
Strategic SEO for Startups - patio11
http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/01/24/startup-seo/
======
patio11
This was inspired by (among other things) a thread earlier today about how to
launch a beta (where Vaksel said, and I agree, get something out there and
start SEOing -- this advice provides a bit of the "how").

I've also chitchatted with a few people here who asked me about this topic.
Feel free to chime in if you want me to share what I told you with the group
-- I default to Facebook 2004 privacy settings regarding specific advice. ;)

~~~
asmosoinio
Did you publish something similar to this about a year ago or so? I had a
really strong deja vu when reading this...

------
sachinag
Really? People don't get that (white hat) SEO is, at its heart, simply _make
interesting content_?

~~~
patio11
That's like saying marketing is making remarkable products. It is true but
incomplete and doesn't tell you anything actionable to get working on today.
I'm sort of hoping my blog post said something that was true and non-vacuous.

~~~
sachinag
Right, my point is that making good content may not be sufficient, but it is
necessary. If you aren't making interesting content, the other stuff amounts
to a rounding error.

There are all sorts of people who will fiddle with tags and whatnot to try to
perfectly shape their site because they're scared/lazy to not make good
content. But there is nothing that has a higher ROI on time than making
interesting content. Sure, try to make interesting content around the long
tail terms that you can optimize for, but at the end of the day, you have to
make interesting content.

~~~
tomh-
There are more types of websites than just content based websites and
sometimes websites who have to compete for the exact same content. The one who
understands internet marketing the best will have better rankings than the
ones that don't. A webshop selling airline tickets won't rank better if you
add "interesting content", thats just not the way it works. Also the
"interesting content" might distract people from what they have to do, order
tickets. People have to realize that internet marketing is here to stay and it
is something you have to think about.

Also your statement about spending time on interesting content gives your the
highest ROI is not true. Hollywood and the game industry prove from time to
time that they can create hypes and market B quality productions and still
make tons of money. This also counts on the internet. Content is evaluated by
machines (Google, Bing etc) who determine if it is interesting or not. Doing
A/B testing to test which landing page works best is better time spent than
spending your time hiring people to create interesting content. Just changing
your button can increase sales by over 100%.

Ask the developers in the appstore whats more important, interesting content
or a position in the top 5.

------
jng
Patrick, incredibly spot-on and valuable, as always. Thanks.

In my experience with ViEmu and Codekana, recommendations by highly respected
bloggers are what help sales the most. In most areas, there already is a
"network of trust" out there, and getting in through someone up in the food
chain can make a great difference.

I do think some presence in Reddit, Hacker News, etc... are helpful in order
to establish credentials and a solid background from which to do more specific
actions.

------
steveklabnik
One other little addendum that I think is important: make sure that you blog
on a fairly regular basis! Nobody will bother to subscribe if you don't keep
making good content for them to come back to.

This is something my startup does poorly. We haven't yet gotten into that
habit, and since we don't pay attention, weeks go by without a post, even
though we have great ideas on things to write about. This is one thing we've
talked a lot about making sure we improve upon in the future.

~~~
patio11
_make sure that you blog on a fairly regular basis!_

A few years ago, prior to starting my current day job (and long before I
started participating on HN), I blogged three times a week or more. I wrote a
few gems and a lot of, ahem, filler, got a wee bit of traction but not too
much (though it was PR6 at one point, which is great for geek bragging rights
and of no use whatsoever otherwise), and burned out eventually.

I think blogging regularly is a practice which auto-commoditizes your content,
which is probably not the best idea for a time pressed startup which has
sharply limited resources. For instance, a fairly typical article for me would
have been a 30 minute exploration into a thought I had that day. Roughly one
of those in ten would attract attention outside of the folks already reading
my blog.

These days, I blog about a fifth as much or less, but am much smarter about
topic selection. While I still have scratch my own itch articles every once in
a while, if I'm going to spend my time on something, I try to do it _right_
such that it doesn't just fall into the background noise on the Internet. That
means being choosy on topics, going for stuff I know will probably be popular,
making smart tactical choices like writing self-consciously for reading on the
Internet (H2 tags, bolded call-out bits, visual engagement, etc) rather than
doing my usual stream-of-consciousness rambling, etc.

~~~
petewarden
To give some numbers from my own experiences, I've been blogging for about
three years and have 700 posts under my belt. I'm up to 300 RSS subscribers
and 400 visitors a day.

It's definitely not a quick fix for any startup, and you might well be better
off focused on improving your landing page conversion rate if you want an
immediate return on your time. It's been a massive long-term help for me
though, both teaching me how to communicate and market much more effectively,
and making connections with my readers. Multiple times I've walked into
meetings cold and it's turned out someone knows me from my blog, which has
been a massive help.

Plus, it's actually a lot of fun!

------
csallen
_> > the site at the top of the rankings for teddy bears (almost certainly
Wikipedia, I can tell you without looking) is the first people go for teddy
bears _

Funny that with teddy bears, the example he blindly chose, Wikipedia happens
to be the 8th result: <http://www.google.com/search?q=teddy+bears>

~~~
asmosoinio
From your link, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teddy_bear comes up as the second result
for me, right after teddybears.com.

