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Defending SEO, Yet Again!

Danny Sullivan on December 29, 2006 at 8:44 am

SEM and SEO, Rocket
Science, or Just Plain Science? (Part 1) from Kevin Lee at ClickZ has Kevin
jumping formally into the "SEO is easy versus SEO is rocket science debate" and
digging a hole even deeper for himself, as far as I’m concerned. Sorry, Kevin.

Kevin writes:

To recap the roots of the controversy, my business partner of over 10
years, David Pasternack, touched a nerve recently when he wrote an article for
his DMNews column, Troubled Times for SEO Firms, in which he stated, "SEO
isn’t rocket science."
Apparently, a segment of the SEO blogosphere hopes to continue positioning
SEO as just that, perhaps to justify high fees.

Sigh. No, Kevin. A segment of the SEO blogosphere dislikes the idea that real
skills they have just get dismissed as if it is stuff anyone can learn by
reading a few help pages at Google in a day. I already went through all this in
my past post, Yes
Virginia, SEO Is Rocket Science – Defending Search Engine Optimization Once
Again, so I won’t belabor the point. I’ll just direct you
here
and

here. Those are just two people having SEO issues this week. Might not be
rocket science to you, but for them, it is.

I’d like Dave in particular to contact

this Danish woman with the shopping site on Google that’s she’s built out of
frames. Have him do that "fix it once" thing he’s talking about and make it all
better and fully indexed on Google. She’s read the help pages he’s suggested:

What I am saying is that most marketers can achieve significant organic
rankings without resorting to anything more mysterious than applying the basic
optimization principles outlined in Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.

Yet she’s still having trouble. Of course, in your column, you recommend:

Some sites don’t get the rankings they deserve based on the quality of their
content and their reputations. Their marketers should absolutely either learn
SEO or hire a professional. Courses and training are widely available.

Why would she hire a professional? Why after you and Dave have suggested that
it’s all about "high fees" or "paying a fortune" or that SEO isn’t an ongoing
task and that the firms out there are offering "unnecessary services" since
anyone can learn this stuff. And after Dave spends the week or two — at least
— it will take to clean up her mess, be sure he bills at $15 per hour. We
wouldn’t want her paying a fortune.

For the record, no one is saying that SEO must be outsourced, not that I’ve
seen. There’s a huge, growing number of SEOers that do work in house. Some do
that exclusively. Some do that with external firms, and there’s no one perfect
model. But those in housers? They have value as well and in many cases have
fought to show their value and wrest control of SEO away from the IT
departments. Articles that suggest what they do is a "one time" thing that the
IT department could do itself in a few hours doesn’t help them any more than it
helps the external SEO shops.

Kevin, I’m with you that there are plenty of bad companies and bad pitches in
search marketing, and that’s on both the paid and organic side. And no, it’s not
true rocket science. But SEO is indeed a skill. You can pick up basic skills and
might be perfectly fine. Many do. Many should, and doing it in house is fine.
That’s a perfectly good message to send. But there are advanced skills as well,
and they are hugely valuable.

I can respect that Dave and you felt you were doing a wake-up call for the
industry, after one single survey suggested a slowdown on the SEO side. I look
forward to your part two to see if there’s more survey data that those in the
SEO world will want to understand. But with respect, Dave’s first article and
your follow up didn’t come across as a wake up call. They come across as an
attack on the side of the search marketing house you’re not part of. Perhaps
that message might have been better delivered from someone actively working on
the SEO side of the house. But I also believe that if it was, it might have
taken a less stereotypical view of the SEO industry.

About The Author

Danny Sullivan

Danny Sullivan was a journalist and analyst who covered the digital and search marketing space from 1996 through 2017. He was also a cofounder of Third Door Media, which publishes Search Engine Land, Marketing Land, MarTech Today and produces the SMX: Search Marketing Expo and MarTech events. He retired from journalism and Third Door Media in June 2017. You can learn more about him on his personal site & blog He can also be found on Facebook and Twitter.