k thx bye

On Friday, I left the fast-paced world of web production for a monthly news magazine to join the somewhat-faster-paced world of writing for the federal government. Per company tradition, I drafted a goodbye letter to my colleagues—a note that read like a position statement—which was met with near-universal positive response from staffers.

What follows is that company-wide e-mail, edited only to protect the identity of my former organization:

There’s nothing I can say about [the journalism industry] that hasn’t already been said. Truthfully, I only stayed as long as I did out of loyalty and the esprit de corps that can’t help but surface when working with so many talented people. And with the skill set this company provided I feel I can go anywhere, do anything.

That said, I promise I will never forget where I came from. So here’s a parting SEO tip:

Yes, [articles tailored for search engines] pay the bills and keep our lights on. But once you’ve reached your quota for those, stop writing for the search engines and compose a few stories for your readers every once and a while. Make time each week to take a moment to remember what you went to J school for. Write something that would bring a tear to the eye of your old professors. Write something you’d read.

Take note that the best examples of modern journalism often never see light in Google News, Yahoo’s homepage, or even Digg. Instead, the truly great stories of our time are passed around by friends and family in e-mails tagged “interesting article” and “good read”.

Please, as writers and editors, forget everything you thought you knew about keywords, Google trends, Page Rank, Omniture click-maps, sitemaps, and—hell—even site re-designs. Yes, search engines, portals, and social networks are here to stay, but more pervasive is the consumer’s demand for good reporting–and you’ll find that those platforms reward excellence.

So continue build our reputation as a relevant news source, it’s certainly within our capacity. Spend your time crafting pieces so compelling that you’d be proud to feature them at the front of your portfolio. Do this enough times and you will develop a readership–a core audience. I promise, they will find you and they will link to you. Your goal is to make [this media outlet] a destination, a name brand experience your audience seeks out rather than something they stumble upon with search engines.

For they too appreciate journalism for the sake of journalism.

That‘s SEO.

Cheers,
Brian Bailey