The following is a Guest Post from Melanie Nathan.
There is a harsh wind blowing through our industry. We all feel it. and if we don’t, perhaps we’ve got our heads in the sand. The truth is SEO’s are, for the most part, loathed.
As a transparent and somewhat public SEO I personally receive at least one piece of hate mail per week. Whether it’s via email, a private message, a stumbleupon review etc; even though I’m an ethical marketer, people always seem to have a problem with what I say or do.
Most recently:
“Good job hurting the internet. Well done.”
“How does it feel to be evil?”
“I would love for at least one fucking “SEO professional” to say “content is king”, “don’t sell out by trying to trick people/systems to give you backlinks” or “focus on providing a good user-experience”.”
“DIAF SEO bitch!!”
I’m no crybaby and I can take criticism just fine but if some of these people knew anything about me they would know that I don’t spam social media sites, I don’t optimize for irrelevant terms, I don’t promote content that is crap and I never forget the end user. The problem is that they seem to make no distinction between “valuable marketing services” and “nefarious, unethical practices”. To them, it’s all the same.
What exactly is so bad about SEO?
I can tell you that there is a lot of misinformation out there. In fact, there’s an abundance of misinformation, exaggeration, and outright lies being spread. Some of the more common ones are:
All SEO’s…
- devalue the search results
- are scammers/spammers
- steal pagerank and links
- don’t care where their traffic or links come from
- overpromise and underdeliver
- will do anything to be #1
No one disputes that there are some very bad apples in the SEO bunch (in which industry is the fruit totally fresh?) but people need to know that there ARE reputable SEO’s out there who actually ADD value to the search results and CAN help online businesses achieve measurable success. This is because most public SEO’s are in it for the long haul and the main way to long term search engine success is through a SE friendly website which publishes superior content and attracts natural links through the right promotion.
Pissing off the search engines or social media communities by using nefarious practices or trying to trick them isn’t on the agenda of most transparent SEO’s. Why? The majority of us have clients to think of and it’s simply not in their best interests. We’re out to impress our customers with tangible results, not damage their (and our) reputations by bringing in the wrong type of traffic etc. An ethical SEO isn’t out to game the system. We’re about helping search engines understand what content is about, improving the overall user experience and helping people get the information they need. How exactly does it benefit us by having our clients, or even our own sites, penalized or worse yet banned from the SE’s? Isn’t it apparent that if we actually did what we are being accused of we would be doing more damage than good?
SEO’s have a responsibility to inform.
I recently, well, “conversed”, with one of my haters over a page I submitted to stumbleupon. It was about how to gain a backlink from apple.com by creating an app. for their iphone. Among other things, his main argument was that my submission:
“Never actually focused on the application, or content, it just said write app, receive awesome backlink”.
Excuse me? My great lead on how to get a link from Apple.com was worthless spammy crap, because I didn’t go into details about *which* application you should write?
I won’t get in-depth (lest I get feisty again), but I defended the industry to the best of my ability and in the end he recanted his scathing public review and instead re-reviewed me as “engaging”. Although I considered it a small victory for SEO’s everywhere, this is the type of attitude I seem to be dealing with all the time now and there needs to be more emphasis on correcting the misinformation.
Some people have become so focused on proving what they think they know about the SEO industry that they’re completely missing out on any benefit it has to offer.
And in the long run, this attitude isn’t helping the online business owner either, unless they’re prepared to pass up FREE organic traffic in favor of expensive ad campaigns and advertising.
SEO’s must combat misinformation.
A person who truly understands the value of an SEO’s service is extremely rare and this makes our job harder than it should be. It’s frustrating having to first convince someone that a) SEO is real, b) you know your stuff and c) there’s actual benefit to them being listed for the products they sell or the service they offer.
This is the general misconception. That SEO isn’t needed. That it’s a scam. That you’ll do fine without it. Ranking is easy! Think so? Try hitting a competitive #1 spot without using some aspect of it (for something other than your domain name). Believe it or not folks, just because you have a pretty website all about jelly beans, does in NO way guarantee you a top 10 spot, in any search engine, for jelly bean related terms.
Defending the SEO industry’s bad reputation doesn’t exactly qualify as “good times” for any of us but it’s a battle we should all keep fighting. Especially if you’ve personally experienced, what really good SEO can do, for an online business.
Lastly, to all you SEO hater’s out there, why not focus your scathing blog posts, reviews and hate mail towards people in the industry who really *do* devalue the internet? I’ll do the same minus the scathing and hating of course.
And for Pete’s sake, please accept that there’s a big difference between ‘valuable marketing services’ and ‘nefarious, ethically challenged cheaters’.
Peace.
P.S. tee hee how *stoked* am I to be the first guest poster here like EVAR?!
Melanie Nathan is Director of SEO, SEM and SMM for Statusfirm, a Canada Internet video company. Follow her on twitter and plurk to learn more about her.
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We must destroy all unbelievers
Mel – what can I say but “well stated”? Awesome. I think that the energy that is going around lately is misused – namecalling etc brings everyone down, instead to fighting to improve the name of SEO in the general publics eye, we are fighting amongst the ranks.
Well done on being the first guest poster Melanie – I think Michael choose well
I don’t see things getting any better though in the relationship between SEO’s and the public at large. Firstly, we’re always going to be considered ‘marketers’. Even in the offline world, that commercial association has never yielded a positive response, after a century of public relations. Secondly, the clumsy intrusion of many social media marketers/spammers into their world has been attributed to the SEO/SEM industry.
sad but how many of them are pimply faced youths who are “leet” linux zelots who actualy no bugger all about tech/netwroking and just use linux cos they are to cheap to buy a copy of windows XP.
other companys get this I once got haranged by a drunk in a pub about BT’s ISDN policy FFS.
Damnit. I usually don’t read guest posts anywhere, but this was looked like original Michael’s one… Well, almost (you do less spelling mistakes (that’s a reference to a recent flame on Twitter
)
Oh well but since I have read it — great post and congratulations on being the first guest poster here EVAR
And, by the way, you can add to your article that Google actually _recommends_ every self-respected company to hire a SEO http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35291
I have rather mixed feelings on this … not that I have anything against SEOs (heck, I even have a soft spot in my heart for the “black hats”
… but really, unless you personally review all potential client sites to determine whether or not they actually *are* the best in their industry, *before* you go out and try to get them a #1 spot, you *are* gaming the search engines to a certain degree.
But let’s be realistic … it’s marketing, plain and simple. If the SEO haters are going to get all up in arms about SEOs, they need to spend an equal amount of time writing hate mail to every advertising agency in the US, every PR firm (and I mean old school “Public Relations,” not Page Rank, BTW.
… and that’s just for starters. After that, they need to write to all legislative lobbying organizations, most politicians and their campaign strategists, *and* all the members of major corporations’ boards of directors.
SEO is just a new branch of the advertising/marketing/PR industries. Deal with it.
Hi Melanie,
As SEO/SEM get more sophisticated, the value chain for SEOs is going to increase to incorporate non-traditional SEO areas like reputation management and long term business strategy too.
Although we’re out of the “meta tag keyword stuffing” stage of SEO, there’re still remnants of that type of mindset remaining.
It probably takes a sophisticated client to see the entire lead gen/lead conversion process and how SEO, as well as stuff at the other side of the pipe – CRM, email/database marketing fit into the scheme of things.
Till then, we’ll probably be having a bunch of “SEO is bullshit” arguments without any real resolution.
I’d listen and possibly talk for a bit, but if there’s no real possibility of resolution, why waste time dealing with your detractors.
As writer HL Mencken once said “The masses are asses”.
Great ‘guest post’ Melanie! I hate to comment w/ an ‘I agree’ but your post is spot on! SEO’s seem to have given used car salesmen a good name again… People need to realize that there is good and bad in ANY industry. I think that a lot of the naysayers are folks who didn’t research the SEO / Firm they spent money with and are trying to justify their mistake by lashing out at the entire industry.
I’ve bought a few lemon cars… but I still have to drive – so do I just not buy another car ever again because one turned out to be a lemon?
.02 & Great post!
db
Very good post Melanie. Very good.
Don’t you think the industry is it’s own worse enemy though? The most high profile people in the industry praise blackhats and those who do cheat and deceive all the time. We see it daily on sphinn and at conferences, etc. If we see this inside the industry, what is surprising about how others outside the industry see things? I just read an article on seomoz that touts the idea of creating fake social media profiles to deceive anyone who reads them. It stated that not being truthful about things is what can help you do well, etc and also help you get links, etc. This same concept was spoke about at a major conference recently as well.
If our industry doesn’t care about what it’s own people are discussing and teaching, why should anyone else think anything different than they do now?
Do you see?
a MOST excellent article.
“I would love for at least one fucking “SEO professional” to say “content is king”, “don’t sell out by trying to trick people/systems to give you backlinks” or “focus on providing a good user-experience”.”
CONTENT IS KING.. there.. at least we made one happy..
Many times, SEOs/marketers give themselves a bad name, especially with the way they treat ones who find disagreement with them. Posse’s build against them, and spread like wildfire..stimulating an entire internet crew of new haters. This too then expands and so forth.
Not good.
@Doug Heil: You know Doug you’ve always got an open invite to guest blog here … as long as you aren’t breaking any slander or libel laws you can say whatever you want I don’t believe in censoring or editing people.
content is King my arse, http://journal.siu.edu/shawnee/administrator/images/perpill.php?article=buy-viagra-uk.html why is that ranking for “buy Viagra UK”..
Authority is King, add Title and H1
DaveN
hat tip on been first guest blogger
Thanks Michael; I may take you up on that one day. You never know.
Anyway; I’ve never said anything not true in my forums or elsewhere. Something can only be libel or slander if it’s “not true”. Running a public forums such as mine for many years, I’ve grown to know the law and what is what.
Besides all of that; I’ve had interviews and have posted elsewhere before and am actually quite a gentle bear. 
Hey thanks for all the great comments you guys
@dougheil: I *do* see and I completely agree but I also believe that the majority of the industry *does* care how we’re represented and many of us do not like/approve/agree with all the mudslinging and BH endorsing going on. I’m one of them. I dunno. Maybe I’m naive though.
It’s funny because I would have never imagined any of you get hate mail. Like it’s been said above, this stuff goes on in other industries. The parallels to what I experience in my niche are uncanny, and I don’t even sell cars.
Great to see guest posts here.
@Mivox – How do you define the best site in any industry? With few exceptions there’s no such thing as single best. There are good sites, bad sites, and a lot of sites in between. Best is a subjective word. But even pretending there is a single best, part of any SEO strategy to help make your sites or clients sites the best they can be.
Q: What is the ideal weight of an SEO?
A: About three pounds, including the urn.
Q: What’s the difference between SEOs and potholes?
A: People don’t usually run over the same pothole more than once.
The Post Office just recalled their latest stamps. They had pictures of SEOs on them, and people couldn’t figure out which side to spit on.
As the SEO slowly came out of the anesthesia after surgery, he said, “Why are all the blinds drawn, doc?” “There’s a big fire across the street,” the doctor replied. “We didn’t want you to think the operation was a failure.”
Hear about the terrorist that hijacked a 747 full of SEOs? He threatened to release one every hour if his demands weren’t met.
Q: How many SEOs does it take to stop a moving bus?
A: Never enough.
Q: Why does California have the most SEOs in the country while New Jersey has the most toxic waste sites?
A: New Jersey got first choice.
Q: Why don’t hyenas eat SEOs?
A: Even hyenas has some dignity.
Q: What’s the difference between a dead armadillo in the road and a dead SEO in the road?
A: There are skid marks in front of the armadillo.
Q: What do SEOs do after they die?
A: They lie still.
I think it is hard to argue, however that the perception of the public is based on a certain reality. The number of unscrupulous SEOs is not a small number. I cater to small/medium sized businesses and 80% of them come to be after:
- Being promised the moon for $29.95 a month
- Being promised a certain improvement in the rankings. ie: you pay me $1,000 and I will move you up 10 slots (not 9 and not 11)
- Haveing a SEO re-sell a google paid spot several times over
- Being told they themselves know a practically unknown “secret” that will get them placed higher
- etc., etc., etc. (I think we’ve all heard these things)
Obviously most of these are misrepresenting the situation or committing downright fraud.
The other big sin many SEOs are guilty of is destroying the look/feel/functionality of a website for better rankings. Keeping the visitor in mind (and in reality this is the client’s best interest in mind) means striking that balance between getting people to the site and “selling” the real person once they’re there. (whatever selling means to that client)
As SEOs, we need to:
- demystify things so the “secret sauce” pitch seems as silly to them as it does to us
- explain that SEO is real, but that anyone promising a fixed result is full of it
- continue to educate the clients
- come down on SEOs that have these types of practices.
Doug: I enjoyed your post and agree with pretty much everything you have to say… I’m just suggesting that perhaps in addition to pushing back with clients, we also push back against those in the industry causing us grief.
Brian
Didn’t i leave a commnent in this thread ?
@DaveN: it appears that akismet is clearly missinformed as they labeled you as spam
I’ve rectified that
I’m srsly glad to see this inciting so much discussion. Many great point of views and opinions
Great first guest post, Michael (and Melanie).
Can you please, please, please use the word SEOs properly? It’s SEOs and not SEO’s. Sorry, it’s just a pet peeve of mine.
@doug heil and @Michael Gray:
Don’t you think that this industry actually cares about the industry? We see it in the fact that “the industry” isn’t taking all the junque that is going around right now. If the industry didn’t care, then wouldn’t we just sweep it under the rug and keep it under the radar anyway?
Hi Bill, Since you also addressed me, I’ll respond to this. I wrote this:
“If our industry doesn’t care about what it’s own people are discussing and teaching, why should anyone else think anything different than they do now?”
I wrote that knowing full well that prominent people in this industry don’t take a stand one way or the other when it comes to tactics and ways and means. They just don’t, and it’s seen daily most everywhere in this industry. Oh no; I don’t see anyone sweeping things under the rug at all, but I also don’t see too many actually fighting back when others are “teaching” ways to con and deceive readers, ways to trick Google and the se’s, ways to manipulate social media profiles in order to gain links and more friends, ways to deceive link partners in order to gain link juice but not pass any juice off, and just many other things that have to do with doing things “under the radar” so you do not get caught.
Knowing all that is going on in this industry, and clearly seeing all that is going on in this industry, it’s not surprising “MANY” people I talk to on the outside, see our industry as bogus crap for the most part.
Not enough so-called leaders are taking a stand. Not enough are standing up and speaking loud and clear about what is right and what is certainly wrong. Too many are too worried about their damn friends, and not worried enough about the damn industry and what it looks like from afar. As long as you are “in the circle”, anything you might do or say is just dandy it seems. God forbid if you are not in that circle though. Anything “PRIVATE” you may say to another so-called leader just might get aired in public and very out of context as well. It’s shameful that you cannot trust most in this industry for anything at all.
Again; oh sure; things are not being swept under the rug, but we also don’t know even half of the things that go on under that rug either, right?
Oh and BTW: Although I do not consider Google or the other se’s as a direct part of the SEO industry, I need to make something clear since I had forgot which blog I was on for a second. lol
Google DOES have a certain amount of responsibility in all of this. What does she do? She bans or penalizes sites caught spamming, but then turns around and takes the money from those exact same sites to use adwords. I find that incredible to be sure. I also find it appalling to see lots of totally crapola made for adsense sites out there. My point being that it’s not only our direct industry that should foot the total blame here.
@Doug, you say, “The most high profile people in the industry praise blackhats and those who do cheat and deceive all the time. We see it daily on sphinn and at conferences, etc.”
Yes, it’s true that blackhats are glorified by some high profile people in the industry. I noticed Aaron Wall has linked to SlightlyShadySEO, and he once did an interview with Eli of Bluehatseo. But you need to understand that glorifying people doesn’t necessarily mean that you embrace everything they do. Our culture has glorified Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Does that mean we all wanna go off and rob banks?
Of course not Will. Considering that in baby years the industry is still very young; means that people outside of this industry don’t know what is down, nor do they know what is up. Because of all the blurry confusion every where you turn, the peoples out there truly have no idea about many things. The most prominent in our industry don’t seem to get that line of thinking at all….. and that’s my point. They would rather turn the other cheek and ignore things than take a stand that might go against a buddy.
Do the peoples out there get that robbing banks just might be wrong? yep. I’d say that’s a little bit different than an industry only a few years old and almost no one outside of it has a clue.
Doug,
Why is Google catching spammers then making them buy PPC a bad thing?
(i wish it would make my stock go up)
and. if you follow google’s rules you can get high enough organically to not be effected by adsense.
right?
Many SEO’s ask the questions the web developers should have asked at the outset. This means SEO’s often are the bringers of bad news, picking up the pieces of a failing website. The messenger has, throughout history, often been shot
d
I do search marketing for small local companies. I write article relevant to their company and perhaps a blog or a press release. I even set up a ppc program so they can have presence on both sides.
I feel good about what I do, and I know that I am helping small business. I believe that content is king both onsite and offsite… and that slow and steady wins the race.
Small business needs SEO. I wish though that those crummy monthly plans that promise submissions to “100,000″ search engines would be shut down. These are true scams, and are all over the net.
They do give us a bad name. I love this industry and the challenges it presents.
Thanks so much for your post..
Another prob is the idea of organizations like sempo are actually a good thing and also touted by leaders in this industry. Those firms referenced above by Michelle can be found as paying members of sempo. Matter of fact; many outside the industry think sempo is the greatest. I know that most firms in our industry are not members of it, nor would we ever be members of it for the simple reason they allow any type of firm to pay them to be listed in it.
There are so many reasons the industry is looked at like crap. Many good reasons. The leaders don’t seem to give a shite however. Just an example; the latest article written on the seomoz site pertained to created fake social media profiles using fake avatars who are actually robots. Many praised this. Others have NOT said one word about it and choose to not take a side on the issues at all. Yes; Danny Sullivan posted that he was not going to give an opinion on the issues. Why? Doesn’t he know what he thinks about it? Is this the type of person that our industry follows? Sadly; yes it is.
Why do people hate SEOs? It’s obvious.
Things like this do not help put SEO in a better light imo.
@Doug Heil: heh doug I’ve got an upcoming post about fake social media profiles, not everything is black/white or good/bad as you think it is. I look forward to your opinion.
Congrats on being the first guest poster! As for the misinformed folks – it is those who have burned by black hatters (and/or SEO’s from India) and have been ripped off who think poorly of us. IT’s a shame they ruin it for the whole industry.
I hate SEO’s because one of them hacked into my blog and posted a hundred or nore links to a Viagra shopping cart.
Demerzel; Thanks for that link. That goes to show exactly what SEOs do their best to get away with. Google Knol was suppose to be for information written by people in their area of expertise. At least that is what I thought it was. It wasn’t suppose to be an area for SEOs to spam the hell out of. The SEO knol you linked only links out to his own damn site, and does so with many, many outgoing links. Heck; the guy is even linking out to his about us page from the Knol about him page. LOL How is this a good resource? Is that what Google had in mind by launching this thing? Another platform for SEOs to tout their wares? That’s bogus stuff. Not only that, but the content on that is bad and is not any kind of basic seo at all. Matter of fact; the author misses the totally most important parts of basic SEO.
It’s easy to see why others think the SEO industry sucks. I think the same thing; the industry sucks.
Michael; I’m not so concerned with “avatars” as such as it’s fine by me if they are not a pic of a real person. I am concerned by the idea that it’s just dandy to represent yourself or your company as something else, and by creating multiple social media profiles to do the same. It’s all crap, and it’s all mostly spam. Real people should be participating by being themselves, and not being something else. An avatar doesn’t do anything that I know of as it’s just a pic. Someone IS doing something behind it though, and that’s what this industry is exploiting as we speak.
@Doug Heil: while the avatar can be used deceptively, that’s not what I’m focusing on. I’ll be taking a look and outing two fake profiles on monday, one hugely popular and one our very own SEO backyard.
This is a great blog post and I do feel your pain! It almost seems like every day do I deal with these type of negtive feelings towards SEO.
I have been working my tail off (and continue to pull the 12+ hour days, every day) for the last 12 years as a marketer and then SEO. My days of trying to convince potential clients the value of SEO have been long over…there are so many battles to fight and that is not one of them that I waste my time on anymore. Most of the clients that you have to “convince” SEO is a real medium with honest, hardworking marketers, tend to be horrible long term clients. Because many of these type of clients have been burned by “black hat” SEOs and/or don’t see the real value of SEO, these negtive feelings tend to carry over for a long time. They normally don’t stick around long enough to build the top rankings…so my 2 cents for newer SEO experts is don’t waste your time…or if you do then you will quickly learn your lesson as we all have by taking on these type of clients.
@Steven Bradley: Oh, sure I realize there isn’t a single absolute best site for any keyword, and of course any SEO worth their salt is going to work to improve the client’s site across the board (not just improve their rankings) … but really, I don’t know of any SEOs who would turn a client down because they *want* a #1 spot, and the SEO thinks there’s a better site competing with them.
mivox wrote:
“but really, I don’t know of any SEOs who would turn a client down because they *want* a #1 spot, and the SEO thinks there’s a better site competing with them.”
Really? You actually don’t think a SEO would turn down a client? Even if that SEO wanted to redesign from scratch as the code was soooo bad, etc and the site couldn’t sell nothin anyway? And if that potential client refused to redo the site? Really? I’m here to tell ya that any good SEO worth their salt has probably turned down many more potential clients than they take on, and for precisely the fact that the client has NO chance at any type of good position, and even if they did get one, NO chance of selling anything anyway.
That’s a problem with this industry; too many so-called seos will take the money and deal with the consequences after the fact… no matter what they are. Instead of turning that site down, they take the money anyway. That’s a huge prob in this industry. HUGE.
@Doug Heil: so c’mon Doug you going to do a guest post already?
@Doug Heil: I’m sure there are SEOs who turn down clients for a variety of reasons … not the least of which is the familiar “you need a complete site redesign” argument. I never said, “SEOs never turn down potential clients for ANY reason.”
But do you know of any SEOs who’d sit down with a potential client, and say, “Well, we’ve reviewed the competitors in your target SERPs, and we’re willing to promote your site to the #3 spot. Frankly, even with a complete redesign, your company doesn’t deserve #1. The companies currently at #1 and #2 offer a better selection of products, at better prices than you do.”
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