You give Search a bad name! (Part 2)
In my last blog I cited the first industry example of giving Search a bad name (apologies to the organizers of SES, I’m sure they’ve had far more damning feedback than this in the past!).
Here’s my second example of industry behaviour and culture which gives Search a bad name:
2. It’s still just one big (yet not so grown up) boys’ club
I sat in on a session at the aforementioned SES London listening to the highly testosterone-charged male panellists interjecting and interrupting each other to gain the lion’s share of voice (while some poor yet extremely intelligent lady from Google could barely get a word in edge ways).
As my attention waned, I distracted myself by counting the ratio of men to women delegates in the room - 10:1. That’s probably fairly accurately representative of the entire industry – ten men to every one woman. Despite the fact that the marketing industry has for decades has attracted more and more women into the field. And from a service delivery perspective, I wonder whether it is a coincidence that SEO agencies and vendors, predominantly led by male management, continue to bamboozle clients with macho tech speak and over-complicate the practices involved. Do they just want to keep the whole industry as one big boys’ club, or do they actually believe that this alpha male communications approach sells Search marketing?
Returning to SES this year after a few years’ absence, I was amazed at how threatening an environment it still feels for women, not least because of the sheer dominance of male industry figureheads. And it’s not hard to work out why women are deterred from the Search industry when you read experiences of fellow female Search specialists like Lisa Ditlefsen of Verve Search. When interviewed by WordTracker recently Lisa described a conversation had with a male SEO at a LondonSEO party who asked her “Ok so you have a high profile in the industry, and I have no doubt all the guys in this room want to sleep with you, but do you actually know anything about SEO?”
Need I say more?!!!!
Tags: Lisa Ditlefsen, maturity of Search, SES, women in search
2 Responses to “You give Search a bad name! (Part 2)”
“Ok so you have a high profile in the industry, and I have no doubt all the guys in this room want to sleep with you, but do you actually know anything about SEO?”
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You cannot be serious?! (can you?)
Shocking.
I do think women are often better at SEO: far more thorough and focused on ‘quality’.
It’s all very well talking the talk, but that will only get you so far…..
L
By Lucie on Mar 19, 2009
Yep it’s entirely true, it’s in fact the exact words. I just replied “I don’t know a thing actually”. Thick skin is a neccessaty in this industry I think, shame that its needed of course.
Amanda is totally right, I’m still amazed how much macho behaviour it is in this industry, but not only limited to SEO peers. I once had an experience with a client where they insisted on talking to my male junior SEO (that had just started) throughout the meeting, even when I replied to the questions. Just plain weird, is it so hard to believe that a woman can be technical. Lol it’s borderline funny.
Saying this though I know alot of GREAT guys in the search industry, that treats me like an equal and don’t doubt my capabilities just because I’m a woman. In fact these are the only people I bother talking to at industry events. If someone is rude and sexist I very very rarely change my mind about them, and karma, yes karma will bite them in the ass
By Lisa Ditlefsen on Mar 25, 2009