That’s the key word from veteran SEO expert Heather Lloyd-Martin

SEO is not about creating a website sausage overstuffed with key words and phrases. It’s all about creating relevant and compelling content that transforms you into a thought leader who can become a trusted provider That is ultimately how you convert visitors into buyers

Of course, this is gospel for me and many content marketers. But, it is still poorly understood by many marketers and SEO practitioners who swear that cramming a ton of “search engine friendly” words and phrases deemed into every nook and cranny of your website will place you high on the results page.

So, I was both encouraged and inspired by Heather Lloyd-Martin’s recent post. She has been helping clients get great search results for more than a decade. Since Heather does search engine optimization for a living, it’s wonderful to hear her say that it’s ultimately all about the content.

As Heather writes in a great post on Success Works:

SEO copywriting “techniques” - as they are commonly understood today - represent a bastardized version of copywriting that’s not good for customers, not good for users and serves up pure schlock.  I am tired of seeing top-Tweeted posts that say you should “include your keyword at least 15 times in your copy,” or “put all the keywords at the top of the page so the search engines can see them.”  I am beyond miffed when I hear prospects say, “I want you to write a bunch of pages for the search engines. I don’t want people to actually read them.” The amount of misinformation out there is enormous.

Heather then adds: “What’s sad is that people are accustomed to keyword-stuffed, overoptimized copy as “normal” SEO copywriting. They don’t know that good copywriting is seamless and benefit-driven. That savvy SEO copywriting, in the brilliant words of Lisa Barone, is supposed to entice, entertain, engage and educate.”

She concludes with a suggestion that warms my heart:

Instead, why don’t we, as marketing professionals, embrace the term “SEO content marketing.”  The term “content marketing” implies an ongoing process - not a one-off Web page written for high rankings. “Content marketing” implies that there is a strategy behind the process. And it’s also more encompassing.  “Copywriting” often elicited thoughts of “sales-oriented writing” - while “content marketing” could mean blog posts, articles, press releases - even Twitter posts.

As Heather makes clear, content marketing should be fundamental to any search engine optimization program. She gives us yet one more, very important reason to start implementing your comprehensive content marketing strategy today.

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