There is a term out there that most writers haven’t heard of before coming to the web: Search Engine Optimization, or SEO for short.
SEO is all about having key words in the right places so that search engines like Google, MSN, and Yahoo! can evaluate your content and then determining your position in all of the millions of links out there when someone searches on your key words.
For example, one of the first things search engines look at is the title of your post. Interestingly, the first words in your post are more important than later words. So having my title be “Is it right to write content based upon Search Engine Optimization” is comparatively worthless to “Search Engine Optimization: Is it right to write content for it.” And having both SEO and Search Engine Optimization in the title is a Ten Keyboard monster title (not that it will make the front page, however…).
Then, search engines look for the same key words in the title in the body of the post — especially those in bold. Especially lists. Especially bold lists. Like:
- Search Engine Optimization: SEO Rules
- Search Engine Optimization: have the right title.
- Search Engine Optimization: have key words in bold
- Search Engine Optimization: Have key words in a list
- Search Engine Optimization: Have key words in a list and in bold
This is begging a Search Engine Optimization post in the top ten listings, of course, but there are a lot of consultants and writers out there who consistently study Search Engine Optimization and know how to write cool stuff using your designated key words.
Should you write that way online?
If you have a book or books out, it would be worthwhile to build in some posts about your book with the title and your name as that will help out positioning your site as the place to come to for the book and help you with your marketing efforts.
Outside of that….I’m not sure writers get that great a benefit from writing in SEO-speak.
I’d just write.
Scot
PS As an aside, check out the blog search engine from Google and see how this post did when you read it. I have no idea how it will do and I’ll be checking it myself. Should be a fun experiment.
[tags]blogging, marketing, technology, technology-for-writers, ten-keyboards, web-pages, SEO[/tags]
