Blog or Website? Which is better? There has long been controversy over whether one really is better for SEO, and if so, why.

I’ve heard reports that blogs do actually index faster, by a week or so, from a credible source. I’ve not heard any other compelling or believable information on long term SEO benefits that were specific to blogs. There was a time when SEs were indexing every blog and treating them like they were something special, but it was short lived – stopped about the time the spammers caught on and started abusing blogs left and right. There hasn’t been any preference for YEARS.

Faster indexing is the ONLY difference I’ve been able to isolate as having any validity, that isn’t attributable to other factors, which are independent of the structure. Most differences have to do with the quality and desirability of the content, the individual optimization efforts, and the promotional efforts of the site owner. Period. Potentials are equal between most good structures, whether it is WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, HTML, etc.

Speculation runs the gamut… I’ve heard all of these things touted as reasons why blogs or websites are “better”.

• Search engines like blogs better.
• Search engines like websites better because they are more stable.
• Search engines like blogs because they have changing content.
• Blogs optimize better.
• Websites build backlinks more stably.

Actually, these factors are all pretty irrelevant.

Search engines don’t really care whether it is a blog or a website. Blogs can behave like websites, websites can behave like blogs, and search engines don’t care. They care about UNIQUE CONTENT. Structure, aside from ability to optimize to a reasonable degree, is completely irrelevant.

We’ve noticed that website pages, or blog pages (posts), index and get traffic long term based on backlinks, and demand for the content. If they are referenced elsewhere, they get more traffic sent directly to them. And if you are the best source for a high demand, low availability topic, you’ll get traffic no matter what structure the site is in (this is, in fact, a great key to getting spontaneous traffic).

Changing content is also irrelevant to the structure. Search engines DO like new content, but ONLY if it is GOOD content. Doesn’t matter how often your content changes if it is trash, Search engines can recognize trash, and they treat it the same way people do. Ever seen those Splogs… You know, those tacky blogs responsible for 99% of comment spam, which consist of nothing but quoted blog posts? Search engines dislike them, and they are a waste of time, because they lack quality original content. The only people who create them are the ignorant, and the dishonest who are charging people for bogus “SEO” services.

Some blogs don’t have regular posts. Some websites have regular updates. So changing content isn’t the reason why some people feel that blogs index faster, either.

So what is it?

It is the ping.

The ONE significant difference in BEHAVIOR, aside from user actions, structure, or quality, is the PING. Potentials are completely equal in all other respects.

Blogs ping when you create a new post. New content has a brief appearance in the latest items index on some directories, then goes into the archives. You have to claim your blog at Technorati and list it with some directories. But as soon as you do, your new posts are announced to them, and fed through RSS.

Some of the blog directories are considered very high credibility links by Search Engines. It helps you get linked faster.

It is important to note though, that the power of the ping is MOSTLY transient. One brief moment in the spotlight, then your page disappears into oblivion unless it is highly desirable information, in which case it will regularly resurface.

So what is the real power information here?

You can make a website ping and feed. You can make pages behave like a blog, you can post regularly, and you can install an extension to make it ping when you update content. Many dynamic site structures have RSS capabilities which can be enabled and used.

The choice of whether you use this or that structure doesn’t depend primarily on indexing speed, or any assumptions of blog preference. It depends on what features are needed, and what the long term growth needs are.

Where SEO is concerned, the playing field can be completely leveled in all other respects.

I have some pet peeves about the elitist attitudes of some web designers. They seem to feel that the way they do it is the only way to do it, and that anyone who fails to do it their way, is somehow inferior. One of those issues, involves hand coding.

Their assertion is that hand coding is always superior to that created by a WYSIWYG HTML editor.

My assertion is that 99% of the time, a WYSIWYG editor will produce a superior result. Because 99% of the time, the site is being coded by someone who has an insufficient understanding of code to produce superior code.

The fact is that human error is responsible for more poor site performance than even bad WYSIWYG editors. And human error doesn’t just cause non-compliant or oddly coded sites. It causes major problems. Well, the one exception would be MicroSoft Word – there are people who think that it is an HTML editor, and it is NOT. It out classes the worst human errors. But as a rule, people are the source of the greatest mistakes, and the mistaken notion that hand coding is somehow superior is responsible for a large percentage of those mistakes.

There are three levels of skills:

1. Beginner. These people know nothing of code, they create a site in an HTML editor because they cannot create one any other way. Any attempt to edit code by hand will potentially cause more problems than it solves.

2. Intermediate. They understand code, can hand edit it to improve or alter some kinds of code, but do not hand write it, and SHOULD not. As much as possible, they should either start with an existing template and customize it, or, use a WYSIWYG editor to create the site code, then only make necessary alterations by hand.

3. Expert. This is someone who understands code so well they can write it from scratch. In this case, they should STILL start with an editor – why? Because it is, frankly, faster to use a WYSIWYG editor, and then tweak it, than it is to write it from scratch. This is more fair to the client who is paying for it. It is also more accurate. Editors are by nature more accurate, and less likely to make typo mistakes. A good one will consistently produce good code 90% of the time, with consistently known issues with the other 10%. A smart coder can easily improve that 10% in less time than it takes to write the other 90%.

It simply is not true that hand coding is superior. In most cases, it is a complete waste of time. It is a myth in itself too, because many people who are touting hand coding as the ultimate skill are using some kind of software to do half of the job anyway.

The key for most designers is to choose a good WYSIWYG editor, and then learn to use it well. Good tools IMPROVE the quality of work, they don’t compromise it, and there is no shame in depending on good tools. It is, in fact, smart strategy.

The myth that hand coding is somehow better than software coded pages is perpetuated by snobs who want to belittle those who don’t have a highly specialized understanding of code.

I bombed two weeks of computer classes in high school. Ok, it was really a math class, but the teacher took liberties and immersed us in command line for two weeks (TRS-80s). I wallowed. Could not figure it out, and HATED it. Swore at that point that I’d never touch another computer as long as I lived. I had no use for them AT ALL.

About 1994 my father-in-law gifted us a Mac Classic. Kevin was a teacher at the time, and he took right to it. To my utter shock, I did too. I began writing poetry and short stories. I sought out freeware and shareware games for my kids – educational stuff. After about six months, I reformatted the hard drive just to see if I could. I was hired as a computer aide at a local school, and within a few years, was buying, refurbishing, and reselling Macs (desktops and laptops). I could quote you the specs of any Mac model off the top of my head.

There was something about the Mac. I could actually USE it. And using a Mac early on in my computer business career taught me some valuable lessons, which have been part of shaping our business into something both original and successful.

1. Don’t make it harder than it has to be. Keep things simple on the surface, and leave the layers of complication for later.

2. Make it fun. The Mac was a lot of fun. There were hidden messages and games in many of the programs (nicknamed Easter Eggs). The computer greeted you with a smile. Mac instructions were written with a sense of humor (David Pogue’s were some of the best, in Macs for Dummies). You could change the desktop patterns and even make your own (remember, all of this was brand new concepts at the time, Bill Gates was still trying to mimic it).

3. Think Different. More than different – think about needs, and meet them, instead of being trapped by rigid standards arbitrated by those who really don’t get what the needs actually are.

4. Don’t be afraid to use what works, regardless of what everyone else is doing. I defended my position to use a Mac over and over, and it taught me to do what worked for MY business, and not be made to feel inadequate because I wasn’t doing it the way someone else thought I should.

5. Meet higher standards. The Mac had higher customer satisfaction standards than PCs had. They also had higher compatibility and performance standards. They met them too.

6. When you make changes to keep up with technology or growth, don’t lose what makes it work. The Mac fell apart when they made some decisions that lost many of the things users loved about it. It lost some of the humor, much of the reliability, and much of what made it unique. The end came for us when they released an operating system that was incompatible with the firmware (part of the built-in hardware coding) on our Mac, combined with a decrease in available software for our industry. We moved to the PC because the Mac no longer had what we needed – It did not matter that the iMac was cute and colored, the hard drive crashed repeatedly and had to be reformatted due to the incompatibility. It was unsustainable.

7. Just because you screw up once, or twice, or even a dozen times, doesn’t mean you can’t make a comeback. While we haven’t gone back to the Mac (it would be prohibitively expensive for us to do so now), an increasing number of our clients and students have done so.

The Mac was responsible for a huge learning process for me. It took all of my half-talents, and combined them together into a combination of skills which had value. And Mac instructions were so much clearer than PC instructions (which always seemed to assume you already KNEW what you were doing and only needed a reminder of a single concept). In fact, I learned more from Macs for Dummies, More Macs for Dummies, and Mac Secrets, about how to operate and diagnose a PC than I did from a huge combination of PC books. Because I learned more foundational computer concepts, and I learned more practical applied troubleshooting concepts, which I could then adapt to the PC.

I function using a PC. But it isn’t fun, and I miss my Mac. I don’t know if it will ever be feasible to go back. But I appreciate the lessons I learned from it. The whole philosophy of the Mac had a huge impact on how I thought about business, and has helped to take me someplace extraordinary.

The last few weeks have passed in a blur. Some good things, some hard ones, some absolutely unmanageable ones. I can blame it on my broken glasses – one of the absolutely unmanageable things. Everything is a blur, regardless of the speed at which it passes!

They are old glasses, ones I’ve been trying to get a few more months out of. No insurance, so they have to be budgeted for. Cleaning them one morning, the lens fell out. One minute I was circling the cloth on the lens, the next moment the lens lay in my hand. No pop, no resistance, it just lay there. I immediately thought to pop it back in (the logical impulse). The frame was broken, and no impulse was going to make that lens stick. It broke where the top of the frame connects to the nosepiece – it was not the nosepiece that broke, it was the top of the frame. Unrepairable.

My mother helpfully suggested tape… I love my mother, but I still can’t believe she seriously suggested this, even if the break HAD been in a place where the tape would conceivably hold the pieces together.

Ok, so I have no pride where some things are concerned, I’ll drive an old car and not feel bad about it. But taped glasses on a 40+ year old woman are completely incompatible with any SEMBLANCE of a professional image! She suggested this the day I was invited to present at the Idea Expo. Yeah, that’s just what I want… Show up with tape on my glasses, right between my eyes where it is sure to attract the maximum attention.

I wonder, which sort should I use?

• The classic surgical tape has a pristine white tackiness about it. It might be considered the all season look. It frays nicely also, and strings hang off the edges, adding to the overall pathetic-ness of the look.
• Perhaps I should go redneck and use duct tape. It would not only lend a festive silver gleam, it would be sure to be bulky and lumpy – so no one could miss it. The perfect touch to my segment on creative solutions for Shoestring Startups!
• Or maybe a contemporary look would be better – I could try red electrical tape. This is my 12 year old son’s favorite tape for repairing books, toys, or anything else that it will stand out nicely on. I’m sure it would also stand out nicely beside the bridge of my nose. Red is one of our company colors, so I’d then coordinate with our branding.
• How about pop-glitz? We have some faceted mylar tape – in silver or gold. Of course, someone might then mistake the sparkle for an inappropriate twinkle in my eye. Besides, I’m not sure I want to feel THAT young.

Maybe I can create an entire look around it. Worn vinyl velcro tennis shoes, a muu-muu style housedress, and a balaclava.

Think it will catch on?