Banner

Blog

Our Start in SEO

  • August 20, 2020
  • Bradley Taylor

SEO is short for Search Engine Optimization. This term is used for the process of optimizing your website and making the specific changes and additions that will make your website show up higher in search results. It is an ever-changing field but at the core, the philosophy remains the same – That is if you put out a fast, good looking, functional website which has an abundance of unique content, you cannot go wrong.

From the early 2000’s onward, there were classes and seminars being offered to train young webmasters how to optimize their site. Before formal training there was a lot of “learning on the job”. Webmasters would also share tips and ideas with one another in forums and on blogs.

SEO and White Hat Early Days

I created my very first website in 2000. It was a project for a class I was taking in college. A few years later I started my own online business. Within a few years I had websites that ranked both locally and nationally. Naturally, that brought customers my way who were looking to increase their traffic organically through search.

In a way, you could say that I fell into the SEO field as a by-product of having so much success getting my own sites, as well as my early clients’ sites, ranked highly in the search results.

Being a good SEO means sticking with the fundamentals, but also learning new techniques and how to optimize new platforms. Optimizing a WordPress site is pretty different that optimizing a classic html site. But like I said above, the fundamentals are the same. A good optimizer must spend time and put care into each and every page of the site.

If you are doing your own SEO and have not seen the results you want ask yourself the following questions:

  1. Am I trying any shortcuts?
  2. Am I putting in enough time?
  3. Do I really know what I am doing?

There are no shortcuts. Hard work is the only key. You can work efficiently and save time, but there are no cheat codes.

For optimal local results you should be putting at least 3-5 hours a week into your website. National results require 3-5 hours per day, minimum.

Optimizing incorrectly can actually do more harm than good if you are not using “white hat ” techniques.

Feel free to contact me if you need help optimizing your site. I always dispense quick advice for free. And if you are looking for someone to take over your project, please consider Olympus Web.