This is it! The end! The very last post in this series on SEO for Bloggers.
Today, I want to tackle something that I think is really important: writing for robots. SEO is, simply put, a formula. As we’ve learned these last few months, it’s about keyword strategies, and making sure that those key words appear in specific places on your blog. And in certain quantities. The problem is, though, you’re a blogger. Not a website copywriter. It’s much easier to manipulate the copy to make it sound like real english on a website than it is in a blog.
The whole point of a blog is that we are writing from a first-person perspective about who we are, and what we’re up to. We are writing as if we we were speaking directly to our audience.
When you’re writing that way, probably the last thing on your mind is keywords, and making sure your density is high enough. You’re just writing–it’s whatever comes pouring out of you.
Here’s the thing: if you write your blog for robots, normal people won’t read it. Because they’ll know you wrote it for robots, and they aren’t robots.
You have to write for your audience first, and for SEO second.
I usually sit down with an idea and write the post. Then I go back and choose an appropriate keyword, and adjust the post accordingly. I’ll make sure my keyword or keywords appear in the title of the post, in the URL, and I’ll see if there is some way I can work them into my copy a couple more times, without it sounding dumb. Sometimes I’m more successful than others. Sometimes my SEO isn’t stellar. But I’m happy with the post.
So. It’s up to you to decide, but I prioritize connecting with my audience over connecting with Google’s bots. Yes, having kick-ass SEO might bring people to my site, but if the content there sounds like I sent it through Google Translate a few times, and published the mangled final result, no one will stay. Or come back.
I hope you’ve found this series on SEO for Bloggers useful. I know I’ve learned a lot, and I’m excited for the next series I’m going to do… announcement coming soon!
In the mean time, if you want to see the archive of all 12 posts, click here.