The Art of Gentle Optimization

I’ve never believed in crowding the envelope with optimization. Partly because to do so costs my clients more, and requires close monitoring, and always runs the risk that you’ll be the next victim of the trap of changing rules.

So I’ve always been a fan of common sense, and logical optimization strategies. They rely on content first, and on appealing to people first.

Lately, the philosophy has proven itself to be as valuable and effective as I have always thought. I mean, my own sites did well, and most sites that I build do well. But recently I’ve had the chance to optimize some sites that had never been optimized, and to re-optimize sites that had been overoptimized and penalized. The results are now showing, and they are good.

It has been a reinforcement of the rule that if it doesn’t sound natural, don’t do it! All we did on the sites we reoptimized, was to make the word usage natural. The results were dramatic, and very good.

Knowing how far to push it isn’t an issue when you optimize for people. You just focus on the real goal, which is to attract and invite people to enjoy the site, and the optimization rules become quite clear.