Business Management Consultant - Stuntdubl Search and Marketing Consulting

[...] * AMEN to Todd. He’s an optimizer optimizing to become optimally optimized. If only more people would follow his advice. Business sense plus SEO experience and knowledge is the key. Go stuff some meta tags up your ass if you don’t think so. [...]

I’d say optimal is a balancing act online. What’s optimal for conversions may not be optimal for traffic, so optimal to me ends up being a myth. I’ll settle for something that works and forget about trying to get optimal… that takes far too many usability studies, meetings with consultants, committees and other nonsense.

If it gets traffic that converts, I can tweak things, but there isn’t an optimal state to me.

Also, what’s optimal now may not be optimal in 6 months due to demographic changes, outside factors, public opinion, etc.

My final thought is that optimal to me may not be optimal to you. I may see something and not convert, but it may be perfect for someone else to convert. A website can’t be everything to everybody.

Tough business we’re in, but that’s what makes it fun.

I was having a bit of a rant about something similar earlier - the old ‘over optimisation’ saying. Like you said - there is no such thing as half way optimal - there is also no such thing as over optimised. Impossible - by definition!

show me a site that has too much content or too many links…I dare you

Wikipedia!

Isn’t “optimization” but a means to an end? Don’t these words simply represent a facilitation that results in more traffic to one’s website? Sometimes I think that focusing on the technical meanings of these words leads us away from the task potential clients are looking to pay us for–and that is to bring more qualified traffic to their site at a cost that is within acceptable ROI boundaries. Use whatever words you want, I think that ultimately it boils down to dictating client perception and expectation of what they are going to get for their money.

I’ll be optimized when I don’t have to work anymore

[...] Maybe We All Do It, But You Can Only Speculate On The SeverityOnce the cat is out of the bag, there will be no end to the discussion on the usage and implementation of questionable practices and tactics. More importantly, the fact that something of potentially great magnitude has been brought into the open means that anyone looking for an edge will start dabbling in the environment and people that are “in the know” minimize their real conversations and discussions on what may work and what may get you hurt.Perhaps, “It” is really the debatable discussion overall. Is video taping a coaching staff’s play calls just as bad as taking HGH or gambling for/against your team while you are playing for that team? Does the system create an environment which is really enabling coaches and players to figure out ways to game the system and bend the rules? Being successful in your optimization strategy (be it on the playing field or in search engine marketing) is about leveraging experience and knowledge to make informed decisions, designed to give you the highest potential for success while minimizing the risk of negative impact. [...]

Its amazing how information architecture and seo go hand in hand in many cases. When it comes to optimization, the sites must be optimized first for humans and then for robots with streamlined navigation and architecture. After this, the site should be optimized more and more and updated constantly. Many times, like on my wiki (in my sig), the architecture is difficult for the niche is too deep. Does anyone have any suggestions for optimizing the architecture of an SEO/SEM wiki?

As for this article, the biggest part of optimization is continuous optimization based on your audience, yet that still goes into the arena of something much larger, usability studies and such. Wikipedia is the best for architecture, but the pages aren’t entirely optimized, Wikipedia just has the ultimate authority.

As a new website owner this whole optimization thing is very scarey! I have an online party invitation company. We have been learning that links are the most important thing. This all seems like a foreign language and very expensive. I find myself in a panic about not doing the right thing and have google shun me.

[...] Stuntdbl rants about search engine optimization and notes that most SEO’s talk, blog, complain and pontificate about optimization instead of actually doing the work necessary to get pages good placement. [...]

Very well said.

In my mind, optimization is a very loosely utilized term, when working on any site you need to identify what it is you’re optimizing. Organic search? Conversion rates? User interaction? On and on…

Invariably the answer is yes to any of the above. If you’re a site owner then you should be optimizing every aspect of your business continually. If you’re an SEO then working to understand the business model, state of the business, and business objectives is a huge part of the process.

Optimizing a site for search is only the first step in the process. Working to turn search traffic into converting traffic is also a goal (for me anyhow).

Also instilling the concept of relevant content, targeted messaging, strong site structure (technically and design wise) so those goals are achieved on an ongoing basis by everyone involved.

I may have restated your post but I honestly could not agree more. Now I should get back to work

I think the optimizer in this discussion holds the key as to what is optimal and optimized. If he/she is a successful optimizer then that gives said optimizer credibility - his/her optimal and optimized solutions will then gain more weight.

In the beginning I didn’t even understand “SEO”! Then I landed here, and the help just poored in! Thanks!

I also got help from a guy named James Brausch, who has some pretty smart SEO software called Nemeas, which you can find at:

http://www.Nemeas.com .

Between all the help and the SEO software I seem to be pretty optimized…

Now just to get through being Xmasized - lol!

Merry Christmas To You All!