It’s just ten days since Google+ became a reality (by invitation only still) and in that time it has doubled in numbers (though there is no way to know the initial uptake) and created a wow phenomenon in the blogosphere.

The reason we need SEO is because without it, nothing would really be visible on the web the way it should. Because it’s human nature we also try to squeeze as much additional exposure out of it as we can without crossing into the ‘dark side’ of Google’s penalties which can seriously affect a company’s ability to draw traffic from the web and damage its bottom line.

As an author I get hundreds of emails each week telling me how useful one of my books has been, making suggestions for titles or content and asking questions.

Success stories always catch my attention because they are the litmus test by which many of the practical books I write, are judged by.  This one happened to come on a day when I was swamped with requests for articles and the sheer pressure involved in completing the edits for my next book were taking their toll and I was beginning to lose perspective.

As I am writing this it’s Friday. The week has been hectic and I am preparing for the Google conference in Manchester. There are dozens of details which need to be finalized, I started the day with over 50 emails which will need to be answered, a magazine is asking me for an article on search and a website I usually write for has launched a new section on social media for which they have asked for content.

In current SEO thinking there is always the question regarding the effectiveness of on-page SEO. Just how important is it? Google discards these meta tags and BING and Yahoo! have been giving them less and less importance. There is a tendency to ignore them which I always believe is wrong. Well, this month I got the chance to find out.