Learn SEO from Your Spouse

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What a great analogy! It's perfect - building a relationship with the search engines and therefore with the searchers. More and more it's all about relationship building, not just work.

SEO can be a little overwhelming for a lot of people so putting it into terms that are easily understood is great. Until, of course, you meet the person that is on their 4th marriage...!

I'm sure, with create relation with search engine we will be success as Internet marketing. I love the illustration that compare Search Marketing with Dating. Is true.

Great article. I have an additional one: Don't let a fight or crisis discourage you to do better in the future. It wouldn't be all perfect!

And don't give up too easily.

"When I first met him, I thought he was a dork. But he hung around and I got to know him better and he always seemed to be in the right place at the right time and helping in the right way, and the relationship grew".

No, I did not stalk my future wife, but we did have to slowly get to know each other. It was NOT love at first sight.

Keith

What a brilliant comparison - wait till I tell my husband:). You certainly made me look at it with a completely different perspective - think long-term.

Best,
Ana

Great article and interesting take on it. For sure it is a long term relationship and i am always surprised at how quickly people give up. With UK divorce rates at 50% maybe our culture does not inspire/encourage a large number of people to put the effort in to any type of relationship whether it SEO or Marriage!!!

So... what you're saying is that we should find those that have been successful in online dating (building a long relationship) and convert them to online marketers?

Nice analogy, I liked it.

Points 1 and 2 are pretty much on the mark.

On point 3, I'd add that you better understand your date and make sure you deliver what it is that you have to offer that they need.

Good add, @Robert. To me, the key to success is working on a relationship with the search engine and more importantly, with your customer. It's the short-term, tricky, spammy approaches that give SEO a bad name (and rightly so) but also take far more effort and intelligence to pull off than most of us are up for.

Agree with you Mike, we should treat SEO as long term goal. Learning SEO is like building relationhip to Google.

Very amusing analogy, but very accurate. Personally one of the most important aspects of a succesful marriage is the giving and taking, for example if I spend a night out with mates I should expect my wife to be able to spend some time with her friends and thus me look after the children etc.
With Google what you take is the exposure, the rankings, the traffic etc but you need to make sacrifices. You can't expect to achieve all these things without giving something back i.e. great content, good copy, engaging commentary, interactive content etc.
Marriage is a two way process and so is our affair with Google.

Thanks, Eddy. Glad you liked it. I find myself more and more trying to find ways to explain the difference between the spammy flavor of the month, I can outwit the algorithm approach, and what us normal people need to do. Thanks for the positive feedback.