Identities: The Real Me

Do identities count? You’re entitled to know with whom you are dealing. Stay with me, search engine optimization (SEO) is integral to identities. For instance, it would be useful to know that your dentist actually graduated from dental college, rather than flunking out after a few semesters. It’s reassuring to trust that your pastor isn’t an international drug kingpin during the week. And I’m pretty sure that you’d prefer that your auto mechanic is really not scheduling periodic breakdowns for your car. See, identities are crucial. And you need to be able to trust that people are being honest. Sometimes that’s not easy to determine.

More Than a One Trick Pony

Here’s the skinny on me: I grew up on a small farm in southwestern Iowa, with horses, sheep, cows, dogs, cats and chickens. In college I worked in a pizza joint. Later, I taught secondary school and subbed for a few years. I’ve been a clerk/typist in a US Army ordnance battalion. Also, I’ve been front-office staff for a family doctor, a dentist and a pathologist (I transcribed autopsy reports). For over 20 years I wrote articles on motocross racing for a major weekly publication. At the same time, I was sole proprietor of a graphic design/public relations company. It did business with mainly advertising agencies and printers in Upstate South Carolina.

For a short time, I was a freelance writer, until 9/11/2001 happened and everything stopped. My bachelor’s degree in botany was then put to good use in my own lawn maintenance company. After all, grass keeps growing. For quite a while, our garage was overflowing with commercial equipment. I held my SC pesticide license continuously for fifteen years, except for a year during our extreme drought. Have questions about weeds and bugs? I know enough about them to bore you to tears.

Then a work-related injury changed my focus. Changing from the physical to the mental, I went from turfgrass roots back to my writing roots. And that grew into Barbara Williams SEO. For over two decades, I had been unwittingly doing search engine optimization, before there were search engines. Back then it was called, simply, marketing. Of course, that term itself has changed its meaning. It no longer refers to merely identifying your audience and trying to get their attention. Because of technology, the methods have changed, but the focus is the same: Get Discovered.

As T. rex would advise: Adapt or die.