Tommy McDevitt

I help service businesses fix visibility leaks 🔍 local SEO, website clarity, content and AI-era search. 👇 100% free email course.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Maybe one day I’ll be a millionaire.

But the meaning of life isn’t money or success.

It’s about relationships.

I was out with friends last night.

I wouldn’t trade them for all the money in the world.

I could achieve any number of successes in my lifetime.

But if I don’t have a circle to share the big moments with or to lean on for support…

Is any of it really worth it?

To quote the immortal scholar, Barney Stinson:

“Whatever you do in this life, it’s not legendary unless your friends are there to see it.”

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

SEO Tip: Start with the decision, not the keyword.

As an engineer, I kept going after popular searches.

Most clicks.
Highest volume.
Biggest opportunity.

But learning SEO has taught me something unintuitive:

Search volume can hide if the traffic is commercially relevant.

Don’t chase search volume.

Instead, ask what the searcher is trying to achieve.

That's how you create pages for real demand - not just impressive-looking traffic.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Unexpected ways playing music makes your life better:

- you learn to listen
- you get better at timing
- you learn the true value of practice
- you can express yourself artisticlaly
- you stop needing every mistake to be fatal

Every person should play an instrument, even if they suck.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

People think SEO is:

Finding keywords
Writing blog posts
Chasing rankings

What it actually is:

Understanding what buyers want
Creating pages which match their intent
Making it obvious why they should choose you

That’s literally it.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Launching this small business has been a useful reminder:

Being great at the work isn't enough.

You still have to be findable, understandable, trusted and easy to choose.

That's the problem I'm studying/building around now.

If you run a local service business, here's the system I wish I'd had earlier:

https://t.co/M4ay16DLJx

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

6 lessons from launching a portrait photography business to study how service businesses get found, trusted, and chosen:

1. Early on, shipping something matters more than elegance. A tiny portfolio or a page with rough copy -- all better than another week in your head.

When I finally made the choice to just ship AI-generated copy and improve it later, it finally got me publishing pages which I could then iterate on like crazy.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

5. Excessively long pages are actually worth it if they're giving important info.

I used to think huge landing pages were just bloat. Most of them probably still are. But some of the best ones are long because they're sharing things which actually help customers make a decision, such as testimonials, answers to common objections, "what next" details, etc.

Making it shorter is only valuable if nothing important is missing.

6. You can’t improve an offer in private forever. At some point, the market has to be allowed to hurt your feelings.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

The longer I write, make videos and build things, the more obvious this becomes:

Google doesn't care how hard you worked.

It cares whether your page is useful for a searcher at that moment.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

The secret to getting ahead in SEO:

Become the business customers would choose anyway.

- clear offer
- visible proof
- useful pages
- strong reputation
- specific positioning

Google isn't trying to reward whoever says "near me" most.

It's trying to recommend the best answer for that searcher at that moment.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

@Tim_Denning Completely agree with this. One of the biggest unlocks for me online was learning to get out of my own way.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Looking for a creative hobby to recharge your batteries when you aren't writing?

I recommend street photography.

- no expensive equipment required - your phone is enough
- gets you out of the house
- gives you an excuse to walk more/get more exercise
- easy to practice anywhere
- teaches you to notice things most people walk straight past

I started because I wanted better photos.

I kept doing it because it made familiar places feel interesting again.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

My software engineer brain used to like SEO because it looked like an optimisation problem.

More rankings. More clicks. More traffic.

But over time, I've learned that a lot of the skill is constraint.

Great SEO helps you show up where you're the right choice...

...and avoid competing where you're not.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Google doesn't simply recommend "great services".

It recommends businesses that make their service, location, reputation and proof impossible to miss.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

My software engineer brain used to like SEO because it looked like an optimisation problem.

More rankings. More clicks. More traffic.

But over time, I've learned that a lot of the skill is constraint.

Great SEO helps you show up where you're the right choice...

...and avoid competing where you're not.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Bad SEO tries to win the leaderboard.

Good SEO tries to deserve the result.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

I've noticed: the faster I build, the less embarrassed I get.

Not because I've stopped making dumb mistakes.

Because I don't have the time to turn tiny things into a personality crisis.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

I used to think huge landing pages were mostly fluff.

6,000 words of filler.
Endless FAQs.
Sections no one asked for.

But the more I study successful landing pages, the more I realise:

A lot of the "fluff" is doing a job.

It's answering the quiet objections buyers have at the decision moment:

- is it for me?
- can I trust you?
- what happens next?
- is it worth the money?
- why you and not someone else?

Hey, I'm not saying some writers couldn't cut out the fluff.

But landing pages are helping someone make a decision.

Shorter is only better when nothing important is missing.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Understanding search intent destroys the belief that all good content is equally valuable.

[Tommy McDevitt @TMLKMCD]

Local SEO isn't won by the business that writes "near me" the most.

It's won by the business which makes its service, location, reputation and proof easiest to find and understand.

- visible reviews
- local citations
- clear service pages
- consistent business details
- useful answers to buyer questions

Clear always beats clever.