Jack Kerouac and Search Engine Optimization

I think I have posted at least once a week for the entire year (so far), and there aren't many weeks left in 2016. Thanks go to my friend, Kathleen Thompson, for inspiring me with her motivational book, The Project-Driven Life: How To Figure Out What You Want To Be When You Grow Up (click here to buy it). While you're at Amazon ordering Kath's book, think about ordering my book, The Beat Handbook: 100 Days of Kerouactions (click here). They both make great gifts -- something to think about for the approaching gift-ridden holiday.

I guess for this to count as a post and not a self-serving advertisement, I need to include some content of one sort or another. Hmmm.... Let me think.

Well, how about a screenshot of the first few things that come up on Google when I search for "Jack Kerouac." Keep in mind that Google searches are customized to the user, so if you search for that term your results will likely vary. Anyway, here is what my results look like. How are yours different?

Interestingly, I went 20 pages in on this search and still hadn't seen a single result from this blog, which I claim is the most Kerouac-obsessed on the planet. And that is despite over 22,000 pageviews last month. But perhaps blogs don't typically rise to the top of Google searches.

Just for fun, I Googled a specific blog post title (Jack Kerouac and the Tao of fried eggs), and it was the first search result. Specificity helps.

The top four search results -- Jack's Wikipedia entry, UMass Lowell's Kerouac page, The Academy of American Poets, and The Beat Museum -- make sense earning top search honors. Hell, they have Jack Kerouac in their URL. That can't hurt. Plus there are other mystical and magical things that web managers do -- all unknown to me -- to move their sites' search rankings to the top. It's called Search Engine Optimization, and it's a business. Everything is a business. In today's economy you could monetize used toilet paper with the right inside knowledge.

Which brings me to an idea: I think I'll add a permanent section to the sidebar of this blog that contains links to what I consider to be authoritative Jack Kerouac websites. That is, places to go for information about Jack that you can depend on (mostly -- there is no certainty in this life).

That's it for today (or this week). If you haven't done it yet, Google "Jack Kerouac" and see what comes up. Let us know in a comment.