The Art of Honest SEO
Next month I will present a webinar on "What is SEO?" Instead of talking about key phrases, links and code, I will talk about what matters to my audience most: They want to know how online marketing can help them sell more widgets than their competitors. I can get into the nitty gritty explanations later. And to be honest, there are very few people out there who are totally unacquainted with the subject. This is my chance to show them a wholistic viewpoint; what my company is all about and how we can partner together to achieve the customer's goals.
I always like to start these presentations with a definition of what we're shooting for: I want the audience to understand that the goal is to improve the site's usability for human beings, along with its search engine friendliness. A no-tricks, no-spam approach delivers the best results over time, as Bruce Clay explains so well in his excellent article "Search Engine Optimization Standards and Spam Discussion."
What we do is part art and part science. I fall fairly heavily on the "art" side myself, and have always believed that creating content with human users in mind also reaps rewards on the search engines. Jill Whalen in her recent article "The Art of SEO" reiterates her longstanding belief that there is no magic SEO formula; in fact being too stringent with SEO "requirements" may likely trigger search engine spam filters. I'd rather get to know my customer and his business so I can apply my SEO knowledge to improve his website, instead of just overloading it with SEO elements.
All of this said, I won't pretend that I don't want to persuade prospects to work with my company. But I want them on board from the start for all the right reasons. Explaining "the art of honest SEO" has always proven to be time well spent.