“Never forget that the best way to optimize for yourself is to be yourself.” -ML
By Michael LaPenna
Writer, Editor & Content Strategist
There’s a strange contradiction at the heart of SEO: you’re writing for people, but also making sure an algorithm can find what you’ve written.
The trick is not letting the second part overwhelm the first.
Keywords, metadata, structure, and search intent all matter—but none should be more visible than the idea you’re trying to communicate.
Good SEO should feel almost invisible.
I’ve been thinking about this while fine-tuning my own website. I want people searching for a writer, editor, content strategist, or creative collaborator to find my work, which means being intentional about language and structure.
But if everything starts to sound like it was written for a search engine, I’ve solved one problem by creating another.
My approach always starts with a simple question: What are we actually trying to say?
From there, editing, structure, and optimization should clarify and surface that message—not replace it.
This matters even more when you’re working with a distinct voice. Effective SEO shouldn’t sand it down; it should help the right people find it.
There’s no real win in getting someone to click if what they land on could have been written by anyone.
Optimization works best when the human voice survives it.
Because being discoverable only matters if what people discover still sounds like you.
