Shoemoney Hates SEOs
This is a guest post by Paul Wilson, my business partner who recently sold his blog to buy a wedding ring. I spent a good year trying to get him to blog and now I miss his posts.
Paul said he’ll start a new blog but in the meantime I’ve asked him to write for mine (and if anyone else wants to do a guest post, please contact me).
I’ll preface this by saying I’m a fan of Shoemoney and I read his blog and have met him in real life twice. I always respect that he’s worked hard and overcome personal issues as they are determined to succeed. (According to him he’s been fired, he used to be fat, etc). Over time he’s built a business, gotten healthier, built a lot of respect, and he’s openly shared a lot of his journey in an authentic way.
Jeremy doesn’t actually say he hates ALL SEOs - he just doesn’t like most of them. I wrote about how Aaron Wall loves SEO a few posts back (he didn’t say how he feels about actual SEO experts).
——- BEGIN POST BY PAUL WILSON ABOUT SHOEMONEY AND SEOs ——–
Jeremy Shoemaker (shoemoney.com) recently did a post on why he hates SEO experts (SEOs = people who are experts in search engine optimization). I know that there has been a lot said on this, but I have to weigh in.
I could not but wonder if Jeremy has lost touch with reality when I read his comment:
“SEO’s are like the 21st century car salesmen. Most are slimy and have no clue what they are talking about. They tell you you just need to put spammy keywords in your title tag, keyword tag, and write a spammy as hell description meta tag.”
Now, I will agree with Jeremy that there are definitely hacks in the SEO industry. However, you are going to find hacks in every industry. There will always be people who don’t know what they are talking about, trying to convince others that they are the “gurus.”
My good friend Jason runs JibberJobber, a legitimate business in the employment industry. Just because I receive tons of spam about slimy business opportunities doesn’t mean what Jason does isn’t viable, if not necessary.
What makes Jeremy’s post even worse, is the influence he wields. By him stating that 95% of SEO experts are “slimy” states that the industry as a whole is worthless (which I believe it wouldn’t take much to get him to admit).
To drive my point home, I recently was twittering Newspapergrl about possibly creating a monthly Utah SEO organization. Here are the responses her and I got on Twitter:
Twitter A: @paulwilson … sounds interesting but I do think that 90% of SEO is snake oil. Maybe i’m misinformed?
Newspapergirl: @Twitter A - misinformed. SEO is messier to track but it’s totally legit. You could benefit - you need to expand the reach on your site.
Twitter B: @PaulWilson There’s no need for monthly SEO meetings. Everything honorable about SEO can be learned fast. Monthly meetings are just slime.
Me: @Twitter B: I seriously disagree. I have been doing SEO since 1999, and I still learn something new with every person that I meet in my industry.
Twitter B: @PaulWilson You have to get past the slime, though. The good people will avoid a monthly SEO meeting, so all you’ll be left with is slime.
Me: @Twitter B: If the meeting is for SEO experts and sponsored by corporations like Franklin Covey, 1-800-Contacts and other corporations. Just like RMAMA. I am pretty sure we would get past the slime.
@NewspaperGrl: I am surprised the overall impression people have of SEO
@NewspaperGrl: I guess that makes it easier to rank higher for us =)
Twitter B: @PaulWilson It is possible to increase your rank honestly. SEO has been synonymous with gaming the system. Don’t brag about it.
Me: @Twitter B: You are welcome to believe what you like.
Me: @Twitter B: I personally believe SEO & SEM is a viable solution.
Twitter B: @PaulWilson Writing good content is the only viable solution. Once you start writing for robots, they’ll be the only ones reading your site.
NewspaperGrl: @Twitter B - don’t you think you can write good content AND add keywords that people are searching for? It’s usually not either/or
If you read Jeremy’s post in its entirety you will see that Twitter B is espousing almost word for word what Jeremy wrote. It worries me to see such a powerful blogger wield his influence so carelessly. For me, I see Jeremy blogging in his ivory tower totally disconnected from the practical concerns of everyday web life.
So, all-mighty Shoemoney what is your advice to the rest of us lowly peons:
“Concentrate on building a quality service. One that people will actually WANT TO BOOKMARK and comeback to…Its like people don’t know you can goto a web site without going to a god-damn Search Engine. When you create a good, useful service/site people will actually want to come to your site without you spamming Google.”
This is not bad advice Jeremy offers, but with so much noise on the web word of mouth generally will carry a website only so far. To believe that SEO shouldn’t be a part of your quiver of arrows is either ignorance, or willful stupidity. Google’s own page on creating useful websites shows that good content should be coupled with keyword research:
“Provide high-quality content on your pages, especially your homepage. This is the single most important thing to do. If your pages contain useful information, their content will attract many visitors and entice webmasters to link to your site. In creating a helpful, information-rich site, write pages that clearly and accurately describe your topic. Think about the words users would type to find your pages and include those words on your site.“
It truly is sad to see those, like Jeremy, live in their lofty ivory towers and scoff at us who make our living doing SEO.
———– END POST BY PAUL WILSON ABOUT SHOEMONEY AND SEOs ————–
I recommend looking at this - straight from Google for a primer on SEO for your web site:
Google’s - Making the Most of Your Content: A Publisher’s Guide to the Web
Done well SEO helps people find what they’re looking for. Most of the SEOs I know provide a huge benefit and 5% are scum.
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2 Responses to “Shoemoney Hates SEOs”
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March 20th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
nice title bait… although inaccurate.
March 22nd, 2008 at 11:42 am
I am on shoemoney’s side here. Although I would actually amend his complaint and say that 99% of what we see done in the name SEO is white noise or just open slime.
An SEO expert who has joined the dark side can produce millions of pages of white noise. They fill comment sections with useless garbage, etc.. Often many of the people who pound the SEO drum loudest are on the dark side.
The people who are on the good side of the SEO force are generally interested in more subtle issues like making sure the structure of a site doesn’t detract from its content.
Because the wanks in SEO produce millions of garbage pages and are loud, they drive our perceptions of SEO.
I would go one step further and say that the lion’s share of people who identify themselves primarily as an SEO Expert are generally used-car-salesmen* like dirt peddlers.
The SEO experts I admire generally see themselves as web designers with SEO knowledge.
BTW, if you want. I would be willing to write up an article on what I consider to be quality SEO in exchange for an essay on the town where you live. You can contact me here.
*PS: I apologize to any used-car-salesmen reading this comment. I realize that the typical used car dealer has much more integrity than the standard self-proclaimed SEO-expert. I did not intend a slight toward the used-car sales industry.