Maestro, Mike Murray is nothing, if not blunt, about common tactics in SEO.“People go to competitors and they say ‘I’m going to analyze their website and look at their keywords’ and that’s the dumbest thing I’ve heard of.”Chicago’s Michigan Avenue Hilton saw a lot of expert traffic during this year’s Search Engine Strategies. Some made pit stops with the WebProNews crew to share such nuggets of wisdom.Having already met with FathomSEO’s VP at Cincinnati’s What’s Working Now Conference last fall, we were excited that he decided to pay another visit..“Why would you go to a competitor’s site and and say ‘I’m going to see what keywords they have?’ Because… what they sell is not necessarily what you’re selling. Then you’re going to end up grabbing things that aren’t material to what you do.”It’s funny that what should appear reasonable wisdom is so easily overlooked. Maybe it’s the culture of immediacy? People tend to ignore the benefits of time in SEO endeavors (like most others). Sure, fast results are possible but how permanent can such swift gains be?“If you do something initially for two or three months, you’re going to get a lift. But the lift is just a lift… if you’re going to really improve that… you have to keep working at it. It’s an ongoing practice.”"Murray likened SEO to traditional marketing, referring to it as “test and measure” and encouraged people to spend at least a year with a program for good results.Mike also spoke on SEO’s bad reputation in the marketing world.“There’s so many bad apples out there… [but] people run around like this is the only industry that has bad apples. Those people take things to the hills… they’ll put twelve different keywords on the title tag, when really they’re only really going after one or two at most.”Suggesting that conferences like SES… and a simple dose of time can legitimize the industry, Murray adds,”As time goes on, you’re always going to have some of that back-and-forth, arguing about the SEO. I think the prof...