In my research to become a better SEO, I came across an article about the relationship between search engine optimization (SEO) and blogging. The article argues that SEO advice for a traditional Web site is useless. I agree. Search engines such as Google want quality, original content. A good blog will be updated regularly so the front page won’t maintain a post for long. After x amount of time, the post becomes archived. These archives are a lot more important. I regularly check server statistics to find out how visitors got to where they are, where visitors are going from there, and what they do on the Web site. What I’ve seen is that this blog’s archives are its primary source of traffic from searchers. For instance, an article I posted quite a couple of months back regarding old computers has received large amounts of traffic from 1 keyword in there. This was not my intent but it is a most welcome gift.

Blogs are not only for exposing frauds, updating friends on your vacation, or learning the latest about a band, they are for networking. Blogs are easy ways to gain new business without the drive to the local business breakfast (while the food is great). This moves blogs from falling into needing search engine optimization and into the world of search engine marketing (SEM).