Wingnut SEO

Living in Denver and working in Boulder I see a lot of homeless people every day. As an SEO who lives and breathes and dreams search engines I had an interesting thought today inspired by my co-worker Nathan Joynt - What if the homeless needed SEO but just couldn’t afford it? I think it would really be helpful to everyone if I took the time and did my part for the homeless - Free homeless SEO

Lets look at some examples:

Exhibit A

This is the kind of sign that probably worked really well about 10 years ago. This man has been on the streets a long time but has lost touch with what works and doesn’t. He should really consider a redesign as the usability is just horrible, the information is jumbled and the font choices could be better. I’d also suggest that a he write better, less spammy copy - This would not only help usability but he might even be able to get higher SERP positions bringing in more traffic and ad revenue.

Exhibit B

This is a great example of good design but sadly they are not going to get the traffic they deserve. First of all the keyword density is lacking not to mention the fact that “work” and “food” are highly competitive keywords - ranking for these is going to be nearly impossible. With just a little keyword research we see that “Homeless Vet will work 4 food” would be a better choice - You can still get your message across and you find you will get a lot of traffic by putting yourself against less competition.

Another problem with this sign is that it’s out there so much - It’s duplicate content. Just changing the “for” to a “4″ isn’t enough to make the spiders think it is different. I’d suggest adding more words and maybe breaking up the content with bullets and H1’s. Even something as simple as changing “work” to “manual labor” would be helpful.

Exhibit C

Clearly this homeless man has some SEO experience. This man knew that he would get hurt in the SERPs if he used spam tactics or duplicate content. This is a great example of how great content will always be linked to and get a lot of traffic. Not only is this a link baiting sign it is a great example of niche marketing. He knew that ninjas are a big market and by by positioning himself for what people are searching for he gets the traffic. Not only that his copy writing and design skills are great. He gets his point across quickly and makes the reader want to buy.