Last week, I found myself working on a strategy for MySpace. Yes, MySpace. The newest iteration of the old school social site ended its invitation-only private beta, coinciding with new co-owner Justin Timberlake launching his first single in over five years. The completely reimagined UX has gotten coverage by everyone from Mashable to Forbes.
Just the week prior, I was checking out rave reviews for the new iPhone app for Flickr, launched as part of Yahoo’s latest attempt to return to digital relevance. It was a well-timed launch, coming just before the current front-runner in photo sharing platforms, Instagram, took a major misstep with their latest terms and conditions.
“Isn’t SEO just gaming the search engines?”
If you’ve ever had to make the case for SEO, this Molotov cocktail of cynicism has likely been lobbed your way.
“But good content doesn’t need an SEO strategy.”
Right. It doesn’t. And horses don’t need saddles. But things go a heck of a lot smoother if you have one.
“SEO is just a temporary solution; the way technology changes it’ll be obsolete in a few years anyway.”
Yes, you’re probably right. And this whole Internet fad is probably on its last legs, too.
But I’m not here to make counterarguments to SEO cynics. Because the larger argument is this: Even if Google folded, Bing disappeared, and Yahoo went back to being just another name for crazy, SEO would still matter.
Why? Because the practice of SEO will make your website better, stronger, and easier to use, even if the search engines stopped crawling. Think about it:
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