Sorry, Max, but I’m with Chris on this one. You can’t have it both ways. If your blog is not about sales leads (as you say in a comment to Chris’ post), then whey are you bragging about how many leads it generates (“two prospects have called me this way purely based on my blog”)? If search engine results aren’t important, then why are you bragging about that?
I’d much rather be ranked highly for “marketing strategy,” for which I could expect at least 30 visitors per day from Google compared to less than 1 for “IBM marketing strategy” or “BT marketing strategy.” You say that:
“Unlike many companies, I achieved this not by spending vast sums on search engine optimisation, but simply by publishing my opinion on the marketing strategies of the above companies online using this weblog.”
What exactly did you achieve? After the Super Bowl I was briefly number highly ranked for “Go Daddy girl” and “Candice Michelle” mainly because of this post (and also because, just for the heck of it, this one). That was kind of neat, but it didn’t translate into anything in terms of new business or influence in the marketplace.
Not that I’m knocking blogging for it’s less-measurable qualities. Writing in general is a good habit, and the more content you put out there with regularity, the more weight Google gives it as a “fresh site.” But I’m not gonna brag about my effortless, zen-like SERP results either.
Every now and then I see this meme of “search engine optimization doesn’t matter,” usually by bloggers who’ve never seriously investigated it for themselves. While good, relevant, regularly updated content can be a good SEO practice all by itself, don’t dismiss detail SEO out of hand. I know people who make millions – yes, millions – of new revenue thanks to good SEO. It’s not for everyone, but in some markets SEO can be the difference between success and failure.
At the lower end of the food chain, I know someone who’s boosted her personal take-home from AdSense by several hundred dollars per month just by optimizing her web site and blogging on topics that draw free search traffic.
(By the way, I’m not an SEO consultant, so this post isn’t an attempt to boost my business.)
It appears that even Google uses SEO practices, some of them rather questionable.