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Is SEO cheating?

Thu, 19/05/2011 - 09:37 — imanuelv

Something I pondered over today... is there a need for search engine optimisation? If we all have good content that people want to read - won't they find it naturally? Is SEO 'cheating' Google's indexing system?

Perhaps organizations should spend less time on SEO, and more time on creating innovative, fresh content.

Just my morning traffic-jam thoughts. What are your thoughts/opinions/feelings/ideas? (Yeah, it's a little SEO joke...)

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imanuelv's picture

I guess how you view the internet is going to affect your views on this. If you view the internet as a platform for promoting your own goods and services then yeah, you're going to want to get as many keywords on your homepage as possible.

But if you're an individual wanting some information, you have to wade through SE optimised - but completely irrelevant to you - websites before you get to the content you want. If Google banned the use of SEO, how would we cope? There must be more interesting ways of promoting a site...

Fri, 20/05/2011 - 10:10 — imanuelv
rhiandaniel's picture

Surely creating fresh & innovative content is a part of SEO? I don't consider them separate practices. And in most cases good web development breeds SEO and vice versa, so I wouldn't say it was cheating. :)

Fri, 20/05/2011 - 09:02 — rhiandaniel
John-Gerald's picture

SEO is not cheating, why would it be if everyone can make use of it? (sure, limited to financial resources, but aren't all marketing efforts limited to such?).

Though noteworthy; using SEO does not mean you should stop creating innovative, fresh content - you might rank high thanks to SEO, but you won't convert anything into a sale of your content is boring/outdated.

Fri, 20/05/2011 - 08:02 — John-Gerald
Blaine's picture

Matt Cutts, Google's link to the SEO community, commented on Google's view on SEO in his 2009 video titled "Will SEO still exist in 5 years time". In the video he explains that Google considers SEO as valid (in fact endorsing it by providing people with a 20-page guide to SEO) and very much as the process of "polishing the resume". http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQArUFRb4Is

Thu, 19/05/2011 - 21:09 — Blaine
R_Arblaster's picture

I don't see SEO as cheating. I think many people if they have the time can do it themselves without having to pay hefty fees to "experts".

Thu, 19/05/2011 - 11:05 — R_Arblaster
jembop's picture

Good SEO will always put good content first, so if anyone is suggesting innovative, fresh content isn't important for SEO they are wrong. The idea of SEO being only smoke and mirrors is becoming quite outdated from what I gather. Yes, there are still "black hat" SEO techniques that have some impact, but as the search engine algorithms/indexing become more sophisticated, it will only get harder to game the system.

Thu, 19/05/2011 - 10:56 — jembop

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