I read Shoemoney’s post within this last week and I honesty didn’t get into the debate about 95% of SEO’s being “the used car salesmen” of search engine marketing (SEM). But then yesterday his podcast with Danny Sullivan about 95% of SEO’s being “shady” and it really got me thinking about the real definition of an SEO and what their value should be. Ultimately Danny and Shoe made really good point, and I understand Shoe position.

What value do we truly offer as SEO’s or SEM’s? Danny talked a lot about new things coming in and kind of branching off SEO like reputation management, social media, etc. and I think they are viable SEO activities but at the same time, I feel they shouldn’t be used to “razzle and dazzle” but rather compliment the basics such as the title tags, building out content, and link building. The more and more I learn about SEO, true link building is an art and not such an easy one. I mean, people are building out great content and getting links back, but I think there are some elements to link building that can be tougher than just content creation.

I think this podcast was awesome and more real discussions like this should take place between people in the industry! Thanks Shoe and Danny!