Search Engines & Optimization

By Anthony Parsons
Posted Monday, June 28, 2004

Search engines, search engines, search engines....Who knows which one to optimize for? Why does everyone behave so silly when it comes to search engines and optimization for a particular engine or keyword even? As most know, Google is the flavour of the month. It appears that everyone is excited about it. What about the other engines? Did someone forget that they exist?

Because Google is the leading engine, this years "in engine" , word of mouth spreads, more people use it, website owners begin optimizing for it and SEO goes nuts. How easily we forget, that only a year or so ago, Yahoo was the leading search engine. Which one next I wonder?

I think it is quite humorous that people have become strung up about one particular engine and one method of advertisement because they do well for a short period. By a short period, I mean a year or two. This is short when your running a business over decades. Google changed their algorithm end 2003 and sent the world a shockwave. Someone forget to tell these many upset businesses and website do it yourselvers, that relying upon one method of advertisement is not good business practice. If that's the extent of business knowledge , then some businesses are in lots of trouble.

Florida (Google HQ) decided to change their system. As a result, many website owners, who had paid thousands of dollars or suffered thousands of man hours building a website came unstuck. Why? Because all of their efforts were built around the characteristics of one system. Who did they blame? SEO's, Experts, Copywriters, Link Building Companies, Google or anyone who would listen - often the media. Someone forgot to tell them that Google is a business, and if your manipulating a website within their search engine rankings, your messing with their business. Keeping this in perspective, only those negatively affected are crying to the press. Those businesses or individuals who gained rankings as a result of this change, strangely enough, don't have anything negative to say.

I think the moral of the story is, people need to stop attempting to over optimize a website and never concentrate on only one source for rankings. Website owners need to focus on reality and market their websites across as many engines as possible. It is also necessary to keep a focus on what you are trying to achieve. Essentially, a website to attract visitors and stimulate their attention for your information and products.

About the Author
Anthony Parsons has been performing search engine optimization since 1998. In late 2003 I decided to fly solo and opened my own SEO business to service the global community. With my wife being an acknowledged copywriter, anthonyparsons.com as a business will continue stepping forward breaking the boundaries of conventional SEO techniques. Making a winning husband and wife team, we make SEO affordable for all budgets.