Want good SEO? Stop Blogging Like it's a Diary FFS!

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You published a blog post called Exciting News from the Team

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

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

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anyone else.

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

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for over 30 years before it was even called SEO.

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

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

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

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diaries, company newsletters or motivational

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Instagram posts. And then the business owner wonders why

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

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

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the difference.

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The main problem is that your blog is essentially a vanity

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

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

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

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

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Welcome to our new website, posted 18 months ago.

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73 words, 0 useful information. We're

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

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Nobody. Our trip to the industry awards.

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Lovely for your mum. Completely fucking useless for SEO.

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

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

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performances. Five reasons we love working here.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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searching for, not things you fancy writing about over

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your morning coffee. Let me explain something that it seems

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

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getting this spectacularly wrong. Google's entire job is

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

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

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

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

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

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That's your entire audience. Google knows this.

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Google can see that nobody is searching for your company name

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wins an award at Coventry Business Gala 2026.

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

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

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not lazy. They've actually put effort into blogging

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

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bit, sitting down and writing something every week or every

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

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effort, all that time completely wasted because nobody

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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self serving content that nobody reads, Google forms an

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opinion about your entire site. Google crawls your blog.

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

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

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

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

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when you do finally publish something decent, proper service

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page, a genuinely helpful guide. Google's already

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

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budget and it's a real thing.

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

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wasting that time on our office dog turn three today and

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

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

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

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

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

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

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blaming the business owners, not entirely, because this problem

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usually starts with bad advice. It's the marketing

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

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contain. It's the web designer who said blog

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

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suggested repurposing Instagram content as blog posts.

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

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with zero guidance on keyword research or search intent.

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Blogging for SEO without a strategy is like driving

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without a destination. Recalculating your route. You're

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

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absolutely fucking nowhere. And the worst offenders?

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The content mills and AI content farms, pumping out

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hundreds and hundreds of generic blog posts with no

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strategy behind them. 10 fun facts about Accounting,

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why We Love Mondays the History of Plumbing.

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Nobody is searching for this shite.

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

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blog into something that actually brings you traffic, leads and

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

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Here's what you really need to do,

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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ChatGPT does not know what people search for. It

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guesses and its guesses are often bollocks. Use actual

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search data from actual search engines. Step 2

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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completely different from what's ranking. Google has already

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

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better, not differently. Step 3 Answer the fucking

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

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

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If someone searches how much does a new boiler cost in

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

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

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

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

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with content and then with your expertise. One question

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

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

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asking will outperform a 5,000 word essay that waffles

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

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Structure it properly. Use headings. Use subheadings. Break

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

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

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

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your target keyword. Your subheadings should cover the specific

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

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

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subheadings break that conversation into logical chunks. And

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

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secret Ingredient. When the post is about pricing for accountancy

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

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in leads? Boring. Yeah. Effective.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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delete it. Yep, delete it. I know that

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feels brutal, but 47 shite blog posts dragging down

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your site are worse than 10 properly targeted ones doing

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actual work. Quality over quantity every

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

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

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genuinely useful case study or a post that demonstrates your

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

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National Donut Day from everyone at Smith and company can

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go straight in the bin. Step 6 Stop letting someone

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

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

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your business, understands your customers, and ideally,

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understands basic SEO. If the person writing your

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

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

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

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

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understanding of what makes content rank. Keyword in the

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

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but it does need to be intentional.

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

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

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

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genuinely got something newsworthy, a major partnership, a significant

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

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

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

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

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blog. Keep your blog focused on content that answers

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questions and targets keywords. Keep the company updates somewhere

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

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be your hardest working marketing asset. Every post should have

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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graveyard of company updates that nobody reads. The choice

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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an email via Nikki hyphen pilkington.com until

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

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Stop blogging about the office dog.