Search Engines Or Readers: Whose Attention Is Most Important?
First off, I’d like to thank reader Consolidation School Loan for giving me this idea, because it really is rather timely.
We’ve talked at length here about capturing attention, and Consolidated School Loan finally broke down and basically asked which one is the most important?
The simple answer is neither. But when in doubt, err on the side of your readers.
See, the whole reason to appeal to search engines is to GET you readers. If, in the beginning, the search engines aren’t happy with you you’re not likely to get very far. But once the search engines start bringing in readers, that come back regularly, well, then there’s not much point to the search engines any more, is there?
Search engines don’t buy your merch. Search engines don’t click ads or leave comments. All a search engine does is BRING READERS, that in turn, do all those things.
Search engines take territory, to misquote the military parlance, but readers hold it.
So if you MUST decide between the two, choose readers. Do what you can to keep the search engines happy, because they bring more readers. But don’t sacrifice your readers’ happiness for the search engines. What does it profit me if I have the highest-ranked blog on Google, but spend all my time screaming keywords and racial epithets? Who’ll stick around and read THAT?
Don’t ignore the search engines. That’s a move you make at your own peril. But neglecting the search engines a bit in favor of your readers, a sixty-forty split, say, will not go unrewarded.
Popularity: 4% [?]
#1 by Indiasafaries on January 14, 2010 - 2:51 am
The Title of post is very powerful author it gives the full meaning to the readers.
thanks
#2 by Essays on January 14, 2010 - 6:31 am
Choose readers, write something interesting and you will see when search engine spider rank the page, it will generate a new keyword whic you never thought before.
#3 by Program on January 14, 2010 - 8:34 am
First, search engines, then the readers.
#4 by Kevins Promotional P on January 14, 2010 - 9:44 am
at first all i did was write for google.. big mistake once i started focusing on people not only did i get more traffic i actually got better results in google???? go figure.
#5 by Car Transporters | I on January 14, 2010 - 10:50 am
Ultimately what we have to do is to find a balance. Work more for the reader, and partly for the search engine. Because in the big picture a site is really for the reader and not the search engine.
#6 by Bidet on January 15, 2010 - 6:31 pm
Readers in my opinion are more important than the search engines because they are the ones that read your blog and comment on your blog. They are the ones that make it lively, without the readers, the blog would not be worth much.
#7 by Evden eve nakliye on January 16, 2010 - 10:05 am
Choose readers, write something interesting and you will see when search engine spider rank the page, it will generate a new keyword whic you never thought before.
#8 by oem usb on January 18, 2010 - 5:23 pm
yeah,it's good for me ,and usful.
#9 by monitor cable on January 20, 2010 - 12:53 pm
It's a fine balancing act…..gotta keep em both happy. Ignore SE's or readers at your own peril!
#10 by wood beads on January 21, 2010 - 1:34 am
this thing that you said (All a search engine does is BRING READERS) bombards my brain to choose search engine than readers…but what if your blog has very low quality? readers will just ignore it and will not come back for more.
I agree, choose readers.
You will never be popular with search engines but you can be popular to your readers and MORE readers.