This is The Only Time You Should Absolutely Ignore SEO
I’m not an SEO (Search Engine Optimization) expert, but I do know this…
You Should Not Ignore SEO!
It’s super important that the people who are searching online can find your web content.
For example, the difference between searchers looking for the term “video production” and “make a video” are huge.
If you are new to making videos, you are much less likely to know that the word “production” is super common in the industry.
It only took me five minutes of research to find this out, but if I had not done it, I would have always used the less common word “production”.
If you don’t put in at least a little research effort and use keywords and “readable-by-humans” descriptions, you are missing out. You are leaving “money on the table”, as they say.
However, you should totally ignore SEO if this one thing is happening.
If you are not publishing because you are too focused on SEO, you should ignore it. Or, if ANYthing is keeping you from shipping your work, you should stop doing that thing and focus on getting your work out, instead.
At this point you might be wondering what the top thinkers in this area say.
Seth Godin Says Don’t Worry About SEO
Instead of being focused on SEO, Seth and many other wise, empathetic leaders would say that we should try to delight a few readers first.
Seth usually says that number is “ten”, by the way. This may seem small, but you have to start somewhere. And if ten people truly value something, then many more are likely to follow.
I agree with that sentiment. Please a few people first. Learn how they are finding you and do more of that. Learn what words they use, and use more of those words! This is the essence of SEO, anyway.
The One Reason I Enjoy SEO
But I also happen to enjoy tweaking SEO, and I especially enjoy seeing what words make people take action.
Action is what we want. Action is where power lies. So, if a headline gets people to act, then I think we should act on that!
However, it’s worth stating again. Don’t focus on anything if it’s keeping you for putting your work out there or slowing you down.
Put Shipping First, Then Tweak Later
The reason I’m focusing on this is that I’ve been down the “overly focused on SEO” road before. I don’t recommend it. Ship first. Make a few folks very happy. Then tweak your SEO. And have fun with it!
Image By Myriam Jessier
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