As a native Chicagoan, I felt some pride at reading a New York Times article which traced the real estate maxim “Location, Location, Location” back to a 1926 real estate classified ad in the Chicago Tribune:
Attention salesmen, sales managers: location, location, location, close to Rogers Park.
The journalist notes that the context of the ad suggests it was already a familiar aphorism in Chicago. The piece debunked the claim by some British lord that he initiated the phrase. (Why is that not surprising?)
At any rate, I would like to now state (and take ownership) for the phrase content, content, content as a maxim for B2B blogging and SEO optimization.
A recent post on B2Bcontentengine.com notes the growing trend of content marketing articles on many SEO focused forums and blogs. Among the findings cited from Ecoconsultancy’s inaugural Content Marketing Survey Report, based on a survey of more than 1,300 marketers working for brands, agencies and publishers:
A recent post on creditablecontent.net points us toward why:
The reason can be historical as well as contemporary. Historically content has always ruled the roost although many would like to disagree. Everything on the Internet is content. Everything search engines like Google crawl, index and rank is content. Whenever you are trying to improve your rankings you are trying to improve the ranking of your content pages. So overtly or covertly it is your content that is evaluated and ranked by the search engines. It is your content that is shared and talked about on social networking and social media websites. So far this has been an unstated truth.
Of late Google has been quite aggressive and it is heavily penalizing websites and blogs that use “illegitimate” ways to improve their search engine rankings. Many of these tactics and methods blacklisted by Google have been a staple of SEO companies. Back links and keywords-centric content— once the most acceptable ways of improving your search engine rankings— can plummet your rankings irredeemably if done wrongly. Many small businesses have had to create new websites from scratch.
So what is the safest bet? User-focused content writing.
Let me applaud the demise of keywords, keywords, keywords as an SEO maxim. Far too often the myopic focus on keywords has led to bad writing and boring content.
Google’s new guidelines are crystal clear and refreshing:
As we’ve known for years, it always comes down to words; to content, content, content, if you will.
If you’re looking to develop exceptional content for your website, I’ve love to talk to you. And if you’ve published content, content, content before me, I’ll gladly relinquish the mantle to which I’m laying claim.
My academic paper, The Summer of Springsteen’s Political Baptism, has been accepted into the Bruce Springsteen Special Collection, which is housed on the campus of Monmouth University in West Long Branch, NJ. The Collection serves the research and informational needs of music fans, scholars, authors and others with a serious interest in Bruce Springsteen’s life and career.