The term "SEO" is now used to encompass a much broader area of online marketing than it did in the past (tricking Googlebot and not fucking up Googlebot). You'

The term "SEO" is now used to encompass a much broader area of online marketing than it did in the past (tricking Googlebot and not fucking up Googlebot). You'll certainly run into lots of liars and conmen who use it to refer to outdated voodoo that worked ten years ago. But in most ecosystems it refers to planning and developing websites and web content for the purpose of satisfying the needs of people performing searches. And now the advice is "don't ever trick googlebot or googlebot will end you." As far as general human value goes, one aspect can be boiled down to "we found that 10,000 people look for such-and-such each month, but Google serves them all dogshit, and most of them go away knowing nothing. We will build a page that solves 5,000 peoples' problems a month, and it will be on your company website." A big chunk of the content on the web is there because of this process - and not just the spammy garbage. Without it, you see marketing teams throwing years of effort into the black abyss of outer space.