SEO is just like American politics, or at least for the purposes of this article we’ll assume that it is. “It’s the economy, stupid” is a famous slogan from the Clinton campaign in 1992 where Bill Clinton defeated George Bush (the older one, not the stupid one) just one year after 90% of Americans said they were pleased with Bush as a president.
The slogan was meant solely for internal use for Clinton’s followers, and referred to George Bush’s failure at realising the importance of the US economy, which had just entered recession (how times change eh?).
Bush’s foreign policy was excellent. He’d ended the Cold War and had staged a successful invasion of Iraq, but his boasts of ‘no more taxes’ proved false.
Just like Bush, many SEOs believe that their foreign policy is what will earn their clients the rankings they’re after. Using links and social networking websites to try to boost their client’s rankings is what occupies much of their time, rather than what they should be doing, concentrating on the economy, the on-page SEO.
You can spend as much as you like on links and on promoting your website abroad (off-site) but if you get the basics wrong at home you’ll be throwing away your lead in the polls, or in the Google rankings. The SEO on your own website is the most vital part of any SEO campaign, and if your on-page SEO is being held up for any reason you’ll never achieve the rankings you should.
“It’s the economy, stupid” became a piece of political culture in the US, and has been paraphrased many times over, yet its use in the world of SEO is just as valid.
As an SEO, are you a George Bush or a Bill Clinton?
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