You published a blog post called Exciting News from the Team

and you're wondering why no one's reading it. Yeah, that's because

Google doesn't give a fuck about your exciting news and neither does

anyone else.

This is SEO. Fucking what? I'm Nikki and I've been in SEO

for over 30 years before it was even called SEO.

I help people like you make money from your website by getting found

on search. Today we're talking about something that kind of makes me want to

put my hair through a wall. Business blogs that read, like personal

diaries, company newsletters or motivational

Instagram posts. And then the business owner wonders why

Google's ignoring them. It's because your blog isn't written for the

people searching, it's written for you. And Google can tell

the difference.

The main problem is that your blog is essentially a vanity

project. Because I see this every single week. A business

owner comes to me and says, nikki, we've been blogging for two

years and we're getting no traffic. Blogging for SEO

doesn't work. And I go and look at their blog and what do I find?

Welcome to our new website, posted 18 months ago.

73 words, 0 useful information. We're

hiring. Come join the team. Nobody's Googling that.

Nobody. Our trip to the industry awards.

Lovely for your mum. Completely fucking useless for SEO.

A message from our CEO. And I'm sure Dave's a lovely

bloke, but nobody's searching for Dave's thoughts on quarter Three

performances. Five reasons we love working here.

Great for your careers page. Absolute shite for search visibility.

There's not a blog, it's a fucking diary. And diaries

are private for a reason, because nobody else wants to read them.

And I know why this happens. Someone at some point told

you that you need to blog for SEO. And they were right. Blogging

can be brilliant for SEO. But they forgot to mention the crucial

bit. The blog has to be about things that people are actually

searching for, not things you fancy writing about over

your morning coffee. Let me explain something that it seems

obvious, but it clearly isn't. Based on the number of businesses

getting this spectacularly wrong. Google's entire job is

to match people's questions with the best answers and that's it.

So someone types in how to fix a leaky tap and Google

finds the page that answers that question the best. Simple. Now,

your blog about winning a regional business award, who's

searching for that? Your mum, maybe your Auntie Linda?

That's your entire audience. Google knows this.

Google can see that nobody is searching for your company name

wins an award at Coventry Business Gala 2026.

So Google doesn't bother ranking it for anything. Why would it? And

you know what? The businesses that do this, they're not stupid, they're

not lazy. They've actually put effort into blogging

regularly. They've been consistent. They've done the hard

bit, sitting down and writing something every week or every

month. They've just been writing the wrong things. All that

effort, all that time completely wasted because nobody

told them to check whether anyone was actually searching for what they were writing

about. It's like opening a shop on the high street, stocking it full

of products that nobody wants and wondering why you've got no customers. The

shop's there, the shelves are full, but you're selling well.

Who made that? Nobody's selling left handed cheese graters, are they?

Are they? Who knows? I'm going to say it, but you're selling left handed cheese

graters and novelty egg timers when everyone walking past wants bread and

milk. And this isn't just a missed opportunity, it actually

does damage. Because when your blog is full of thin,

self serving content that nobody reads, Google forms an

opinion about your entire site. Google crawls your blog.

It finds 47 posts with an average of 100 words each.

No one's linking to them. Nobody's spending more than eight seconds on them before

clicking back. The bounce rate's through the roof. And Google

thinks, right, this site doesn't have anything useful to offer. So

when you do finally publish something decent, proper service

page, a genuinely helpful guide. Google's already

decided that you're not worth prioritizing. It's called crawl

budget and it's a real thing.

Google's only going to spend a certain amount of time crawling your site if it's

wasting that time on our office dog turn three today and

reflections on another wonderful year. It's not spending that time

on the pages that actually make you money. And there's also a credibility

problem. If a potential customer lands on your blog and it's

full of navel gazing company updates, what does that tell them? It

tells them that you're more interested in talking about yourselves than helping them solve

their problem. That's not a great first impression. Now, I'm not

blaming the business owners, not entirely, because this problem

usually starts with bad advice. It's the marketing

agency that said you need a blog without explaining what that should

contain. It's the web designer who said blog

regularly and you'll rank. It's the Social media manager who

suggested repurposing Instagram content as blog posts.

It's the marketing intern who was told to write something for the website

with zero guidance on keyword research or search intent.

Blogging for SEO without a strategy is like driving

without a destination. Recalculating your route. You're

burning fuel, you're putting miles on the clock, but you're going

absolutely fucking nowhere. And the worst offenders?

The content mills and AI content farms, pumping out

hundreds and hundreds of generic blog posts with no

strategy behind them. 10 fun facts about Accounting,

why We Love Mondays the History of Plumbing.

Nobody is searching for this shite.

So what's the fix? How do you turn your sad, ignored

blog into something that actually brings you traffic, leads and

money? I'll tell you in just a moment.

Here's what you really need to do,

and I'm going to keep this practical because I know you're busy running a business

and you haven't got time for waffle. So Step one Find out what people are

searching for before you write a single word, you need to know what your

potential customers are typing into Google. This is keyword research, and

it's not optional. It's the difference between writing into the void and

writing something that people will actually find. You don't need expensive tools

for this. Ahrefs has a free keyword generator. Also Asked

has a really good thing for generating questions that people are asking.

Type in the words related to your business. See what comes up. Start

typing a question into Google. Look at the autocomplete suggestions.

These are real searchers. Scroll to the bottom of the results page and

look at people also ask and the related searches. That's Google

literally telling you what people want to know. Please, for the love

of all that is fucking holy, do not use ChatGPT for

keyword research. Search. I've said this before and I'll say it again.

ChatGPT does not know what people search for. It

guesses and its guesses are often bollocks. Use actual

search data from actual search engines. Step 2

match the search intent Once you've found a keyword or a key phrase,

as we should call it, Google it yourself. Look at what's already ranking on

page one. This tells you what Google thinks is the best answer to that

query. If the top results are all how to guides, write

a how to guide. If they're comparison pages, write a comparison

page. If they're local service pages, you might need a service page

rather than a blog post. Don't try to be clever and write Something

completely different from what's ranking. Google has already

decided what format works for that search. Your job is to do it

better, not differently. Step 3 Answer the fucking

question. This sounds stupidly simple, but you'd be

amazed how many blog posts don't actually answer the question they claim to be about.

If someone searches how much does a new boiler cost in

2026? They want numbers, they want price ranges. They

don't want 500 words of bollocks about how important boilers

are. Before you finally get to the point, answer the question clearly.

Answer it early in the post and then expand with detail. One

with content and then with your expertise. One question

per post. Answer it. Well, that's it. You don't need 3,000

words. A few hundred well written words that actually answer what someone's

asking will outperform a 5,000 word essay that waffles

around the topic without ever getting to the point. Step four

Structure it properly. Use headings. Use subheadings. Break

your content into sections that someone can scan. Google reads your headings

to understand what your pages are about, and humans use them to find the bit

they care about. Your main heading, your H1, should include

your target keyword. Your subheadings should cover the specific

questions or subtopics within that main topic. Think of it like a

conversation. The heading tells people what you're going to talk about. The

subheadings break that conversation into logical chunks. And

for fuck's sake, don't write your title as something cute and cryptic like the

secret Ingredient. When the post is about pricing for accountancy

services in leads, say what it is. How much does an accountant cost

in leads? Boring. Yeah. Effective.

Absolutely. Step 5 Audit what you've already got. Go

through your existing blog posts. Be honest with yourself. For each one,

ask yourself, is anyone searching for this? Does it answer a question that a

potential customer might have? Does it have a clear keyword or key phrase,

focus? If the answer is no to all three, you've got two

choices. Either rewrite it with a proper keyword focus, or

delete it. Yep, delete it. I know that

feels brutal, but 47 shite blog posts dragging down

your site are worse than 10 properly targeted ones doing

actual work. Quality over quantity every

single time. Before anyone panics, I'm not saying

delete everything that isn't keyword focused. If you've got a

genuinely useful case study or a post that demonstrates your

expertise in a way that builds trust, keep it. But happy

National Donut Day from everyone at Smith and company can

go straight in the bin. Step 6 Stop letting someone

who doesn't know what you do write your blogs. I know this sounds

harsh, but your blog content needs to come from someone who understands

your business, understands your customers, and ideally,

understands basic SEO. If the person writing your

blog doesn't know what a keyword is, doesn't understand search intent,

and has never looked at Google Search Console, they shouldn't be writing blog

posts designed to rank. That doesn't mean you need a specialist writer

for every post, but whoever's writing needs at least a basic

understanding of what makes content rank. Keyword in the

title, clear headings. Answer the question. It's not rocket science,

but it does need to be intentional.

I can hear you. I can really hear you going, but what about our company

news? We're so important. And look, I'm not

saying you can never post about company news. If you've

genuinely got something newsworthy, a major partnership, a significant

achievement, a new service launch, yeah, write about it.

Be honest with yourself about whether it's newsworthy to your customers

or just newsworthy to you. And if you do want a space for company

updates, consider putting them in a separate news section, not in your main

blog. Keep your blog focused on content that answers

questions and targets keywords. Keep the company updates somewhere

else where they won't dilute your SEO efforts. Your blog should

be your hardest working marketing asset. Every post should have

a job to do. Bring in traffic, answer a question,

build authority and trust, or drive leads. If a post isn't

doing at least one of those things, then why is it there? So there you

have it. Stop treating your blog like a diary. Stop writing for yourself

and start writing for the people who are actually searching. Find out what they

want to know, answer their questions better than anyone else, and structure it

so Google can understand what the hell it's about. Your blog can be one of

the most powerful tools in your marketing arsenal, or it can be a

graveyard of company updates that nobody reads. The choice

is yours. And if this helped, don't keep it to yourself. Make

sure you're following SEO Fucking what? In whichever app you're listening to right

now so you don't miss the next episode. Share this one with your

marketing manager. Share it with whoever writes your blog. Share it

with anyone who's about to publish a post called Reflections on a wonderful

Q1. And if you want me to take a look at your blog and tell

you what's working and what's not, find me on LinkedIn or drop me

an email via Nikki hyphen pilkington.com until

next time. Get found. Make money. For fuck's sake.

Stop blogging about the office dog.