I’m a big fan of optimizing headlines for search engines so they can be found, but sometimes sites go too far. At the moment, there are unverified rumors crawling around the Internet that actor James Earl Jones died. So I did a search on Google News. Check out this piece of work I found on a news site called the Post-Chronicle:
The “story” simply speculates on his death without offering any actual facts. Check out the use of “died,” “death,” “dead” and –yes– “no longer living” in the headline to goose search engine traffic.
Folks, don’t become desperate for page views and do bottom-of-the-barrel stuff like this.
(And no, I’m not linking to the story; there’s no way I’m lending any Google juice to that thing.)
By William M. Hartnett October 3, 2008 - 5:47 pm
Wow, that is embarrassingly shameless. But have I ever mentioned how iPod awesome my James Earl Jones site is? It’s sort of like the bailout or Ron Paul of cool, like a Steve Jobs heart attack or a Obama-McCain presidential debate. Paris Hilton.
By Danny Sanchez October 3, 2008 - 6:21 pm
@Hartnett, my friend, you have a talent for pants-wetting funny comments.
By Guyana October 10, 2008 - 3:06 am
The phrase “Google juice” made me giggle. I’ve been checking out your blog. It’s cool.