To know what works the best in the SEO world today, you have to be a little aware of the history of SEO - particularly after Google came into the scene.

In this evolution of SEO, there are four important important timelines-

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• The birth of Google till the FLORIDA algorithm update

• The Florida update till the Panda update

• The Panda update till the Penguin update

• The introduction of RankBrain and focus on semantic keywords

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The Evolution Of SEO From The Birth Of Google To The Introduction Of FLORIDA Algorithm

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During the early years of Google - from 1996 to 2003 - Search Engine Optimisation meant just inserting keywords - a little too aggressively. This meant that even if a website had low quality content, it could rank high just by stuffing the keywords that it wanted to rank for. And remember, during that time, there weren’t millions of websites that you see today. So the competition was low. Hence, low competition and keyword stuffing meant that the website never had to care about quality content.

All these changed when Google came up with the FLORIDA algorithm update during the holidays of 2003. Those websites that leveraged keyword stuffing, masking keywords with the same font colour as that of the page and other such blackhat tricks took a massive hit. In fact many websites were so demoted that they effectively vanished from Google. It was a good day for freelance content writers like us who play by the rules.

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From The Florida Update Till The Panda Update

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With the Florida algorithm update, Google started cleaning up the SEO mess. And it did not stop there. Next came the Jagger update in 2005 that penalised websites leveraging paid backlinks and spammy backlinks. The concept of no-follow backlinks started from this time around.

However the blackhat SEO guys were relentless. They followed the guidelines laid out by Google but only to a bare minimum level which would narrowly pass the spam test. So Google got crowded with non-spam but low quality content that were published only to serve advertisements via them.

That’s when an Indian data engineer at Google - Navneet Panda (or some say it was Biswanath Panda) - came up with a breakthrough algorithm which was named as the Panda update. The main purpose of the Panda update was to punish websites with low quality content. Websites that served content with very little information were demoted to oblivion. Content farms that produced content as if the art of writing was an assembly line also took a hit.

This update made whitehat freelance writers in Kolkata, like me, happy. Because our hard work would now see results. No more SEO quacks could use some hack to rank without any work.

 

From The Panda Till The Penguin Update

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What started with Panda continued with Penguin. Despite coming up with the Panda update, there were still a large number of websites that resorted to spammy backlink tactics and keyword stuffing. Penguin came in 2012 to stop these things once and for all. And it was quite successful.

A few years later in 2014 Google focused on refining the search results by taking into account the place of the user. In short, local search results gained prominence with the Pigeon update.

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The Introduction Of RankBrain & The Focus On Semantic Keywords
 

 

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 In 2015, Google added a Machine Learning algorithm to their core search system. It was dubbed as RankBrain.

And from the introduction of RankBrain the value of whitehat SEO personnel like me increased. The way SEO experts leveraged keywords to rank changed. From way back in the early 2000s, Google had been harping on the idea that the internet wasn't just a bunch of words - it was a bunch of concepts.

RankBrain looks at keywords not as words but as ideas. So content writing freelancers like me no longer needed to incorporate various iterations of the same keyword. Instead, now we have to incorporate various ideas that a certain keyword is associated with.

 

So for example, if you are writing for a lawyer based in California, you can no longer hope to rank high just by using generic keywords. You now have to use ideas that are associated with any lawyer based in california. So you have to talk about court cases in California, insurance claims in California, property disputes in California and so on…

 

Basically, anything that has a direct link with the main keyword must be incorporated into the webpage. That’s what we call semantics. You can also refer to these ideas as the ‘intent’ behind the main keyword.

 

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I'm a content writer who is aware of the history of SEO, how it evolved and where it is heading.

 

That’s my core USP. And I also have hands-on experience with managing Wordpress websites. So what I know is not limited to theory only. I have practically experimented with various SEO tactics, learned new things and unlearned redundant things.

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The Art of Writing Has Evolved As Well

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Fickle is the attention span of the readers these days. If your writing is not persuasive enough, your website won’t be able to convert potential buyers into actual buyers.

I am a Hubspot certified content marketer ( License ID - b512dfefbf664d9aac05b931975f996c ). Hence I have a pretty detailed idea about what works and what doesn’t as far as writing is concerned.

I’m particularly a fan of Simon Sinek’s idea of the Golden Circle. If you imagine three circles - the third inside the second and the second inside the first big one - you will get three areas. The extreme outer area is termed as the ‘What’ part of the circle. The area inside the second circle is termed as the ‘How’ part of the circle. And the extreme interior part -  the area inside the third, small circle is the ‘Why’ part of the circle.

 

Simon Sinek considers that it is the ‘Why’ part - the reason why you're doing what you are doing - that’s what resonates with the people. So basically, Sinek prefers emotion over logic. But most websites largely talk about the ‘What’ and ‘How’ part of their business - it’s the logical part.

I follow Simon Sinek’s technique of emotionally connecting with the readers and only then I proceed to the logical part - the stats, the info, the how-to’s.

Short introduction, ample white space, headings and subheadings, bullet points, images and infographics.. Phewwww! - I have to keep all these in mind to craft an article. (And that’s why I don’t fall in the 5000 words per day brigade).

Lastly, I end my article with a Call To Value - not a Call To Action. I urge people to do something for THEIR benefit. If you just ask your readers to follow you, your readers will ask, “What’s in it there for me?” Your Call To Action must answer this question. I call such CTAs as Calls To Value.

 

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As you can see, content writing is much more than just taking information from here and there and paraphrasing them. It’s art. It’s science. And ofcourse it’s commerce.

As a freelance content writer in Kolkata, my USP is that I know the art of writing, the science of website management and SEO and the commercial value of persuasion.