a good one who loves your company as much as you do, get up off your wallet and book them before the competition does.

Otherwise, if you ever question their industry brilliance for a moment – Fire Them! Of course, I can’t condone criminal behavior, but you may want to keep a wooden stake handy. They are “un-dead”, so if you see their blood-sucking fangs – stake ’em!

$5000 is Not Half of $10,000! Maybe you think I just made a mathematical error, but I did not. I want to make a point about the vast difference between measuring efforts versus measuring results.

I already discussed the importance of having the right people handling your SEO versus the wrong ones. So, let’s assume you have the right ones – you are confident of it, and you are confident about your business goals. Let’s climb that bell curve that’s killing your success.

You can scale this to any level you like, but if you think that half of the effort will yield half of the result, you’ll waste money. The bell curve I mentioned has a nasty way of killing company hopes for profit.

Look at the bell curve of your industry’s marketing, and notice where the numbers make a sharp increase. Many companies will go right up to the curve and quit as soon as it gets too scary, but then slide back down because it was not measurable enough. A wise SEO knows that a business should push far enough up the bell curve to get the best results, but short of the point of diminishing returns.

If your SEO tries to take you to the shallow end of the bell curve because they are afraid to tell you what it will really take to make an optimal impact, then they are not doing their job properly. Many SEO dread trying to explain the vast difference between doing something and doing something well. In fact, it’s largely why I made the announcement that I stopped taking clients (it’s worth a read, by the way).

If an SEO is unable to explain the value of your strong commitment to their work, and if you are unwilling to hear it, don’t bother. Whether they realize it, they are doing you a disservice and they are lying to you. Fire Them! You can probably achieve mediocre results all on your own, so you shouldn’t be paying somebody else. Fire the SEO, and consider spending the money on an exorcism and perhaps a lobotomy – for you and for the SEO!

It can take a lot of climbing to reach the profitable part of the bell curve, but there is always a point when it becomes relatively self-sustaining. If you keep struggling just to stay on the shallow end of the curve, fire your SEO!

How to Fire Your SEO

I mentioned the matter of firing your SEO. Beyond the incinerator, the wooden stakes, and shoving them off a high cliff, there are other practical considerations. This is a tricky matter, because they have your passwords! You should change them … all of them. Even if you are the one trying to handle your own SEO like the dentist who went to dental school to fix their kids’ teeth – don’t trust the SEO. Any person who does not grasp the importance of this information should not have access to your company website.

If you want to get a better understanding of SEO, there are some basic lessons you should know. It doesn’t come without effort, but if you’re serious enough to read this far, you’re probably serious enough to read these valuable SEO lessons and subscribe for more to come.

Marketing your business should never be left to a roll of the dice, or just getting lucky that you landed the right SEO with the right skills, and who is generous enough to give you success on a minuscule budget with halfway mentality. You should take it very seriously if you expect to see results.

Remember, I’m not telling you this to sell you anything. I’m telling you this because I witness too many people with their heads up a dark place and I don’t want my readers to be among them.

You are not stupid. Don’t act like it with your search engine rankings.

Photo Credit:
Fire Breathing by Luc Viatour via Flickr

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Is Today’s Marketing Mostly Just Lies?

What Are Marketers Feeding You?
What Are Marketers Feeding You?


Have you ever felt so sick of people feeding you lies about marketing that you can still taste it the next morning? Those lies often leave us, as a society, with a bad taste in our mouth for the whole concept of marketing. It creates a heightened level of cynicism that was not there before, and it spreads like a bad rash.

Isn’t it time to take inventory of what you’ve been accepting on faith, and start to question it? I think so, and I think it should apply to marketers and their clients alike. Of course, that will require a shift toward using due diligence and common sense. When you wonder if what you’ve been told is a lie, do you accept the responsibility to find the truth, or do you just give in and believe it because it is what you want to believe?

It is not my full-time job to be a whistle-blower about the abundance of bad marketing, but I’d say I definitely have a knack for it. I also have a sense of industry responsibility to balance out all the worthless junk and cons with some common sense and honesty … brutal honesty. Maybe I shouldn’t harp on it so much, but there are many instances when I see just how badly lies about online marketing can hurt a company. It is true that many marketing efforts can cause a net loss even greater than the upfront price paid.

I’ll wrap this up with a real life example of a company that was scammed for many thousands of dollars, but this is also about the course that brings them to accept their defeat rather than fight back. I’ll begin with some observations, and I’ll include some links throughout this article to extended resources on related topics. You may like to give attention to those.

Convincing Evidence of a Marketing Decline

I am fully convinced that the majority of things people are promoting to fix your online marketing is a string of lies. I see it all the time that somebody lied to somebody else, and now they are out to sell it to you. I suspect that many of the people lying don’t even know they are lying … they believe what they have been told so completely that they actually see it as the truth. There is a huge component of the blind leading the blind, and taking inspiration from even the slightest of success stories they read about on the next amateur marketing blog. I can prove the concept, too … just have a good hard look at this piece about the sad state of SEO and social media marketing experts.

Consider this: How many times have you heard how important it is to use Facebook? I like Facebook just fine, and it can be very useful for marketing, but how much of what you hear is hyperbole and lies? After all, how much do you actually expect to buy from that guy on Facebook trying so hard to sell you his stuff? Do you think the answer is completely different if you asked him the same question about you?

This is not about Facebook, and I actually know for a fact that Facebook can play an amazing role in a marketing strategy. Facebook has performed wonderfully for my wife’s cakes and confections company (of course, she is far sweeter than I am), and it has become invaluable to many of my clients. What I am very unsettled about is the utter loss of common sense I see surrounding “miracle cures” like Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and the rest of the wagon full of assorted snake oils.

Sure, maybe snakes have great oil, but do you rub it on your feet, fry with it, put it in your bath, or what? There is no perfect single-source cure for your every marketing objective, and it takes much more than just showing up! It is important to note that “everybody” is not your target market, but that’s how I see a majority of marketers promoting marketing these days. If you are hoping to earn squillions of dollars, or even a few dollars, just by being on Facebook without a strategy, you will be disappointed. Let’s try to be more realistic … please!

The Internet has largely become a society of marketing. Whether it is marketing to have more friends, more business, or just to feel more connected with society, it becomes a reflection of how we each market ourselves, our ideas, our thoughts, and our beliefs. We must question “how much of this is real versus imagined, and accurate versus lies?” Otherwise, don’t we all suffer?

For your enjoyment, I have included a video about lying.

It is easy to see how the industries related to marketing a business online became so hard to trust. After all, who doesn’t want a commission … a job … a paycheck? Many people will lie to get those things. You will find a massive abundance of them in marketing … especially online marketing. The end result is that it does not matter if the lies are due to ignorance or greed. Lies are lies, and there are no innocent lies, nor innocent victims, as long as the truth is available. There are just the willingly confused.

Great Marketing Professionals Are Not Just Mythical

I’ve got to say that there are some amazing marketing people out there. There are also many of them with a lot of integrity. I know they exist, because I’ve met many of them. I’ve also trained many of them. The trouble is that the field of marketing was flooded with newcomers like a tsunami. Now that it all looks so “easy” to reach a huge audience online, there is little wonder why everybody wants to be an expert. It is a mathematical truth that most of them are not, and will never be very good at marketing. Marketing takes training, it takes experience, and it takes aptitude, but since the majority of today’s online marketing newcomers have very little of these things, they lie … even to themselves. I suppose it must seem easier to lie than to go through the hard process of working and learning their way to the top. Only the few with high integrity and strong work ethic will survive in the long run, but there is a constant flow of new liars … so look out!

There is also a huge audience who are swallowing those lies like a free bacon sandwich and washing them down like sucking free grape soda through a garden hose. It is maddening that they are in even greater abundance than the lying newcomers shamelessly taking their money. They are getting more gun-shy with each leap of faith, so it makes me wonder what it will look like when the whole thing collapses like a house of cards, and there is nobody left to believe it when they actually do encounter the truth. Have you seen the housing market? Most people thought that would never collapse, but it did!

The Marketing Con Job I Promised

I told you I’d wrap this up with an example of a company that was scammed. In this case, it is a friend of my friend and colleague. It is driving him nuts to see his friends get ripped off, so he asked me to help.

The company is paying thousands of dollars per month for search engine optimization services. They have previously paid multiple SEO companies to optimize their law firm websites to reach their target market, but each time, the results were just as bad. They have largely lost faith that online marketing can help them at all, but at the same time, they are strangely afraid to stop sending the checks … just in case.

The latest rip-off has performed so horribly that more than five months into their $36,000 contract, they are receiving under 30 monthly website visits that are even from the same country as where they provide their legal services. The last report I saw showed just over 600 monthly website visits from Southeast Asia, while only 28 were from within the United States. When the law firm asked for a list of the work performed, the marketing company replied with what one could logically estimate at under an hour of work … total … after months of being paid thousands of dollars per month.

The law firm has said they want my help, but they are “waiting it out” to see if the crooked SEO provider will do right by them. It becomes really upsetting as I consider how frequently I hear stories just like this. They keep hoping the lies will somehow miraculously become the truth, even when they have been presented with concrete proof that the SEO company is actually hurting their efforts … quite likely well into the future.

What do you think? Why do people allow themselves to be ripped off? Should marketing companies be willing to lie, just because it is how others do it? Shouldn’t we all use more due diligence and common sense? Am I doing this all wrong by trying to be honest in a dishonest world?

Please answer me!

P.S.

If you question how it can possibly be the majority of marketing that is plagued with lies, be sure to notice that there is a lot more marketing that you never see than what you do see … but yet, somebody is paying for it.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

SEO and Social Media Fear of Being “The D Word”

Beware of The D Word ... They May Be Right!
Beware of The D Word ... They May Be Right!

I believe there is an unrealistic fear that challenges many people in my line of work, and I am bold enough to address it even if others are not. I also seek your input, so please don’t be shy.

There are certain elements within the fields of SEO and social media marketing which cause many misunderstandings and hardships for reputable people with good means, and good intent. People have chosen many names for the people representing those bad elements, but one stands out more prominently than others. For now, I’ll call it “the D word”, and it is something that wise people must be cautious of being tagged with.

It seems that the bad elements in social media and SEO have caused some quality people to become unreasonably afraid to properly promote their goods or services. It affects many other industries, and it seems to have created an overall hypersensitivity which causes many people to only hint about how they actually keep their business running, rather than be upfront about it. This is often an unreasonable fear, but definitely worth some consideration. I’ll explain this with a story.

Not so long ago, I tried my best to be less self-conscious about what others might say, and become more promotional of my own services. Yes, more promotional, rather than less. It felt kind of awkward, because that is the opposite of what I often suggest to others. This is because over-promoting your own value is often looked down upon, regardless how worthwhile it is. Being less promotional and more promotable by focusing on others often leads them to do the promoting for you. The trick is in having a good balance. After all, even if you are astonishingly good at something, if you rely solely on others to do your promoting, you will often be let down.

Finding a Promotional Balance in Social Media

What I am describing can really go either way, and finding just the right balance between self-promotion and being promoted by others is a tricky matter. You see, there is this awkward little piece of our psychology that makes us far less likely to promote something that benefits somebody else more than it benefits us. This often holds true, even if we actually think something is worth promoting. It is a bit cynical, but it is a common reaction of people, and it is hard to change that.

An ideal marketing balance lies somewhere between remaining highly “promotable” by others while still effectively promoting things which actually sustain our business needs. To meet this challenge, it is often considered best to keep our efforts more useful to others than to ourselves, and I believe that’s an excellent goal. It makes us more creative and helps us to be more fun and entertaining. It can also have a really big downside.

In my case of seeking that balance, it is not about a lack of confidence. I know that what I do for others benefits them more than it benefits me. I work hard to be useful to others, and I have a solid record of helping companies to become very successful by implementing effective marketing strategies. I am extremely good at getting websites ranked in the top of search engine results, and I know how to make something very marketable … except my own services.

So why is it that I find it so challenging to create a balance? In simple terms, I don’t want to be one of “those people” who are unfairly chastised for trading money for the things in my brain. You know, because people often think things like experience and knowledge should be free. For more on that mentality, I seriously suggest reading “Strategic Marketing Failure: Are You Giving it Up Too Easy?”

Why the Social Media Promotional Balance Occurred to Me

My moment of introspection came differently to me. It was not because anybody called me “the D word”. It came after several friends told me that my own self-marketing didn’t have enough “bite”. Really, they told me I needed to be more upfront by saying “Hey, look at me! I accept money from companies to make them more successful in their marketing … and I have a hell of a track record of success!” They said I needed to be more clear that the things I write about are the things I get paid to do, and that i don’t cost companies money … I make them money.

That should be simple, and I can support that with facts.

My argument was that I didn’t want to be one of those “douchebags” (the “d word”) so many people were talking about. I didn’t want to be berated for that horribly ugly term, “self-promotion”.

I am very critical of the way some people promote themselves in my line of work, because I can see through the hype. I despise the dishonesty and sleaziness of many people’s marketing approach in my industry, and I refuse to do it. I have always been extremely opposed to taking the “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em” approach, even to the point of under-hyping myself to less than half the level of my own credibility and experience. If I boasted with truth half as much as others in my field boast with lies, I could knock a bunch of them right off the totem pole … but risk being a “douchebag” by doing it.

I even felt really awkward the first time I placed ads on my blog, because “douchebags” do that. I was even more concerned when I added that awesome popup reminder to subscribe to my blog … but now I’m really glad I did it. I described the considerably tiny amount of friction I got from it in my earlier article titled “Social Media Goals and Complications of Winning“, but it has been an overall success.

The Cynics Are Not Buying your Lunch!

I have said it before, but it is worth reiterating … The cynics are not buying your lunch!

It is easy to forget that many people are cynical and insulting without good reasons. I realize some people will not immediately recognize that I actually teach people good and sensible no-hype ideas about their marketing. Most people who look a little closer change their mind once they get to know me, and my work. Unfortunately, that initial concern of a “douchebag” moniker held me back, and still does to some degree. The good news is that I’m getting over the concern and finding it easier to say “Hey, look at me! I accept money from companies to make them more successful in their marketing … and I have a hell of a track record of success!” I am also finding it a lot easier to say “I would like to talk with you about improving your marketing.”

I’ll tell you why it got easier … because it is all true, and it is how I earn a living. Just because some few outspoken people do not like it does not change the fact that I am still providing more value for free than many people do for pay.

I was reminded of all this today as I went through a list of new people following me on Twitter. I found myself making fast judgments about them. It all got me to wondering how I might look, on the surface, and before people get to know me. It made me wonder how many people suffer on one side or the other of this balancing act. It appeared to me that more of them were afflicted on the opposite side of the self-promotion equation.

I think it is an important thing to be aware of in either instance, and I hope I have encouraged you to step back and try to imagine how others see you. Maybe you are a little too “douchebag”, and maybe you are not quite enough “douchebag”. If you are like me and not making it clear enough about the action you want people to take, you may need some more “bite”, too. It is worth some consideration.

This sort of insecurity has begun to fade for me, and it is because I took another look at just how successful I have helped others to become in their businesses. Yes, in the end, I came to understand that I really am damn good at what I do. If you hate me for it, maybe you just hate me for being a “douchebag”. As long as it is totally unfounded, I’m OK with that.

I’d like to know what you think. Have you encountered this, too?

Photo Credit: Shattonbury via Wikipedia

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Bashing SEO and Social Media Experts: Humor or Hazard?

Numbers Don't Lie ... People Do!
Numbers Don't Lie ... People Do!


I had to ask myself whether this is humor or hazard for me to give a swing at our ever-increasing population of SEO and social media “experts”. I guess the idea gave me just a little guilt pang at first, because I always heard that I should treat people the way I want to be treated. Who am I to tell anybody they don’t have what it takes?

Then I grinned from ear to ear, tucked my sweet love-everybody nature back in my shorts, and put my middle finger in the air. After all, this is not “biting the hand that feeds me” … this is harsh and very real truth. This is about educating, and saving a few lucky others from huge disappointments. This is about shining a spotlight on liars. This is a glimpse of reality! In fact, it is a reality that I intend to illustrate for you very clearly.

Are All SEO Liars?

No, not all search engine optimizers are liars. There truly is an enormous value in the trade, but because of that, it has attracted a lot of liars. Any good SEO knows that there is no reason to lie about the service. They may even help you to understand the most common lies of the industry. For example, here are a couple useful articles: “7 SEO Lies: How to Know When the SEO is Lying” or Good SEO vs. Bad SEO: How to Tell the Difference. Each of these include objective means to weed out the liars and cheats.

On the other hand, many self-proclaimed SEO will make claims like the one I found on Twitter pictured below. I am only listing one, but not because I have a problem with this one in particular. I just picked this one at random, but I actually dislike all of the squillion others out there lying to people about SEO. I just don’t want to waste more time making a huge list of them.

The Classic 2000 Website Visitors Per Hour Pitch
The Classic 2000 Website Visitors Per Hour Pitch

Khubah Jogja offers the opportunity to “make money online” and “get 2k visitor per hour”. That’s great, right?! I guess it may sound great, but then I checked out this Twitter user’s website and imagine what I found … some reality! The funny thing is that they actually have their website statistics viewable to the public using a service called “whos.amung.us”.

The biggest hour I found was three visitors, and the maximum visitors in a day was sixteen. In the image shown here, the one visitor represented was me. That is kind of a stretch from 2,000 per hour.

2000 Visitors Per Hour Reality Check
2000 Visitors Per Hour Reality Check

I don’t want to leave this up for too much confusion, so I checked with Alexa, Open Site Explorer, and others. Two thousand visitors per hour was not to be found. Then again I knew that already when I saw the article claiming that keyword meta tags make a big influence in search ranking. Not just that it was total crap, the article was not dated 1998 … it was from this year! If you think that old meta tags pitch is true, it will serve you well to read “SEO Meta Tags: Oh, You Must Be Another SEO Expert!”

Social Media Expert / Cattle Farmer

Perhaps not every instance is so extreme as the social media strategist / cattle farmer depicted here, but I really need to share this with you, because it almost made me pee myself with laughter and sob at the same time!

It is funny, but actually sad when you think of how widely accepted total confusion has become in social media.

I know that farming and ranching is hard work. It is really tough to get ahead in that industry, so why not augment the income and work as a social media strategist? That may just be the perfect fit!

Social Media Strategy ... or Cows ... We Have it All!
Social Media Strategy ... or Cows ... We Have it All!

Yes, you can call me a jackass for singling this poor dear out. I mean, after all, at least she didn’t use a picture of some young hot chick in her profile, the way so many others do. In fact, she looks downright sweet, and wholesome. She is probably a really nice person, too … but she is also lying to herself and others. Her appearance would absolutely not turn me away if I was in the market for cows and chickens. Social media strategy, on the other hand, requires something other than just being sweet.

According to her website at “Lynda’s Social Media Strategy“ she is suggesting to “Use Social Media to Promote Your Business”. She even has descriptions and very low prices for her services. It includes pricing for a service that I pointed out as an absurdity and largely a rip-off a while back when I wrote “Hourly Rate for Setting Up Social Media Profiles?!”

How We Do it Down on the Social Media Strategy Farm
How We Do it Down on the Social Media Strategy Farm

Contrary to her own advice and service offerings, when I clicked on the social media links on the right side of her page where it says “Follow”, I found a non-existent Blogger profile, the link to edit a LinkedIn account, links to Digg and Delicious (but not to a specific profile), an incorrect Feedburner link, a Facebook personal profile with 28 friends, a MySpace account, and a Twitter account.

Being a social media strategist, you may think she would use social media a lot. She was pretty scarce across the board, but I enjoyed this example. Within the Twitter account, the last five updates included a lot of weather change as follows:

“Snow outside. Good time to do some ghostwriting.” (on 20 January)

Then, five tweets and six months later …

“It’s hot no rain pasture’s drying up feed bill going up everything’s going up except my pay. Oh well…could be worse.” (on 19 July … earlier today)

I thought to myself that maybe she is actually doing what she says, and using her social media strategies for her own business down on the ranch. No, there was not a single social media instance of anything whatsoever at the Belle Manor Farms website. Go ahead … see how Lynda’s social media strategy is working out for her. Check out the Lynda’s Social Media Strategy Facebook Page that I only found after looking it up on her personal Facebook profile (not on her website). Maybe you could give it a “Like” for sympathy, since nobody else has.

Perhaps I’m just not clear on this yet, but it seems that Lynda, like so many others, is struggling with confusion of the difference between social media strategy and social media tactics.

Now Let’s Bash Murnahan

I know I may seem to be a real jackass when I ask questions like “Why Do You Want to Become an SEO and Social Media Expert?”

Maybe I’m just jealous of them for having a lack of a conscience. Maybe I’m bitter with them for becoming experts without actually having to spend decades to learn about marketing. Maybe I’m pissed because they get to have fun jobs outside of the Internet, while I am stuck here all day as CEO of a decade-old Internet company.

Sure, if I could have done it so easily, I would have a lot less gray hair today. Let me explain something for you, though, before you start calling me names.

Just because a person has a new computin’ machine does not mean they have an equal shot at this mythical money generator that people make the Internet out to be.

Just because “everybody” said you will miss huge opportunities by not being on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and the many other social metworks, it does not mean those “huge opportunities” are what they told you, or that they will come to you without equally huge effort.

Maybe “everybody” was exaggerating just a tiny bit when they said you would “earn millions online … easy … in your pajamas!” Maybe “everybody” was not lying to you, but just made it a little easier to lie to yourself.

There are a lot of damn liars out there on the Internet! Worse yet, the online marketing fields of SEO (search engine optimization) and social media marketing have them breeding like cockroaches. I think that an astonishing number of them are lying to themselves.

I hope you don’t let them lie to you, too. There are no “innocent victims” in these cases, because we each have the same opportunities to gather due diligence. The victims are better described as “ignorant victims”.

So, was it humor or hazard that I chose to share this with you? In my opinion, the humor is that anybody could actually be fooled by such absurdities. The hazard is that such absurdities even exist.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

11 Humorous Answers to Dumb Google Searches

Google Search: How to Spell Duh
Google Search: How to Spell Duh

You may wonder how I will make this turn out to be both useful and humorous, but have a little faith, my Google searching friend. This is a list of my answers to some the dumbest Google searches I recently found in my server logs. Before I cut straight to my list of absurdities, allow me just a moment to set the stage.

I love SEO. There, I said it! I really do love my work, although it is usually much more fun to do it than to explain it to people. I am the first to suspect that, as I have often said, “When I Go to Hell, They Will Have Me Selling SEO“. Yes, fun to do it, but tortuous to explain it.

One of the reasons I love SEO so much is the great humor and insights to the human mind that it offers. This is also one of the reasons you may sometimes find me to be condescending and uppity, because there are truly some dumb people out there. Yes, saying that makes me a jerk, but actually more of a “PECKER” (Reference: “New SEO Acronym to Replace SEO by 2012“).

It takes all types to make a species, but wow … just “Wow!” I am a fan of people, but sometimes I have to feel just a little tinge of embarrassment for the floaters in our genetic pool.

The term “SEO”, for the uninitiated, is an acronym for “search engine optimization”, and as a practitioner in the field, it means that I can generally rank at the top of the list for damn near anything I choose. That is why companies pay me to provide this service for them. Yeah, can you believe it? Being ranked at the top of search results is actually worth paying for. That is totally crazy, I know!

Don’t hate me for it, because it comes with a touch of insanity, and a good dose of time. Like well over a decade of practice and studying SEO to know what works.

A good amount of this particular achievement comes down to having a squillion website links pointing to my blog from other websites, and having just a touch of Murnahan wit and charm. OK, you can call it “BS”, or whatever you like, but let’s face it, some websites will rank well in search engines, and some will never be indexed for popular searches. This one ranks particularly well, which comes with a great potential for humor.

I previously wrote about the downside of being obsessed with statistics and over-monitoring of user data, but it is also very important to know how people are finding a website. It tells us what we need to know, and how to make things even better. When you dig really deep, it can sometimes make hot coffee shoot uncontrollably from your nose as you laugh. This is especially the case when you try to picture what in the world those people were actually hoping to find in their online search.

NOTE: Although I am a huge proponent of targeting a market based on specific propensity of readers to become a customer or to refer business. Targeting is why I write things to attract specific searches from specific people. For example, I wrote about NASCAR start and park teams to reach the racing community, while offering good marketing thoughts.

With the good comes the bad, and sometimes it all goes wonky. If you rank well for the useful search terms, always it comes with unexpected absurdities. Although some of these may not seem so humorous on the surface, if you squint and look closely, there is something just a bit funny going on here.

Each of these searches have come in many variations of the search, and each is an actual verbatim quote taken from the top 5,000 searches in my website analytics within the past 30 days (typographical errors and all).

  • Dumb Google Search One: “icecream for sore bum“

    OK, I hate to drop this little peach so early, but this one does set a certain tone. This is an actual search that has been repeated in many various forms, including some that were probably typed urgently like “what;s good for hemorrhoids” (Twitter, of course!). It leads users to an article that asks “Is Twitter Good for SEO?“. The article may actually be useful, but I didn’t write this one for bums. If your butt hurts, I really don’t have a lot for you, but dozens of people seem to think that ice cream may help.

  • Dumb Google Search Two: “can your testicals reconnect them selves“

    I can forgive this fella for misspelling testicles, and for not realizing that “themselves” is actually just one word. This came from a Korean speaking individual in Burke, Virginia, USA. What I picture is a really frustrated little Korean guy sitting cross-legged at his computer screaming at his lover and murmuring “You betteh be right woman, oh I keow you!”

    I actually took a screen capture of this one when it happened. My guess is that he did not want to call 9-1-1, just in case he actually ended up killing somebody. I hope that poor guy is alright! I also hope he does not come for my testicles for wasting his precious moment with my article titled “SEO, Social Media, and Marketing Balls“. In my defense, I did not use the word “testicles” in the article, even once, and there was no medical advice.

  • Dumb Google Search Three: “best hookers“

    I suppose I kind of asked for this one when I titled an article “Hookers Write the Best Blogs“. What I didn’t realize at the time was just how many people would be performing Google image searches for pictures of hookers. I searched it one time, just to see what they were seeing. A few transsexual hookers and other creepy images later, I washed my eyes out with Listerine and vowed to never do that again!

  • Dumb Google Search Four: “buy termites online“

    Who knew that termites were so in-demand? I see a lot of variations for the query of where to buy termites. Although I am sure a number of these are people seeking to study termites in their laboratory, it makes me wonder how many angry ex-husbands are dumping these voracious little monsters around the foundations of their former homes. For those looking for termites, I offer this article titled “Things You Cannot Sell Online“. Termites are not one of those things, and it is highly unlikely that what you sell is on the list, too!

  • Dumb Google Search Five: “blog trolls“

    I wonder what they want with a blog troll. Yeah, I am sure that some people are just looking for a picture of a blog troll, but nobody I know has actually ever seen one. They sneak around in the shadows of the Internet. Here is what I had to say about them: A Few Words About Blog Trolls and Lurkers.

  • Dumb Google Search Six: “cheap sutures“

    This one is really dumb for a couple reasons. Sutures are those things they use to stitch people up after surgery. They generally come at an extremely high cost to we consumers. I guess maybe there is not enough markup in the medical field, so they have to find their sutures cheap so they can earn an extra four dollars on a $40,000 surgery.

    The other reason this one cracks me up is that I was once contracted to place a client at the top of searches for cheap sutures. They still owe me many tens of thousands of dollars, but then, that is why I now hold five of the top ten search results for their company name, “Suture Express“, along with their coveted “cheap sutures” and the names of each of their executives. Oops! 😉

  • Dumb Google Search Seven: “what happens if i set up a facebook page and dont use it?“

    This one should be simple. What else could a person logically expect would happen? Your computer will be infected with a virus that causes it to explode into a squillion pieces. I would not suggest this, especially with a laptop, but if it happens to you, just Google me when you need those testicles reconnected.

    In case you need to know more about Facebook or their computer-exploding virus, here is more information on the topic.

  • Dumb Google Search Eight: “SEO meta tags“

    This one is actually a very popular search, and it blows my mind. I mean, seriously, just look at the source code on any one of my blog’s pages if you need a mental re-adjustment on the topic of SEO tips. I would like to give you a quote from the article these search patrons find:

    “As long as there are people who ask “do meta tags help with SEO” there will be plenty of people to con them out of their money.”

    I hope you are not searching for information about meta tags. If so, you really should stick around and read some more.

  • Dumb Google Search Nine: “what to do when your too good at your job“

    My answer would perhaps be to quit the job and seek something better. Please just don’t make it a writing career until you at least learn the difference between your and you’re. Sure, maybe this is no big deal, but if “your too good at your job”, you’re probably going to need a better resume writer.

    This search landed the user on an article titled “Are You Too Good at Your Job?“, but what I think they really needed was to learn about Cousin Prolly in the article titled “Grammatical Reasons They’re Taking Their Business Over There”

    Another idea for being too good at your job is to give it all up and become an SEO and social media expert. That seems to be mighty damn popular (in searches, too)!

  • Dumb Google Search Ten: “things people find“

    My first thought here is “huh?” I am not so sure why, but a lot of searches just don’t make any sense to me at all. Apparently a limited few people are trying to find things people find. What they actually find is an article titled “Crazy Things People Search For” which addresses the ways people use search engines. It kind of goes well with this piece, so you may enjoy it.

  • Dumb Google Search Eleven: “how much does seo cost“

    This one actually comes with a whole lot of related searches that are equally as ridiculous. Some of those are social media rates, seo hourly rate, how much does it cost for SEO, social media marketing cost, how much will a social media strategy cost, and literally thousands more.

    What these searchers are obviously completely terrified and confused about is that there is a vast difference from one SEO to another. Asking the cost without knowing what to expect or understanding that it is not about cost, but rather increased profit, is about as wasteful and dumb as any question ever asked.

    Have you seen the Grand Canyon? I would like to submit that the difference in good SEO and bad SEO makes that thing look like a crack in a sidewalk.

My Dumb Summary of Dumb Google Searches

I guess eleven is enough for now. I gave you a whole lot of truly useful links dispersed throughout this article. In fact, probably enough that if you sit there and read them all at once, it will make your bum hurt. So, please bookmark this page, get yourself some ice cream to sit in, come back, and take some time checking them out.

Also, please add your comments and tell me how you arrived here. If you are that poor Korean fella represented in this image, I’d love to know how things turned out.

If you are not that Korean guy, be sure you subscribe, because I’ve got a whole lot more where this came from!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download