One of the first rules of business is not to rely too heavily on any 1 client or customer, for the majority of your income. If you do, and that customer goes broke or takes their business elsewhere, you’re in BIG trouble! Even if that customer just decides to pay you late, it can kill your cash flow or put you out of business.
Everyone knows that it’s far better and a lot less risky, to have a wider spread of business.
Or do they?
For some reason, when it comes to the Internet, it seems many site owners and bloggers focus the majority of their efforts on just one form of traffic development; search engines. Then, the vast majority of that is focused on just 1 search engine – Google. As a result, some people are now very dependent on Google traffic. Many invest a staggering amount of time and effort doing everything they can, to keep Google happy.
Even the most read sites on the Internet can become extremely dependent on Google. In a recent blog post, Darren Rowse from problogger explained that he almost went out of business, when Google decided overnight, to cut his traffic (and thus his sales/leads) by 30%!
I believe it’s insane to allow any 3rd party to have that much control over:
- Your sales
- Your leads
- Your enquiries
- Your income
- and maybe even your business’ future
Whilst I strongly recommend that every business invests in professional Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), I ALSO suggest that you consider investing in alternatives too. Why? Because the results can be amazing AND it removes your exclusive reliance on search engines.
For example, although this blog is currently ranked one of the top 100 marketing blogs in the world by Adage, just a small percentage of my traffic comes via search engines. The vast majority comes from people, via social media (more on that in a moment.)
SEO, social media and your Internet marketing mix
When I started this blog, I decided that Google was NOT going to play any deliberate part in the blog’s development. I do NOT recommend others follow this path, it’s not the right move for the vast majority of people.
Why did I do it? Because as someone from a traditional marketing background, I wanted to use a form of marketing for the blog, which was not so reliant on Google. I elected to use a strategy, which used a number of social media related activities. The idea was (and still is) to provide my blog with a much wider spread of human-powered, marketing options.
I DO USE some basic SEO here, like tagging posts so that it’s easier for search engines to correctly identify what my posts are about. This takes seconds to do. However, I do not deliberately use Google friendly key phrases or key words – I don’t even have a sitemap! I also do zero off-site SEO. If Google stopped sending people here tomorrow, it would have very little impact on the development of this blog. Chris Brogan claims to have gone 1 step further than me, and says he does no SEO on his blog whatsoever! In my opinion, ignoring SEO completely is at best, a little blinkered.
Here are just some of the ways that people, via social media, have helped me generate targeted traffic to this blog:
- People share my blog posts on Twitter. I use Twitter most days and have connected with a some great people. Some of them are kind enough to share posts on Twitter, if they find them interesting.
- People use sites like Facebook, Delicious, Stumbleupon and Digg etc to share blog posts. For example, this 1 post gets hundreds of views every week from Stumbleupon users.
- Fellow bloggers link to posts here, which alerts their readers to this blog. Some bloggers link to the entire blog.
- People have mentioned the blog in podcasts.
- I link to this blog in my marketing newsletter; which helps new newsletter readers discover the blog.
Because SEO is very much the secondary focus of the blog’s development, I focus on optimising my posts, so that they are as attractive as possible for people. I have to admit that as a writer, I find it far, far more natural to write for people, than to alter my writing style, so that there are key phrases and words scattered strategically – to attract Google’s attention too.
It’s wise to combine great copy writing with powerful SEO. Particularly when writing copy for a website, as opposed to a blog, the combined SEO social media approach is extremely valuable.
Love SEO – but give social media a hug too!
Do not misread this post and think for one moment that I am suggesting you ignore SEO. That would be wrong. I am not saying that at all. However, I AM saying that all site owners and bloggers should spend some time exploring additional ways to generate targeted traffic. Keep up with your SEO, but seriously consider adding a little people-power to your Internet marketing mix!
Do you use social media to help with the development of your site? What has worked best and least well for you?
Let me know what you think!
Photo credit: Aussie Gall
I set up my new blog a few months ago and so get very little traffic from search engines at the moment. I get most of my traffic from Twitter and links on other blogs. From experience of setting up blogs at previous companies, the best traffic comes from these sources, not Google. Search engines traffic tends to have a greater bounce rate. It’s so easy to get bogged down by SEO and not concentrate on just creating the best website you can. Great post Jim!
Thanks for the feedback Tasha. You make an interesting point about how easy it is too get too concerned with the SEO. As you say, the content has to be the best you can make it.
Great post Jim. Your points are well made as always. We were guilty, as part of our prep for launch, and were way to focussed for a while on SEO and not enough on the social media side. This has changed and its’ a combined strategy along with the good old reliables of direct sales!
The ‘trick’ Barney is to do as you say and combine the 2; great SEO and social media.
Thanks for the feedback sir!
Yah but the problem is most marketing people are frickon annoying as heck.. they annoy me with spam in my inbox that doesn’t go away even if I click spam on google.. when I add myself as a fan all they do is update my profile.. and frankly I don’t care if your apple, or the store down the street, once a week is enough… as for twitter… as soon as I see a link in twitter I unsub people.. stumble I do like cause it has far less steps than digg and frankly digg people are elitest…
The thing I find interesting is twitter… Facebook I think will stick cause at its core it is useful… although it does cause stress when a girl you like updates her status and doesn’t email you.. but twitter.. other than people selling themselves and instant news it would be very easy to live without… plus I hate these geo location things.. stalkers paridise.. at what point will their be a user backlash when they are tired of being sold in social sites.. kind of like ads in bathroom stalls that got vandalized? Cause everything you can do to market, I can do to yell at you for annoying me…
It’s interesting that you see such good results from Twitter – I hear that more and more right now.
I think the geo stuff is going to become big, but as you say Gebadia, there’s some serious stalker-related issues that need to be considered.
Thanks for the comment.
I think before the social web, Jim, SEO was definitely a lot more important. That’s why you’d see agencies (wrongly, in my opinion) charge tens of thousands of dollars to optimize sites.
The thing is, like you say, Google is just part of the attraction. The fact that both they and Bing include your Twitter feed in search results and alerts now speak volumes.
I’m like you – I’ll write for the reader first and the search engines second. I’d rather have 100 human eyes than 1,000 robot indexes any day.
And not sure about Mr Brogan no longer doing any SEO on his blog at all – there’s a fair few posts about how to use organic linking and keywords, not to mention the frequent pimping of his blog theme’s SEO capabilities…
Thanks for the comment Danny.
Yes, I noticed the post on Chris’ blog about how to link using hyper text and wondered why he was doing it. I assumed he was trying to encourage people to link correctly to him, but he’s not into SEO so…
Brogan is turning into a prima donna. If he’s not doing seo its probably because he thinks he’s bigger than google!
You hit the nail on the head when you said writing for people, not search engines, is more natural. I couldn’t agree more; after all, people are the ones who will visit and read your site plus do business with you. On the other hand, you have to be found first. That’s why writers, web designers/developers, etc. need to coordinate a content strategy to determine how best to promote the site and build awareness. So often departments work independently and don’t share ideas. Obviously, SEO, social media, copywriting all work together for a common purpose.
It’s hard enough to develop content that’s human optimised – human optimised and search engine optimised….. I’d write about 2 posts a year!
Thanks for the comment Cory!
Jim – I think you and I think way too much alike. However, let me take this one step further. Even SEO does not need Google anymore than Google should be the controlling way we get business.
Let me expand. Yes, SEO is important. But what so many bloggers worry too much about is, how can I write so Google notices me and moves me up in the search rankings? This is a very easy question to answer. Write for the Human Search Engine first and Google will follow.
If we remember that the human search result, or organic result is really what we need to worry about. We can not build a relationship with Google. We can not interact with Google. We darn sure are not going to be selling any of our products or services to Google. And Google is not going to leave comments on our blog and enter into the conversations we are taking part in.
We have to remember as bloggers and online marketers, build the relationship with the Human Search Engine and Google will follow.
Greetings Mr Headway!
You make a good point about Google rewarding good content, but I have found people like my work a lot more than Google does. Equally, Google gives some very poorly written sites a lot of search juice, because the site’s are developed to ‘game’ Google.
Having said that, if you do a Google search for “Marketing blogs” – this blog’s on page one.
Thanks for the comment Grant
Great points here Jim… however, Google + $$$ = proven traffic and sales. Social media requires persoanlity, engagement and real value… this will prove to be a stumbling block for most.
I agree Mark. If you’re talking about a blog or website that thrives on interaction, then its design and purpose should reflect the “human search engine” as others like to say.
However, if your website is more of a traditional ecommerce or brochure-ware site, then optimizing for the search engines (both Google and Bing) is probably the better investment.
That’s not to say to ignore social media opportunities (kind of the reverse of what Jim is saying), but you have to put your emphasis in the right areas (hmmm, sounds like I’m backlinking to a previous post Jim had about effort directed appropriately).
Rob – LexiConn
Hi Mark,
You are right about the stumbling block – and it’s why I said in the post that the approach I use is NOT designed for most people.
Like you say, Google + money will equal traffic.
However, by developing an effective Internet marketing strategy that includes social media, you can make your Internet presence less exposed.
Thanks for the comment my friend.
Times have changed and the shift from traditional to online marketing has been significant to a lot of businesses nowadays. I do agree that it’s important to be able to develop an effective marketing strategy that would cater to the needs and wants of your target market at a pace adaptive to what is currently happening.
By mere observation, I can say that a lot are already into the different social media platforms. I do agree that combining SEO and Social Media Websites can be a very powerful tool. However, it can also be tricky and risky at some point. To be able to maximize it, i think it’s important to study well the behavior of those people involve and to have a clear and well planned strategy on where you are going to position yourself or your businesses online.
It’s true that social media can make or break you. A well planned and careful execution can make a huge difference.
You make a good point Karen, about the need to study what works and try and avoid, what doesn’t.
Thanks for the comment.
[...] Why Google means so little to me (and you mean so much!) (Jim’s Marketing Blog) [...]
Good bloggers understand that if you write great content people will be interested – and SEO, even social media to an extent, happen much more “naturally.” Unfortunately, a lot of small business owners are so busy running the business that writing great content and reaching out in the social media space often gets overlooked. But you are absolutely right on, if you depend too much on one source of traffic, you will get burned sooner or later…
WBS – The time required for effective social media related marketing is considerable. I’m planning a post, all about maximising the return you get for your social media marketing time.
Thanks for the comment.
[...] I love SEO. It’s one of the reasons I use the Headway WordPress theme on this blog (affiliate), which is extremely SEO friendly. I also use tags for my posts to help with my SEO too. However, I do not deliberately write anything to keep Google happy. [...]