In response to a discussion of the scientifically distasteful term “missing link,” and how SEO favors its use:

I wonder sometimes about how many of our traffic-enhancing strategies, including those focused on search engine optimization, are grounded in solid data and proven hypotheses, and how many are based on hunches, wishful thinking and preconceived notions.

To take the latest example, “missing link” is a hot search term. But its use is going to affect your — apologies for this word — brand; if I see an outlet using it, my snap judgement will be that they’re not credible. So I’ll be a bit less likely to look at other of their stories in the future; the chance of my subscribing to the outlet’s RSS feed, and providing a great many pageviews thereafter, drop to nil; and I won’t spread the story through my social network. (And then there’s the question of whether there are advertising or payment-relevant differences in the audiences of “missing link” and “non-missing-link” approaches.)

Maybe all this doesn’t matter, and lowest-common-denominator SEO really is the best possible approach to monetizing pageviews. But I’d like to see rigorous data to back this up, and not just marketing spiels from SEO consultants with products to sell.