The more well-known you are in the SEO world, the more money you can make from SEO clients. But is having SEO clients the best goal?

When I first started blogging on PocketSEO.com my goal was to become more well-known so that I could make more money. I have other tech blogs that get much more traffic than PocketSEO.com, but I thought that I should have a blog where I post under my own name. But the main problem with the goal of becoming well-known is that SEO consulting is a bad business model.

If you have the skills to rank for competitive keywords then why aren’t you ranking your own Web sites?

How many SEOs out there prefer SEO clients to developing their own Web sites?

Andy Hagans said it well in his hierarchy of SEO activities:

1. Spend your time posting on forums [lowest profitability]
2. Spend your time blogging
3. Work for an SEO firm on salary
4. Spend your time consulting
5. Launch a site you own in a niche you’re passionate about
6. Launch a site you own in a highly profitable niche [highest profitability]

Here’s a hint: those options are listed in ascending order of long-term profitability The guys who do 1, 2 and 3 are the ones with the names and who we all love to hear speak at PubCon. The guy who does #6 might get ignored at PubCon, but on the other hand if he sticks with it for 36 months he’s paying cash for a Ferrari and a beach house.

I’ve done all of those six activities and I agree with what Andy Hagans wrote:

So forget about being the best SEO be a good CEO, instead. Bop on over to CJ, find a category with a lot of high-EPC offers, acquire a semi-premium or premium domain name, and get cracking

If you really know how to do SEO/SMO/SEM, then why spend time trying to become famous in order to get more clients? Put those skills to use on your own sites.

Another take over at Scoreboard Media.

Alternatives to Being a Famous SEO

I think that if you are an SEO who wants to make more money, don’t bother with becoming famous. Get a part-time job with the best SEO company that you can find. Learn as much as you can, while developing your own sites in the rest of your time.

The reason that I haven’t been posting as much lately is because I’m in Asia working on our own Web sites. I am having a great time. I will never be chained to a desk again. I think this is a much better use of “SEO” than trying to be famous.

Related posts:

1. The Worst Thing About WordPress SEO
2. New York Times: “SEO = SPAM”
3. Introduction to Advanced SEO Site Analysis for Large Web Sites

To those in the trade, outsmarting the algorithm is called “search engine optimization.” For the rest of us, it produces Web pages littered with spam.

This is a funny statement coming from the NYT because the New York Times has been heavily optimized for search engines, even to the point of using black hat cloaking techniques.

Here is the listing for that article in Google’s SERPs:

Clicking on that link results in bombardment by an offensive full-page Flash advertisement that I could only get around by clicking on the inconspicuous “skip this ad” link in the top right corner of the page. The first time I visited that page, I was forced to login before viewing it.

I find it funny that the New York Times would run an article that says that SEO “…produces Web pages littered with spam” when the NYT itself is using annoying and spammy SEO methods that are normally forbidden by Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.

Related posts:

1. WordPress, Google Groups, Porn Spam and Malware Distribution
2. WordPress Comment Spam Warning
3. MSN Keyword Referrer Spam Continues, Distorting Analytics Everywhere