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The Slacking Spectrum

Be honest: Did you flip to this chapter before you even started your SEO campaign?

Have you been planning to do the bare minimum from the get-go? If you expected us

to disapprove, you’re wrong. Let us reassure you:

And this is especially true if your competitors are doing absolutely nothing in the

way of SEO.

Slacking, as we’re using the word here, simply means taking an honest look at

your time and abilities and determining whether you can put off, or even blow off, a

task or a group of similar tasks. Slacking can be the result of a simple judgment call;

for example, if a task we assigned in Your SEO Plan didn’t apply to your site, don’t do

it. Or slacking can be a path you’re forced to take due to a lack of time, budget, or

manpower.

Take heart: There’s really nothing wrong with having a slacker mentality as long

as you follow these important Dos and Don’ts about slacking and SEO:

DON’T beat yourself up.

Periodic dips in SEO activity are to be expected for busy

people in dynamic organizations. An occasional bout of inattentiveness to your cam-

paign is common. Dropping the ball every once in a while is no reason to abandon

your SEO efforts altogether.

DON’T slack if your competitors aren’t.

If you are in an extremely competitive mar-

ket, there’s probably no easy way to shirk. You will have to work harder on your

SEO campaign to see changes for the better. Likewise, if one of your sleepy competi-

tors wakes up to SEO, you’ll need to step up your efforts accordingly or suffer the

consequences.

DON’T blame it on the budget.

Just as you don’t need a big SEO budget to be an

overachiever, you don’t need to slow down on SEO just because you’re low on funds.

Site edits, link building, landing page A/B testing, and competitive analysis—to name

just a few—are tasks that most organizations can do at no extra cost.

DO be realistic.

If you anticipate that you

never

will be able to devote an

to your SEO campaign, it’s time to think about sharing the load with a coworker or

hiring a consultant. (We gave some guidance on hiring SEO help in Chapter 9, “Month

Three: It’s a Way of Life.”)

Pearl of Wisdom:

Any amount of properly executed SEO that you can muster will bring about

some

positive effect.

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