Barely Myself

Do you write in article directories and other user generated content sites? Have a blog you post in frequently (and monetize)? Chances are you have fallen prey to the SEO demon as well.

I’m not saying I didn’t. I even sell a report with my SEO secrets. SEO can be a dangerous thing. Here are three things I would consider before spending large amounts of time and energy on SEO.

1. It changes your focus. A lot of writers will start to focus what keywords are popular and simply write to them, trying to include them rather than focusing on content, and even choosing topics solely by popularity.
2. It isn’t evergreen; it is a flash in the pan. When you write to SEO solely, you are taking what was popular at the moment and you ride a trend. Passionate writing is evergreen. While the subject you wrote on may not stay your love forever, your passion shines through in the writing. It will make it a steadfast attraction to your target readers: not because you used the right keywords, but because you had genuine, evident interest for your topic.
3. It ignores your audience. You may think that SEO is writing for your audience because you are using statistics to discover them. This idea only goes so far: you are using statistics and optimizing for a search engine. Try optimizing your content to a reader.

SEO isn’t all evil. I recommend small amounts of research after you have a starting point. Don’t let SEO make your decisions, let it help you point readers to your work, rather than point your writing to the search engine.

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