It turns out I hadn’t written anything about SEO since March of 2021. I wrote an article titled Top Five SEO Tips, which followed an article on the same subject titled SEO & Common Business Sense.

You’re hungry for information, aren’t you?

I have to admit that I hadn’t given it much thought over the last 2 1/2 years until I came across this article which popped up on The Verge, titled The People Who Ruined The Internet. Although it’s pretty long, it’s a fascinating read, and I was so captivated that I read the entire thing. It probably took me to a different place that many of its readers, though I can’t really verify that. Thus, I thought it was my turn to give my overall opinion on both the article and what I consider is that “actual” importance of good SEO techniques, along with some things I see often that I absolutely hate.

The article mainly talks about some of the people who were early adopters of SEO tactics that drove massive traffic to their sites and the sites of those who paid them to do the work. They weren’t necessarily aiming for consistent visitors for “business” purposes; they were aiming for buyers, and were making tens of thousands, sometimes millions of dollars a year… some of them a month!

They were aggressive and ruthless, which back in the day there weren’t any rules against almost anything one could do to drive traffic to their site. I knew about SEO around 2008, but I went a totally different route that didn’t actually generate a lot of money, but at one time had this site ranked in the top 70,000 sites in the world; wow! lol

What I did wouldn’t work the same way these days, and it’s the same for these early SEO people. Many of them have left the industry and found new ways to generate income, though nothing as lucrative as early SEO tactics. I don’t condemn anyone for trying to make money legally if they can get away with it; I just wouldn’t have done it that way. If you read the article, I’d love to know what your thoughts about what they were doing are.

One of the gripes the article points out happening these days is the issue of search, and how hard it is to find exactly what you’re looking for because of the proliferation of what I’ll call “sneakily bad SEO”. I’ll use this as an example; stick with me.

I have diabetic neuropathy in my feet. After my podiatrist recommended I try something to relieve some of the pain, I started taking that particular supplement. It took about 2 weeks for it to start working, and most of the pain has subsided; it was amazing. However, I still have an issue with my feet always being cold, even if I’m wearing 3 pairs of socks every day, and wearing sneakers. Unfortunately these days, even though they’re comfortable, most of them are mesh, which doesn’t help one’s feet stay warm, even with all the socks.

So I tried searching on both Google and DuckDuckGo for potential solutions… and I had problems finding sites that could actually help me find what I was looking for. I searched for: “can 1200mg alpha lipoic acid help make feet warmer; “can 12mg alpha lipoic acid help diabetic neuropathy make feet warmer”; “Cold Feet and Diabetes: What Can You Do if Your Feet Are Always Cold”; and “diabetic neuropathy feet are always cold”.

What happened? I mainly got the same sites leading the results, along with lots of other sites that, unfortunately, never answered my question properly. I take 600mg of alpha lipoic acid, and wanted to know if increasing the dosage might help; not a single site I looked at, which was at least 11 or 12, addressed that particular question, and I was royally irked.

What also happened is that more than half of the sites defined what diabetic neuropathy was and the general benefits of using alpha lipoic acid; some of them were verbatim of other sites. A few sites decided to explain what diabetes is and the areas of the body it can affect, along with some of the horrible things that can happen to people who can’t get it under control soon enough… and once again, much of it was verbatim, or close to it.

nothing fraudulent here

I complained about this the first time in 2017 in an article I wrote titled 5 Things Google Should Do To Stop Being Seen As Evil, and it was #1 on my list. I know Google wasn’t going to listen to me, but I had hopes that maybe other search engines would consider it… nope! Then again, at least DuckDuckGo indexed it, which Google didn’t; suppress things much, Mr Google?

In my opinion, those are the types of articles that most people aren’t interested in reading. One, they copy what others have written. Two, they don’t get to the point quickly enough, if they even get to the question you’re asking. And three, they don’t even try making it seem as though they actually care about your question or even using language that makes it feel like you’re trying to speak directly to them.

I mean, even though I have a bit more to say and acquiesce that I haven’t gotten to the overall point of this article, at least no one can accuse me of copying what someone else has written and that I’m not talking directly to my “hoped for” audience… or have I overlooked my audience? I hope not; as a blog that hopes to get engagement rather than always selling stuff (notice I only promote one product, not including my books), I’m writing in a style as if we’re holding a conversation, even if I’m the only one talking at the moment. Please, stay with me for a while longer.

It’s time to get to what I consider is the real point of trying to use good SEO tactics when you’re running a business, not just trying to get as many people to visit your page to buy your articles without giving anything new or real back to them.

I’m not using this site as an example of good SEO tactics in general terms because I haven’t stayed on topic, if I have a specific topic, over the course of years here. Instead, I’m going to talk about my business blog, linked to on the right sidebar as Mitch’s Blog.

Up front, I’ll own up to the fact that it’s not as popular as it once was. However, when it was doing very well, it was in the top 140,000 blogs/websites in the world. I add “website” because it’s a part of my business website, which is where it’s important. I mainly cover two general topics there; leadership and health care finance issues. I obviously cover other topics as well, but for SEO purposes it’s the other two that works for me, mainly the health care finance part.

Though the term “chargemaster consulting” means nothing to you, it’s been the work I’ve done that has generated the most income over the last almost 20 years for me. For about 12 years it was ranked in the top 2 on Google before other sites started using the term, often at #1; yay me! Even now, it’s ranked #15, and I’m the only independent consulting company listed in the top 40 sites. When it comes to actually providing the service, there’s only 4 sites ranked higher than me; the other sites market software, which I’ll never be able to do.

Also, that’s using the first time as only one word; if used at 2 words, which is actually how I market it (I’ve been doing it the longest), I’m sitting in the 8th spot, with only 3 companies offering the same specific service that I do. Not only that, but I haven’t written on that topic since early 2021.

backyard right now

Pretty good, right? If I’d kept up with it I could still be in the top 5 across the board, but it’s hard to keep up with companies that have multiple things to promote when you’re an independent consultant. I also haven’t promoted it as much in the last couple of years; I’ve had a lot of other things going on.

The same type of thing also works for my accountant, whose site I created and whose blog articles I write. Hers would be considered a small accounting firm when compared to everyone else, only 4 or 5 accountants overall, but she’s ranked in the top 10 when you throw out sites that list the top accounting firms… which her name isn’t in… the morons! lol

I’m not necessarily bragging about the success that I’ve been able to achieve, but I had to mention it. What I’m trying to say is that what’s more important for most businesses is finding ways to engage potential clients to contact you as someone they can talk to for business services, either short term or long term.

What things do I do to get there? Mainly two things: internal and external links and writing articles about things you normally talk about that allows you to do those kinds of links.

In this article, I’ve linked to one outside link and 3 internal links, all on the topics of SEO and search. I’ve also added images that helps catch the eye, even if they’re not germane to the topic at hand; we all love images, don’t we? 🙂

My belief is that it’s better to write content in your own style, link to articles on your own site that in some way relate to what you’ve previously addressed, and if you can find something outside of your site that coalesces with the topic of your article. You’ll be able to generate consistent visitations, empress the audience you’re looking for, and hopefully keep them reading the entire article instead of what I did on all those sites talking about alpha lipoic acid, which was to jump from headline to headline looking for specific information that never came up and getting angrier every step down until I left because they weren’t addressing my question.

At least if they’d been writing something that was different than the norm, like the massive article I linked to at the beginning of this post that’s not mine, you might have at least been entertained and engaged; who doesn’t want that (Yeah, I know; “people don’t like reading stuff anymore”… sigh… lol)?

In any case, that’s what I’ve mainly done over the last 10 years or so. I was doing it differently most of the time for the first 3 or 4 years, getting lots of traffic, connecting with other online personalities, but because I wasn’t greedy I wasn’t generating as much money as others were. Oh well… 😀

I hope you made it this far; let me know your thoughts. Have a wonderful day!
 

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