The Quick Fix VS. The Long Haul

Much like the X-Factor makes instant stars out of its contestants, some quick and dirty SEO can see a website climb the rankings over night.

A whole bunch of paid-links with identical anchor text are great if you want instant gratification, but don’t expect it to be sustainable. Like many X-Factor favourites, your website may be dropped and forgotten about within weeks.

For sustainable and natural SEO you need to pitch yourself much more like the honest and hard-working band – the guys who slog it out on the pub circuit for months, sometimes years, to amass a genuine following of loyal fans.

This effectively means that you should produce desirable content that attracts natural interest from your peers and customers. This will take longer, but you will see higher quality, and sustainable traffic.

Covers VS. Originals

Another similarity between shoddy SEO strategies and pop-star wannabes is the seemingly relentless need to copy other people’s songs content.

In the world of SEO, most of us know that content duplication is pretty pointless, but I am referring to the types who blog about the exact same stuff that other people are blogging about. Most know to avoid direct duplication, others may rely on article spinning or churning out stuff that’s been said a million times over.

Write something original.

Better yet, be creative and don’t simply follow the crowd. Have a crazy idea or want to challenge convention? Do it!

Content will always be king so make sure yours is original and fantastic.

Fodder VS. Quality

The Cheeky Girls

This SEO would be low quality and spammy. It may be effective for a short period of time and nobody would pay much attention to it, except for Google who may grant you a temporary boost before sussing out your game.

The Beatles

This SEO would be extremely high quality. Not only would it attract lots of real users, people will talk about it for months, maybe even years, to come. Choose quality SEO methods to avoid being Google’s “flavour of the week”.

Imitate Others VS. Be Yourself

When taking to the stage you could pretend to be Michael Jackson.

If you do a good job, some people might even believe you are him (albeit, back from the dead).

The problem with this route is after the initial shock of your amazing impression; people will quickly lose interest in the illusion.

If you write content, comment on blogs or use social media platforms, just be yourself.

Use your own name, bring your own thoughts to the table and offer a valuable and unique contribution.

People trust others who are genuine and real, not poor imitations or fake identities.

Be Generic VS. Be Creative

How many cover versions of You Raise Me Up have we heard?

The thing with X-Factor contestants is that they’re often incredibly forgettable because they sing the same songs in the same ways.

The thing with a lot of SEO content and methods is that it is all very similar – same methods, similar content distributed to similar websites.

Kick your brain up a notch and get creative. Think about where you can get links from and what true value this adds to a) the source site b) your own site c) the users.

Videos, games, infographics and quizzes are all creative SEO examples. Don’t sing the same tune as everybody else!