It turns out the much-celebrated genius Albert Einstein might have been wrong about a thing or two.
Either way he’s certainly given me some food for thought when it comes to SEO. He is quoted as saying some remarkable things in his time, here are a few of my favourites and how they can help you be a better SEO…
#1 – Give a shit
“Weakness of attitude becomes a weakness of character”
I’ve long been a believer that great SEO is actually about giving a shit. Having the right attitude…
- Creating decent content
- Earning links from quality sites
- Working out how to make your site more user-friendly
- Writing guest posts
- Researching linkbait
- Updating to the latest version of WordPress
- Adding structured markup to your pages
- etc
All these things could be impacting your SEO and the one thing they have in common is that they require effort.
Google wants you to make the effort, they want you to give a shit because A) it leads to a better web for everyone and B) it means you stand out from 98% of the crowd which makes their job a lot easier. It frustrates me to see SEO agencies and consultants out there that are too lazy to give clients what they deserve.
Don’t have a weak attitude and don’t be a weak character. Like the guys at Distilled say, you can’t outsource giving a shit.
#2 – Try something new
Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
In SEO, the goal posts don’t just move – they change colour, form, disappear sometimes and even shift depending on who you are. I’m being metaphorical of course.
My point is though that the ground beneath us is always shifting, as SEOs we need to anticipate and stay ahead of the curve. The ability to do this comes down to being willing to try new things. Hypothesing and then experimenting. This is precisely why having your own website or portfolio of sites to experiment with is so important.
You never want to be taking risks with a client site or your money site when you can try out a particular method on one of your testbed sites and see what the outcome is. You’ll win some and you’ll definitely lose some but the important thing is that you tried something new.
See Rishi’s 9 ways to be a competitive SEO
#3 - Get started
The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education.
Reading blogs is exactly that, reading, you’re not actually learning SEO.
This might sound counter-intuitive of someone who writes an SEO blog and wants you to continue to read it so I will clarify this statement. Reading blogs IS a great way to gain theoretical knowledge and some advice however if you want to actually learn SEO, then you need to get out in the field and start doing.
#4 – Look up once in a while
We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.
We all know that SEO is an ongoing process, at some point the chances are you will find yourself with some kind of challenge to overcome. Perhaps you have an unnatural link profile that you need to rectify before its a problem, perhaps the content you are producing just isn’t gaining traction or perhaps the structure of your site that felt so relevant 18 months just isn’t anymore.
The point is, every once in a while, we all need to look up and assess what is actually going on and where we are heading. There’s nothing wrong with chipping away each month to move towards the eventual goals of the campaign but mindless drudging without a thought for the impact your actions are having is quite frankly insane.
Seek outside advice, rethink your methods or look for new ways of doing things – you simply can’t solve the problems you have with the same mindset that created them.
#5 – See the bigger picture
Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.
You’d be forgiven for thinking Einstein was referring specifically to links when he said this.*
Things that can be counted but don’t necessarily count
- Number of links
- PageRank/MozRank/[insert metric here]
- Potential traffic from a link (is it relevant traffic?)
Things that can’t be counted but do count
- The ‘quality’ of a link
- The ‘relevance’ of a link
- Transferred social proof
*I’m not sure he actually said it, but it was on a sign in his office.
Don’t forget this one:
“Things should be made as simple as possible, but not any simpler. ”
This applies to so many aspects of online business etc (and in any area of life.
I think in SEO though there is a tendancy toward complexity (think elaborate linkwheels etc). Sometimes, the “could you explain it to your mother” test is worth applying!
Interesting article!
I like these thoughts, “try something new”. Albert was à genius!
Thanks Tommy – he certainly was