I’m going to share a little something with you that I tell clients at every first meeting…
The internet is the opposite of the field of dreams.
What do I mean by that?
I’ve been building web sites pretty much since the dawn of the commercial internet back in 1995. Back in the day, everyone thought the internet was the field of dreams. They thought, if we build it they will come. Remember that Kevin Costner movie? It took me about 2 web sites to realize that “if we build it, it will probably just sit there in obscurity.”
So how does this relate to SEO and what do I mean by “they’re coming, lets build it for them”? It’s all about keywords. Every day millions of people search the internet for millions of keywords (or more accurately, key phrases). They’re already coming! Build it for them! This is why keyword research is so critical. Before you open Photoshop to start designing a site, before you launch Dreamweaver or Visual Studio, before you write one line of code, you better know what key phrases people are searching the internet for to find the products or services offered by your client. And once you know that, you better build that site around those keywords. It’s my feeling that if you don’t do that as a web developer or designer, you’re committing internet malpractice.
More later on how to find those key phrases and some advice on how to pick which key phrases out of the hundreds you will discover to focus on.