Are you trying to keep up with Google’s changes for SEO purposes? Maybe you might be better served to create SEO friendly material than try to focus on making Google happy. With all these unnatural rule changes and such, it does not make sense anymore to solely focus on writing to influence Google. You are better served to write first for your audience or community.

Rob Cairns and I had a great chat last night on what’s going on out there with SEO. Google is getting smarter, and definitely harder to influence. In the age where content marketing is taking off, you had better figure out who you are writing for, and who you are trying please.

With this in mind, I am becoming more focused on writing SEO friendly content for my community. My blog content does contain the keywords I want to show up for, but I am not solely focused on pleasing Google. It is more important to me to write content that actually helps my community. I am not going out of my way to dot my “i’s” and cross my “t’s” with Google.

So what do you think? Are you working hard and seeing the results you want? Maybe it’s time to focus on the end-user when you create your content; and not Google. It is fun to play the Google game, but at the end of the day, what will it bring you? I and reminded that people work with people they like. So let your content create a lot of “Like” for you with your community.

Let me encourage you to still use your keywords that you want to show up for, but don’t stress yourself out by always trying to please Google. Make your community happy by writing great content. They will share your great content, and in the end, you should be better off this way. Put people first and Google second.