A lot of businesses new to search engine optimisation imagine that it’s much like other forms of Internet marketing. In essence, you throw a message out there, it flies the path you’ve decided for it, and lands where you want it to, like tossing a pebble.
SEO, on the other hand, is more like throwing a rabbit. It tends to squirm in unpredictable ways once you release it, making it difficult to know where or how it will land. If you’re lucky, it will land next to another rabbit and soon you’ll be able to fill the whole of Cheshire with your results. If you’re unlucky, you’ll end up with a twisted paw and a grumpy bunny on your hands.
The point is that search engine optimisation doesn’t necessarily behave the way you want it to, and this makes it important to learn how to handle it properly. Instead of trying to force it into the patterns you’re used to with other areas of Internet marketing, you need to learn its own patterns. Once you do, you’ll have a much easier time of it.
This is something learned early on in successful SEO careers, as without an acceptance of how unpredictable SEO can be, you aren’t likely to get results. Once you accept that SEO is more like a rabbit than a pebble, you can start to plan for unexpected moves. Instead of looking only where you think the pebble will land, you can start looking at the whole field, planning on how you’re going to use your unexpected results.
Careful though, it’ll probably be full of rabbits.
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