Google and search engine optimization

My co-worker Ryan McLane Googled me this morning to see if Sixty Cent Main Event was bumping me up the search engine’s rankings.

Alas, I am still second fiddle to a young piper named Aaron Todd.

I’ll admit it, I’ve Googled myself before. It’s one of those things everyone has done at some point. And since you can find me on the Internet, I must be important.

Anyway, this other Aaron Todd is hogging the top spot at both Google and Yahoo when someone searches for Aaron Todd. At least I’m at the top on MSN.

Now there’s no one in the world who loves the bagpipes more than me. The only reason I went to my college’s commencement ceremony every year was to hear the bagpipers play the recessional tunes.

Seriously, we’re all proud of you kid. But come on Google, this site hasn’t been updated for more than two years. Meanwhile, I’ve won sixty cents in an Internet poker freeroll, decided to trade my way to the World Series of Poker and made amusing observations about the betting world.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, Ryan has now leapfrogged over a writer for teenbodybuilding.com who dominated him for years. Now the first two results link to some freelance writing he did, followed by his Casino City page.

At least I’m still ahead of the guy who has www.aarontodd.com, but that site consists of one page that links to itself and allows the visitor to listen to one four-minute track of the guy’s music. (Apparently, Aaron Todds are a musical sort. I was in a barbershop quartet in high school … does that count?)

But I’m happy to say that while Google might put me behind the young bagpiper, I can take solace in the fact that both Ryan and I appear in the garble some idiots use on pages created for search engine optimization purposes.