We live by an important rule and today we have decided to share it with you. In our view, its the golden rule of SEO/SEM, and marketing in general: “What would the average (web) person do?” And when we speak about the average web user, who do we mean? Do we mean males between 18-24 living in big cities? No. We’re talking about that guy who uses his computer for word processing and email or the gal who uses Facebook and  might text her friends a hundred times a day. Or to bring it down to one person think of it this way. What would Barry do?

Who is Barry?  Barry doesn’t read TechCrunch or Search Engine Land. He definitely doesn’t read this blog. He gets his tech news from his daily paper, the radio, FOX or CNN. He doesn’t use Gooole Chrome, might be aware of Mozilla, but prefers (and uses) Internet Explorer 7 . He  doesn’t own a website or a domain.  He uses the internet to get information, like the weather, sports scores,  do research online before  buying a new TV or Camera. He might partcipate in a forum or two , visit IMDB, buy stuff from E-Bay or search Craigslist occasionally. A couple of months ago, for fun he created an account at Match.com, and had a couple of dates, but nothing serious. He prefers going to bars.

His sister Claire is about the same age, she uses Facebook (alot), doesn’t really care much for Twitter. She likes to text Barry from her iPhone, which only has a couple of apps. She reads Perez Hilton and TMZ.  She uses her brothers computer for most of her other surfing, which is spent at Youtube,  looking at funny videos. She also uses it to do her homework, and research at Wikipedia. Last, but certainly not least, the words/acronyms  SEO or SEM are three letters that mean absolutely nothing to ethier of them.

So why do Barry or Claire matter? Barry & Claire are your target audience. They are most people’s target audience. They are tech savy, or aware, but aren’t early adopters. They don’t spend hours surfing the web. The web is there mostly for information and entertainment. You need to keep them in mind when you design most websites, choose keywords for campaigns or your meta tags. They don’t care about Google Sidewiki, or the Cannonical tag. They will not watch a video about how to use your site or even subscribe to an RSS feed. They will search on Google, and if you do your job of SEO or SEM right you’ll show up in the first three pages. If not, you don’t exist to them. Its that simple. Everything else is just details.

Now what? Create your own Barry and Claire in your head. Write down their profile. Remember to think average person. Use a family memebr or a friend as a template. You need to remove yourself, from what you are used to: being Mr. or Mrs tech savy. The person your family or friends call for computre problems. Now that you have them in your mind, visit your site. Revise your plans or create a new one. This is the secret to e-marketing success, so use to wisely. Good luck!