I’ve been due a rant so here goes:
logo professional creative branding competitive revolutionary strategy designer
Confused? How about….
I am a professional creative designer who specialises in revolutionary branding solutions. My services range from logo design to providing advice and guidance concerning brand strategy.
Now, I am guessing that you are still confused. It’s more likely that you assume that this post is an SEO punt at trying to get more hits to my site. Well, it’s quite the opposite, and I’d like to share my opinions on the untamable beast that social media has become and how it is affecting business as a general rule.
If you have an interest in the Internet, web design in particular, you’ll know that SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation. It’s that supposed little golden ticket to achieving a ton of hits to your website by utilizing certain techniques that help push your domain further up to the top of the rankings in search engines.
SEO, in my opinion is a pain in the ass. Not because it can be so hard to get to the top of the rankings for certain keyword searches, but how it brings a lot of the scum to the top of the pond. I guess you could call the Internet an ocean as it’s so large, but for examples sake I’ll refer to a particular key search as a pond.
When I want to search for something, especially a business, Google hits me with an influx of websites that offer that particular service. It normally takes me about 5 or 6 pages in to a search before I find a match that I deem worth investigating further. The results prior to that are more often than not full of spam under the hood (code) to get them in that position in the first place. The quality of the design of a website can also play an important role in grabbing my attention, since that’s what I do for a living, but it’s not always essential. Some of the most genuine and helpful people I’ve ever dealt with have websites that are somewhat stuck in the dark ages yet they still thrive in their own way. However, it upsets me that they could and should be at the top of the rankings rather than the frothing scum.
This has been going on for donkeys years (accurate figure) but since the birth of Social Media it’s taken on new forms of bullshit. Around the time I joined Twitter in 2009 it was a great place to meet new people and share links with one another for interests sake. As the user base of Twitter, and to some extent Facebook, expanded this practice became more common-place. As more and more links were shared, a timeline (depending on who you follow) could be filled with links relating to that subject. Which is perfectly fine.
Now the problem we have is that a majority of the people who share these interesting links are doing so purely for SEO purposes. Which again is fine. But the problem is good old Joe Bloggs who isn’t exactly web savvy but offers the best service there is gets further left behind. You could say that it is their own fault for not ‘keeping up with the times’ but why should have they have to just to get more business?
Then there are the people who have seen this as a business opportunity to capitalise on people in this situation to help them embrace social media & seo and bring them up to speed. Social Media Experts. If someone tells you that they are a Social Media Expert, they probably aren’t. What would that job title entail do you imagine? Being able to converse with potential clients in a professional and effective manner or would it involve spamming their eyeballs with a ton of links and bolded keywords. May I add in some cases the articles/pages don’t make any sense at all.
It often makes me wonder if in the future people will ask speak in keywords rather than real sentences as the internet makes them even more lazy. ‘like long walks cinema drinks coffee dvd wine dogs girlfriend?’
p.s. this is not a veiled attempt at jumping in the SEO pool of bullshit, I’d just thought I’d give a different take on the wonderful world of social media and just take a closer look before you are hooked in by a cheesy article.
