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View Full Version : Is content still king?


KPickenJr
11-04-2005, 08:41 AM
Hi
Im quite new to SEO and I work in the Travel industry. When I began to learn about SEO, the emphasis was on content. So all the sites I have worked have became very content rich (also relevant tags etc). This even worked for a while, with more specific, less competitive terms until Googles May update ( i think it was may???) then it all went down hill. Even more so since the jagger update.

I constantly compare my pages with the pages that rank in the top 10 for my search terms. My content is better, by far, but you won't find my site within the first 10 results pages. I figured that I have been spending far too much time on all the "on-page" factors and now, practically all of my time is spent getting links. I don't think you can rank at all in the travel indusrty without links.

I was browsing the net and came across this article, via "fantomaster": http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,66893,00.html

The article is from March of this year and to quote from it,

""I could create a blank page without a keyword anywhere present, or a 404 error message, and if I can get enough sites to link to it, I could get it to place first on Google,"

Based on my experience in the travel industry, I now agree with this statement 100 percent.

I would like to hear the opinions of some more experts though?

Thanks

KP

rogerd
11-04-2005, 10:09 AM
Perhaps inbound linkage is king, and content is now queen? ;)

A lot depends on how competitive the arena is, and what kind of results you are expecting.

Content does lots of things for you - it gets you "long tail" search traffic, it keeps visitors on-site, it stimulates unsolicited links when other webmasters find your content valuable... but in a competitive arena, you'll need strong off-site factors working for you as well.

While if you have the resources, it may still be possible to "googlebomb" your way to the top for a particular phrase, this isn't the formula for long-term site success. If you are in it for the long haul, work on both on-site and off-site factors.