I love reading SEO blogs, especially those of the theoretical kind. Two of my favorites are SEO Theory by Michael Martinez and SEO By The Sea, written by Bill Slawski. Both of these men are brilliant. That’s not to say that I always agree with them. I just think they are always interesting.
Recently, Mr. Martinez poured out his passion (and his ironic ire) onto the page by dissing meta tags, keywords, and other flora and fauna of the SEO world. I found myself going Yeah, What?, Yeah, What?, Yeah! You know, like watching a ping pong game by imaginary world class beer pong players. I got a small case of mental whiplash for agreeing and disagreeing in rapid-fire automatic.
Here’s what he said (in a proverbial nutshell):
- Never write another meta description
- Stop putting keywords in your page titles
- Exact-match domain names have never worked
- Stop using keywords
- Google Panda is a ranking factor
So which part of that did I agree with? Let’s analyze.
Meta Descriptions Are Useless
I laughed when I read this one because, quite frankly, he’s wrong.
In theory, of course, he is quite right. Here’s the theory (right off the page):
Your Holy SEO Mantra for Meta Descriptions for the next THREE YEARS must now be: “The Entire Page Is The Meta Description”. GET THAT THROUGH YOUR THICK, CONSERVATIVE, GRAND-FATHER CLAUSED NOGGIN’ because I am *not* going to repeat myself again for a long, long time.
On that point, Michael Martinez is absolutely 100% correct. The search engines will take any part of your page and make it a search results snippet. I’ve seen it, I’ve cataloged it, I know it to be true.
However, it is equally true that they will take your meta description and use it as a search results snippet. What they will not do (I’m fairly sure) is use your meta description to determine your ranking for a keyword phrase, and that’s OK.
What Mr. Martinez would have you do is stop writing meta descriptions and rely entirely upon the search engine to cull its SERP snippets directly from your page. I don’t think that’s a good idea any more than you leaving your career to the chance that your employer will know what is best for you. You present resumes, CVs, and portfolios to present your best work, right? Then why wouldn’t you offer a meta description so that the search engine can determine whether to use it or something off your page?
Never, Ever Put A Keyword In Your Page Titles Again, You Moron!
Theoreticians love half-truths and this is where is Michael Martinez shines. His first two paragraphs under this section of his blog post are nothing short of brilliant, so I’m just going to repeat them.
There’s nothing like a well-written title tag. And, frankly, given all the SEO dreck I have to slog through every day about “title tags”, there *IS* nothing like a well-written title tag. Give it up. You suck at writing page titles. Furthermore, you suck at teaching other people to write page titles. Look around you at all the crummy, lousy, boring, repetitive page titles that are flooding the search results.
What does a SERP look like when you type in a query such as “build a backyard canopy” and you are met with 10 variations of “How to Build A Backyard Canopy”, all of which are stuck on pages that ask the question but fail to answer it adequately? Yeah, that’s your handiwork mister Advanced SEO. All those Directors of SEO and Senior SEO Managers who are telling their copywriters to stick the keywords in the title should be shot, horse-whipped, hanged, and sent out to get breakfast from the local fast food joint.
I wholeheartedly agree. Most SEO writers write sucky titles. Really. They’re unimaginative, repetitive drivel.
As a former newspaper editor, I understand the importance of writing a good headline (which is what your page title effectively is). You can’t SEO a print magazine or newspaper. There’s no reason to. It would be silly. But online, keywords in your headlines are gold. The search results prove it.
Here’s what Mr. Martinez follows up with after delivering the above-quoted gut punch:
I’ll bet those cookie-cutter page titles look REAL compelling next to the cookie cutter meta descriptions, don’t they?
Yep, another good point. Doggone those cookie-cutter page titles with keywords in them. They look rather stupid in those search results. But here’s the deal. You’re supposed to be creative, different, unique. And that’s what he’s trying to get at. I agree with him.
Except that I don’t.
You should be writing creative, unique page titles with your keywords in them (if you want to rank in the search engines).
Now, I’m not saying you’ll get automatic rankings if you use your keywords in your page titles, but keywords in the page titles are a HUGE ranking factor. I’m not the only SEO in the world who believes this. Many prominent SEOs teach it and I’ve tried and tested it. It works. And, for the record, I’ve written some of those crummy page titles.
Nevertheless, page titles serve multiple purposes, one of which is to get readers to click on your search result and actually read the page. If your keyword-based page title doesn’t do that, then all you’ve done is annoyed a searcher who won’t click your link. Don’t do that.
Instead, write a compelling page title that gets people to read your content. If possible, use a keyword. It sounds like Mr. Martinez is saying you can’t have it both ways. I think you can.
By the way, try this experiment: Google and Bing “build a backyard canopy” as Mr. Martinez suggests that you do, then click on the search result for eHow’s article on the topic. View Source and compare the SERP snippet with the meta description. See a similarity? Extra credit if you do.
Exact-Match Domains Don’t Have Value And Never Did
I’ll be honest with you. I’m not an algorithmic genius. I’m no mathematician. I’m a writer. And Mr. Martinez might be right about this one. But I have seen a keyword-based domain name outrank other domain names that were not keyword-based, were aged longer, and that had more and higher quality links. Why would that be?
There could be any number of factors. SEO is not a zero sum game. There are more than 200 ranking factors that Google uses and this is straight from the horse’s mouth. No one knows all of them, and I’d be correct to say that no one knows ANY of them for certain. No one but Google. So, who knows? Maybe exact-match domain names are preferred. Maybe they’re not. Maybe I’m a complete moron.
Or maybe Mr. Martinez has other motives?
I’ll tell you this much: I’ve seen non-keyword-based domain names do extremely well, and I’ve seen keyword-based domain names do equally as well. And I’ve seen rankings rise and fall with no reasonable explanation. Maybe links were discounted. Or maybe Google, in their one of 500+ algorithm changes they make each year, put greater or lesser emphasis on domain names. The truth is anybody’s guess.
Keywords Are Bread Crumbs On The Sidewalk Of Your Pigeon-Infested SEO Park
Michael Martinez’s SEO philosophy can be summed up in the following statement:
Stop using keywords and just build links
Don’t believe me? Get it from his own words:
Keywords are less important to search engine optimization than content. For that matter, even links are more important than keywords. Most SEO article writers cannot even begin to tell you why that is so.
What? Huh? Eh?
Let’s translate. Keywords are stupid. Content is smart. SEO is doing smart things. Smart SEOs build links. Why? Because it’s smart.
In the previous paragraph he said this:
You’re a master search engine optimizer if you can take any Website and improve its traffic. You’re a neophyte just learning the mechanics of the trade if you think you should be focusing on keywords.
So if I can improve traffic to any website by using social media and PPC, then I’m a brilliant SEO. Right? Only that’s not SEO. That’s social media marketing and paid search advertising. They’re not the same thing. All of them can build traffic if used effectively, but building traffic is not SEO.
I’m not nitpicking. I am making distinctions. There is a nuance in language here that Mr. Martinez isn’t telling you. And it’s very subtle. When he says
Search engine optimization is not, never has been, and hopefully never will be about chasing keywords
what he really means is you can make money online without being a keyword spammer. You don’t have to stuff your web pages with keyword schlock in order to rank well. That’s true. But do you really think that you can optimize a web page for a search query without using the specific phrase you want to rank for on the page itself and just build links using that phrase as anchor text?
Answer: Yes you can! But why would you? It’s just as risky as writing keyword-based web page spam. Google bombs still work. They’re just not preferred.
Many SEOs worship at the altar of links as much as spammers idolize their keywords. It takes both.
True SEO is about taking advantage every opportunity you have to entice the search engines to raise your search rankings relative to your competition. To do that well, it requires on-page optimization tactics and off-page optimization tactics that don’t involve spam techniques but which rely on making your content stand out in the crowd while targeting your intended audience.
You might think I’m playing with semantics, but I prefer to think that I’m offering a more nuanced way of saying what I think Mr. Martinez was trying to say. Or what I hope he was trying to say.
Is Google Panda A Ranking Factor?
Now, on to the last point. Is Google Panda a ranking factor? Mr. Martinez says it is. Is he right?
Yes. I believe he is.
Why?
Let him tell it:
Neither you nor I are equipped to identify anything that is a ranking factor. No one in the SEO community has even come close to providing an accurate list of search algorithm ranking factors. I seriously doubt anyone ever will. Hence, we should think of EVERYTHING as a possible ranking factor.
Bingo! That’s exactly what I’ve been saying. No one has a fully accurate list of search algorithm ranking factors. And that’s why EVERYTHING is a possible ranking factor. Even Google Panda. Even keywords in your page titles. And your domain names. And your meta descriptions. And your links. And your on-page content.
I’m not a theoretical SEO in any sense. I’m more the practical kind. I may not wax poetic on the way things ought to be, but I know what has worked for me in the past and what continues to work. As long as it works, I’m going to keep doing it.
In summary, SEO isn’t about your keywords. It’s about your content. You should focus your efforts on writing great content, but you can use your keywords to do that. That’s different than saying don’t use keywords at all. A fine nuance, but a necessary one indeed.
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