Search Engine Optimization Is a Waste of Money

I’m well aware that this is a controversial topic. I have friends who make millions of dollars (literally) running businesses that seed their clients’ content with just the right keywords to help improve their search rankings. I’ve always thought this to be an odd business. If your content isn’t relevant to the audience you’re hoping to attract, seeding it with keywords and hoping it’s more relevant to your audience just seems bazaar.  Adding more effective keywords to bad content is like putting on cologne instead of taking a shower. (Boy am I bad at analogies or what?)

Relevant Content IS Relevant Content

One of my favorite bulletin boards is HackerNews. I find a lot of great stuff there and last week I found myself reading a very interesting post on BlackHat World – an SEO Forum. The specific post, written by Doug, is title “How I Make 15K a Month with Google Adsense.” Now who wouldn’t want to read an article with a headline like that?

The backstory here is that Doug started a firestorm of interest in December, 2008 when he posted a screenshot of his Adsense dashboard, showing his extremely profitable enterprise. Of course, the BlackHat community wanted to know how he does it. After a few days of community speculation and inquiry, Doug finally revealed his methodology.

Doug's Google Ad Sense Screenshot

I’m going to summarize his process for you (it IS very scientific), but at the end of the day Doug’s strategy is to co-opt high-value adwords by creating his own websites to generate a decent volume of traffic. With the traffic co-opted to his site he adds his AdSense module and then waits for the cash to come rolling in.

So what’s so interesting about Doug’s strategy? Doug pays people to write relevant content. Now, Doug pays as little as $8 an article, so I’m not confident the content is very good, but I am confident he understands that the content must be relevant in order to index high enough in search results.

The key to Doug’s success is not only the perception that his content is relevant, but frequent updates and ‘tweaks’ to the content to make sure that it’s continually relevant to the search terms he’s trying to co-opt.

Doug’s posts are littered with spelling errors and grammar errors (I’d imagine it’s those $8 articles), but he creates a high volume of content about a very specific topic and frequently updates it. That sounds like valuable content to me.

Here’s the problem: Doug’s content is actually so bad, the reader is forced to choose one of the Google Ads, hoping to find actual relevant content sine someone’s paying for it. For Doug, that’s a WONDERFUL, money-making concept.

Don’t Be Doug

So, let’s imagine for a minute that you’ve hired an SEO expert. That SEO expert is doing exactly what Doug does. He’s littering your content with ‘key words’ in an effort to improve your search result ranking. He’s driving up your perceived value and generating more traffic to your website. However, is your SEO expert actually adding valuable content or is he just creating a hodge-podge of crap like Doug’s $8 articles?

I’m willing to bet your bounce-rate increases with every successful shift in search result rankings. Your audience is hitting the back button, because the content may work for the search engine, but it doesn’t resonate with your audience.

Takeaway Message

If you want to improve your search result rankings for a specific set of key words, I suggest you rethink your content. Start rewriting it. Update it frequently. Make sure it’s relevant and that when your potential customers arrive they’re engaged in a high volume of useful, insightful information.

My Question To You

What do you spend on Search Engine Optimization every year? How much content could you buy?

About the author

Andrew Davis -

In 2002, Andrew founded Tippingpoint Labs with journalist James Cosco. Since then, he's spent countless hours exploring the online universe and building a methodological approach to developing digital strategies that drive revenue or reduce costs.

Andrew's always asking big questions and analyzing data to understand markets, online forces and even business models. Andrew's research has resulted in the creation of innovative online metrics including Online Brand Value and Category Brand Value, eye-opening graphical representations of website evolution through the New Media Life Cycle and even using online data to predict offline revenue.

When he's not surfing the web, Andrew's traveling the globe speaking to a wide-variety of audiences about everything from social media to the future of print. Andrew is a frequent contributor to the Tippingpoint Labs website and has been creating valuable content since the early 1990s for The Jim Henson Company, CNN, The Today Show and MTV.

He's contributed to a book of short stories, called The Way Things Were and produced and co-wrote Roadside Ambition a documentary film about one small town with two huge balls.

"In a world where content is consumed as rapidly as it's created, companies need to develop a sound strategy to creating valuable online experiences that can, and should, be leveraged enterprise-wide. There is a content solution to every business challenge."