Ignore SEO, just produce good content?

I don't think your wrong. For example one of my most recent site launches was just a niche I was really interested in. I wanted a break from the normal grind and this site is pulling in about 300 uniques a day--with ZERO promotion.

I think the articles speak for themselves and they really don't have very many keywords in them. I definitely agree that when you don't have to bend your will around keywords writing becomes much easier and is far more enjoyable.

Plus, it's WAY more fun to write!

It's mot just that. Content is important for SEO but still not a huge factor. You shouldnt ignore SEO but you should keep building backlinks and write great content. What I realize is that when you build backlinks, you dont have to target some keywords.

The concept of stop trying to rank for keywords and write good articles is the first point I always give to my client. Steve Pavlina is a highly successful blogger that did it pretty well.

I've been preaching until I turn blue in the face that relationships are more important than anything else online.

I focus on creating content that builds a relationship with someone.

Great content isn't all that great if the reader leaves without ever visiting you again.

Interesting post. I definitely think there is a degree of precision in the statement "the best seo is unique content." Certainly, the typical on-site and off page optimization is still a great idea, but, considering recent changes, Google's main objective and the way the permaflux continues, yes, quality is king (among other things of course)

It's a big deal now. I too have found myself to be ranking for terms I didn't deliberately target. Additionally, I've found myself ranking for certain terms without links to the page, or any of that, possibly because people found it useful, checked it out and DIDN'T go back to the engines to search.

Ultimately, I'm with you on this.

That advice is kinda like saying "Don't promote your business, if you are good then people will find you".

It's nice in theory, but in reality it doesn't work that easy.

Of course, there are different levels of paying attention to SEO. I look at keyword to determine demand and that's about it. If I'm writing about it, it'll be in the title/body and I don't fuss about how many times. There are others that count the keyword density and tweak as needed. That, to me, is kinda silly if it takes away from the readability of the content.

Content is king.

Well, well-written, original, authoritative content is king. But that's not as catchy a mantra.

I find that themed sites get ranked even if you don't focus on specific keywords. Just don't stray off topic. For example, set up a blog and be sure all your pages and posts are about a fairly narrow topic. It won't happen quickly, but eventually you will see in your traffic stats that people are finding you in the search engines using all kinds of long-tail keywords. It adds up. And as the OP mentioned, at least you don't have to spend as much precious time on KW research. It can work, it just can take more content and patience.

John

Content and SEO are part of website promotion. You cannot have good results without having this two.

As long as there is an algorithm that ranks content in the search engines, there will be a way to optimize your content for those rankings. The two concepts go hand in hand. Of course, you can write well written, original authoritative content and imagine that the algorithms will rank it higher, but if you don't know what the algorithm is, then you can never be completely sure, but only hope that it ranks higher.

I agree completely with you and just replied in another discussion along these same lines earlier today.

When I first got into this stuff I just wrote about what interested me. My pages ranked well and pulled in a good amount of traffic. However, I didn't even care about ranking in the search engines. Why? Because I was getting a good amount of traffic from other websites.

Many sites (a couple thousand including universities) linked to me all on their own. No backlinking tactics by me. Just some very simple research using the SBI tools and I went to work building my site. Sure I guess I was building backlinks but not the way people are doing it today. The actual backlinks from an SEO perspective I made back then were really more of an afterthought. I was just getting the word out about my site trying to find like-minded people so I participated in discussions on other sites and took the time to write quality content on other sites.

Anyway, a while back (maybe close to two years ago) I started taking a look around to see what other people were doing. And I came across a huge amount of focus on backlink building, keyword research and competition research. And PPC value research. And the whole "find the hair on fire" research and on and on.

In an effort to improve my results I began working on all of these things that all of these gurus, and seemingly everyone else but me, were recommending and doing.

I can honestly say the past two years have been the biggest waste of time for me. Sure, I learned a lot of things. Tactics. Research. Research. Research. SEO and all of this crap everyone seems to be doing. But what good is it really? Results wise I have got maybe 1/10th of the results I was getting before when I didn't think about building backlinks, finding buying keywords and so on.

There is a difference between true marketing to find your target audience and exchange ideas with them & introduce them to your site... and all of the stuff they teach in these MMO ebooks and videos. It's like the whole idea of focusing on people is an afterthought now and people are obsessed with building thousands of backlinks, getting traffic (which has become a completely generic term - it's like they don't even realize these are real live human beings) and making money. That's it. ha ha!

So, I am dropping most of it now and primarily just spending my time writing about things that interest me the most. I am no longer wasting hours of time looking for keywords with at least 1,000 searches per month nor studying all of the sites on page one. I do take a quick look at the site at #30 and the site at #10. But I am thinking really even that is just a waste of time.

It really doesn't matter what other sites are on page one of Google. The only reason why it should matter to anyone so much that they spend all of their time and money building junk links all over the Internet is if, for some reason, they are completely relying on Google for all of their traffic... and that is simply not wise in my opinion.

Now having said that, I guess I need to back up, it did matter to me at one time (and does again now) because those sites are my potential partners. They are not my competition. I don't know really but it seems like many of these IM MMO gurus just look at the world very different from the way I do. To me, when I search for materials on my subjects... those sites sitting in the first 30 positions on Google and Bing and especially in the top 10 are some of the first sites I am going to be participating in adding value to their sites by contributing my own knowledge on the subject and so on. I'll find like-minded people there. Lots of them. I'll add links on my own sites creating tiny paths to the best articles on those sites so visitors to my sites can also benefit from that information. Like I said, I think somewhere along the way the past several years this whole online thing has taken a very strange turn. It's kind of like everyone sees it like "me or them!" In the end there can be only one! And that is crazy from a marketing perspective.

I build links for traffic but let me quickly add that means I am getting a link by giving something of good value to someone else who in turn allows me to build a tiny trail back to my site. I do this to reach like-minded people. People who share my interests. Not to reach robots and get google rankings. If the robots find the links and my pages rank higher for it then great but that is an added value to the work. Not the focus of the work.

And you are absolutely right. All of the time you are spending on researching and probably writing about keywords you really don't give a damn about... imagine how much truly high quality content you could be creating and sharing with the world on subjects that you are very knowledgeable on and experienced in and have a strong interest in. And common sense just says those are the very subjects you should be writing about.

It's easy to lose your way, and that is what happened to me, but I've found my way again and sounds like you have to.

It's not wise to ignore SEO because it matters now. We cant be sure of anything in the future and I am in the business to make money now. Google lays out their SEO rules and if you want your pages to be indexed highly, you have to abide by those rules.

It surely is possible to publish great, quality content that is truly beneficial to readers and yet still have it optimized for its keywords 100%. But to simply ignore the SEO side of it would be like giving up free money.

Optimizing your pages for keywords is what Google wants you to do and is why they have implemented it as a part of their algorithm. If you don't do keyword research or SEO for those keywords, you just aren't going to get as much traffic as somebody that does.

I dont think you will be giving anything up in the way of quality by making sure that your page is optimized for its keywords. But you surely will miss out on a lot of targeted traffic and money in your pocket.

lololololololololololol...

I was tempted to just leave that there, but ugh. This is just the kind of nonsense that keeps people from making money online. While I agree that you should create a website that adds value and has unique content, to ignore SEO is to ignore the rules of the game.

It's like giving the advice of playing Soccer and "just have fun and winning will come!" No, no it won't. You have to know the rules of the game, and you need to know how to use strategy to win.

If you aren't building a lot links to your content, you're ignoring the rules of the game. Sure, you might pick up the random odd search phrase with no competition, but you're fooling yourself if you think people are going to link to your content on blue widgets as though it's the greatest thing they've ever read. You're just selling blue widgets, along with 50,000 other people. There are probably 1,000 other people out there that wrote a great article on why their widgets are the best, but only 10 slots on the first page. I will laugh you out of the room if you think the only reason those top 10 results are there is because they were organically chosen as the best, most relevant result by real users.

If you want to pretend that it only takes great content, please, by all means do so. You'll be looking up at me on top of my mountain of cash as you grind out "quality" content as judged by a Google robot.

I think we are mixing apples and oranges.

Content is part of SEO, not instead of.

Can you do without all parts of SEO? Sure.

Sometimes other SEO will outshine content, sometimes
content will outshine other SEO.

Creating content on the web, desiring it to be seen,
requires one to incorporate a little SEO in and around the
content.

Paul

The connivance of making good and quality content and competent SEO campaign is very remarkable for the ranking of the site.