Ask the SEO Guru

Sometimes it is better to remain silent and have others wonder about your true abilities than to speak and remove all doubt.

Donna Fontenot is one of my favorite people I’ve met online. She has a unique perspective on the seo community and articulates it well at Seo-scoop. This past week she wrote an impassioned post about the negative aspect of the new world social media and her decision to remove herself from it.  I Refuse To Participate In The Vicious Nastiness Going On In Our Industry 

While I applaud the attempt at raising the awareness of social responsibility in others and admire her having the intestinal fortitude to take a stand, I doubt it will have much impact on actually decreasing the daily drama such is social media.

Don’t get me wrong, there will be plenty of support from her readers and passer-bys who are attracted to the theme of the post as they feel the same way, at the moment at least.  A lot of people all agreeing that yes, it is a problem and they are happy to see someone speak out and maybe even wish they had said it first.

You see, it’s easy to champion a lofty ideal as long as it is from a detached position because we all know it’s the way it SHOULD be. That’s cool and all but I still don’t see much changing. Probably not for the reasons you may be thinking though.

Moments after publishing her mini-rant against the vicious, nasty cr@p blogging, (Donna’s words,not mine. I love the way she can make her descriptions almost eloquent  in their brutality), someone promoted it on Sphinn, http://sphinn.com/story/60431 where it quickly went hot and gained several supportive comments. One of the comments I felt summed up the general attitude of a lot of people not actively involved in any dispute perceived to be referenced in the post. The comment was:

We're destroying and abusing the very nature of social media. Which is ironic when so many of the articles we produce ourselves describe processes to leverage social media.

I tried to post a comment myself but somehow my comments keep getting cut off after just one or two lines.

{planting tongue firmly in cheek }
I’m probably banned and only allowed to post two lines because my posts are too long. That would be discrimination and I’d like to do the research to prove it but I lack the time and motivation that Mr. Lewis has to make my case The Sphinn Exposé
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What I was wanting to say was simply this:  

"It isn't a thing that "we" can destroy. It is what it is. By definition, it is the actions and reactions of humans being in a social environment.

It simply reflects what it is that makes us human. I think that is sad and more than a little scarry but it simply is what it is. When you say “we’re destroying the very nature of social media”, the thing is that the entire topic of this post IS the very nature of social media."

We all have the right to choose to participate or not and Donna has publicly announced her decision. I applaud her and desperately hope it helps to raise the bar on online social etiquette ---- but I doubt it.

The Lord of the Flies wasn’t so much fiction after all. Backstabbing, false accusations, hateful comments used to make a weak point, those things all live within the realm of human emotional responses. Now, couple those human frailties with perceived anonymity AND an element of promotional value and ------- HELLOOOO  ugly underbelly !

For me, I choose not to participate except in very rare cases, (and those cases usually offer an opportunity to benefit some goal or objective of my own), but rather observe, accept and use the data to formulate strategic plans to capitalize on the cause and effects.

When you see vicious, nasty cr@p, publicly displayed online, what you are seeing is what we all really are. At least online no one is actually getting physically harmed and personal property isn’t being destroyed. It is all just emotional responses. And I never forget that it is emotional responses that sells things. Not search engines, not blogs, not twitter.  People being people is what makes it all happen and when it is ugly, I always try to remind myself that ugly can be a stimuli as can beauty and both can make a sale.

You see, no one wants to be made to look foolish. No one wants to be hurtful for no good reason and no one wants to see themselves as “bad” people.

BUT, we DO all want to be respected, validated, rich, powerful, happy, satisfied, oh yeah, and we all want our link bait to work like a charm.

While the guru completely agrees with Ms Fontenot’s choice to not participate, the Guru also suggests you remember:

#1. Your words online represent who you really are

#2. Other peoples words online represent who they really are

#3. Once words are published online, they follow you probably forever

#4. As much as we’d like to believe in the ultimate goodness of mankind, there is a dark side in us all and that dark side is as strong a motivator as the light.

Peace Y’all!

G

If ya cain’t say nuthin good bout somebody ----- make sure ya cover yer ass!