SEO Geek Speak – I can speak Geek…can you?
It amazes me how many people in the tech world like to speak Geek to potential clients. I’m guessing that they do it to impress and to appear knowledgeable, but it usually turns a potential client into someone who feels like an idiot. I wouldn’t want to do business with someone who makes me feel like an idiot… would you?
Plain English gets us way more business than Geek speak. Yeah, sure, there are times when we speak Geek speak to someone who has some knowledge about the topic. But in many cases, they have read some Geek speak article somewhere and have just enough knowledge to be dangerous. On the other hand, some potential clients have too much knowledge for their own good. We like leaving these for the Geek speaker SEO’s to deal with not us.
In closing, here’s two simple examples.
Geek Speak: Your site is coded in Dream Weaver using tables and we need to transition it to CSS and XHTML while limiting the use of Javascript. We suggest doing a new PSD Mock for you to review in order for us to put a new skin on your website. We’d also like to change your pages from .htm to .php and potentialy need to set up a MySql database to dynamically generate data. Oh, and by the way your URL query strings are all screwed up and we need to rename them to something more SEO friendly with 301 or 302 redirects. With the redirects, we need to speak with our Geek speak programmers on using a 301 or 302. In addition to all this, we need to update your meta tags, provide more internal and external linking using anchor text while balancing the optimization of the on page content. It’s really important that your on page SEO and off page SEO be completed properly. We’ll be able to give you a better idea of all this after doing a site command in Google, running a backlink analysis on your site and your competitors sites. We will also check the anchor text of the backlinks. Finally, Mr. Totally Lost by Now Client, we’ll do an XML sitemap for the major search engines.
Translation: Us: “Here’s what we will do in KINDERGARTEN ENGLISH.” Client: “Oh, I get it. When can you start?”
[...] Original post by Create Business Growth [...]
Does your PHP work with Ruby on Rails or MySQL? Let’s try the 802.11b or g or n, maybe that will work.
I love Geek Speak. If you want to increase your SEO then use Nemeas to increase PR and Alexa.
Laughs all around,
Dan
Hi David. I agree, speaking geek doesn’t help at all.
As you said there are clients who know nothing about it and clients who think they know everything.
As simple as it might seem to some people is the ability and experience to use all the little things properly that makes a website optimized for search engines.
In kindergarden english: Your website has to present the information properly for search engines. It’s not only about the code behind or the links.
Dan and Chip…Thanks for chiming in.
How about we all chime this…
I love Geek Speak Yes I do
I love Geek Speak how bout you
At some level, you want to speak Geek to gain authority… Leave them in the dust so to speak. Of course not all the time till they zone out into a trance and start giving you all the moola in the world
Just a tip about seo, you better get it going from the start, ie even with the choosing of your domain names. Just using simple tools like nemeas can give you a head start already. So remember to take note of the details between.
Cheers
Duke
Duke…Thanks for sharing
You’ve really got to know your intended customer.
‘Geek speak’ can definitely give you an image of being knowledgeable to people who kinda know what you’re talking about, but the ones who need the kindergarten English might just feel overwhelmed and leave you.
I think authority has a lot to do with your confidence and passion, and not just about how clever you can make yourself sound.
Most people don’t even know what SEO is, let alone know what it’s comprised of!
…and of course I know this, because Tyler knows this…
Joshua…Thanks for commenting…”Most people don’t even know what SEO is, let alone know what it’s comprised of!”
So many SEO Companies/Individuals just don’t get what you said which is why they scare away potential clients. I do scare away clients intentionally sometime, but mainly through price and not Geek speak.