Turns out Google’s in the market for an SEO Manager. Apparently, the company’s product pages – search aside, of course – don’t actually have the best SEO in the world. Who would’ve thought?
“As a Program Manager for Technical SEO, you will work with cross-functional teams across Marketing, Sales, Product Development, Engineering, and more to help drive organic traffic and business growth,” reads the job listing. “You will take part in website development and optimization, help shape blog and social strategy, improve website code hygiene and define web architecture for international websites.”
Those of you who are interested in applying for the job can find it on the Google Careers Portal. As for everyone else, there’s something to be learned about search engine optimization here. Basically, it’s that anyone who claims that they know every answer to how Google’s search engine works – anyone who claims they’ve guaranteed strategies for upping your PageRank – is either delusional or lying to you.
Think about it. Even Google’s own internal departments don’t fully understand how the search engine works, and the company’s own on-page SEO is actually notoriously terrible. Food for thought, right?
Of course, this is an unfortunate reality that many who are involved in search engine marketing have long since accepted.
“Whatever you do, don’t spend money on aggressive SEO,” reads a Smashing Magazine post written by Paul Boag. “The inconvenient truth is that the best person to improve your ranking is you. Unfortunately, that is going to take time and commitment on your part. The answer doesn’t lie in hiring an SEO company to boost your website ranking for Google.”
But wait…isn’t that exactly what Google’s doing?
Yes and no. While you certainly shouldn’t shell out money for SEO snake oil salesmen, there’s nothing wrong with bringing in a seasoned expert to guide your website in the right direction. That’s what Google’s doing – they’re bringing someone onboard who has an idea of what works and what doesn’t from a search perspective, in the hopes that they can improve their rankings.
That said, it is a little confusing that Google’s not simply doing this internally. Maybe they figure it’d give them an unfair advantage if they had an insider tweak their pages to rank higher? Or maybe they’re just trying to form a concept of how well outsiders understand their search engine.
Who knows? It could very well be both. Either way, the lesson here is clear:
Don’t obsess over making your SEO absolutely perfect. After all, even Google itself can’t do that. Focus on content, instead.
