Content or Keywords — Which is The Key to Page Rank?

I've had some interesting "conversations" since I took up this content position on SEO during my weekly marketing podcast, The BeanCast. And I'm not sure how to feel about how things are turning out.

Again, my usual disclaimer that I am NOT an SEO expert, but I play one on TV.

With that out of the way, I've been shocked by the vehement opinions I've heard by both people who love to hate SEO and those who swear it's manna from heaven. (As for me, I'm somewhere in the middle, probably leaning much more heavily on the pro side, so I'm kind of a like a battleground state, I guess. People want to convince me.)

Everyone Wants To Talk Keywords
I thought for sure that this would be a slam-dunk statement: Saying that content is the most important thing and the only factor that raises page rank seems like a no-brainer. It sounds like an idea people can get behind. But I could not have been more wrong. People's opinions about the role of keywords is what seems to have dominated the discussions I've had so far.

From those who dislike SEO evangelism, there comes cries of BS on the claim that good SEO experts focus on content creation. This group certainly believes that content is important, but they point to an undeniable focus on keyword optimization among SEO sites. Even Duane Forrester, they claim, says that everything starts with keyword research and his own sites are case-studies in keyword manipulation.

From the SEO advocates comes a similar cry from a differing perspective. They too rally around keywords and say that having a good keyword strategy and implementing it well throughout a site is the key to gaining page rank. You can't get recognized for you content unless you have the keywords in place.

A Clarification on My Content Stance
Because of all this, I've decided to clarify a bit on my own understanding of things and see if we can't eek out a bit more consensus.

Let's start with Duane's comment on the show that "everything starts with keyword research." Both sides used that to defend their stance. But let me play Switzerland and say this statement may be taken a bit out of context.

The essential reason for starting with keyword research is not to find keywords that will drive traffic, but to find the interesting ideas that drive your content creation. For indexing purposes, it's important to use these keywords in your content so that there is a well optimized and easily accessible content structure. But the keywords themselves are not what is being sought. It's the relevance and depth of the content on that subject.

For instance, I can splatter "marketing podcast" all over this site (look, I just did it), but that in and of itself is not going to raise my page rank. All these keyword will do is put me in the consideration set "somewhere." To raise my page rank, though, I need to have a bulk of relevant podcast content on the subject of marketing (look, did it again) that is being used and appreciated. The more depth and richness I provide on the subjects that are dictated by my keywords, the more people interested in those keywords will appreciate my site, generating more traffic, thus raising my page rank and generate even more traffic.

What Are YOUR Keywords Doing?
So to restate (and again, this is just my understanding, not putting words into Duane's mouth) keyword research is not about the keywords themselves as much as the content they point towards. The value of the content is what is of paramount importance.

More to come on this issue, I'm sure. I'm loathe to add anything to the above until I engage and "marinate" on the subject for a while. But for the moment consider the semantics of what your keyword research is really yielding. And please, if you are an SEO expert I welcome your comments. I would love to bring clarity to this issue. Because I still believe that SEO has a PR problem and the start of a solution will come from pulling back the veils and understanding what the industry is really all about.

Image: Semantic Studios