Taylor Swift's Secret Wedding?... Google It

Like this woman needs more publicity? It's not enough she's part of everything, everywhere, all at once? But now this... taking up residence in my blog? And what's on the horizon, will she be guest speaker at an upcoming NATO summit? Could Taylor suddenly usurp Barbie's reign in the doll department? Will her name be bandied about during the next election cycle? Does she have a killer ham recipe about to drop just in time for Easter?... If the past is any indicator, the answer to all of those questions is a resounding "yes". Or at least three out of four (hell, I don't know, maybe she's not even into ham). But love her or hate her or feel indifferent altogether, that girl be trending.

So, what gives? Am I producing more opium for the people, more pablum for the masses? And what up with the reference to some furtive wedding? How is it possible that I could be hip to the fact when this juicy nugget is nowhere else to be found? Surely, if this were true the news would be reverberating across the globe at breakneck speed. I mean, we're talkin' a woman so in demand that even when she's just hanging out in a luxury box, sans microphone and guitar, a major television network deems it necessary to break away from the Super Bowl--America's one true religion, garnering some 124-plus million sets of eyeballs--every couple minutes to see how she's reacting to the game. So yeah, how could I possibly be the only one to have the skinny on her clandestine nuptials?

Alright, so here's what's up: I'm testing out a theory here. Kind of a dry run. Just a little amateur sleuthing regarding a scientific practice that's been going on for some time now. It's all about increasing traffic to a website. It's about making yours rank as high as possible in Google so that when someone types in a word or words that have to do with the subject you're presenting, your page will appear at the top or near the top of the list. So, from what I've gathered, the prevailing theory is to use words in the title that are currently trending and then load up your piece with as many other popular keywords as possible--the hottest celeb names always a big draw--so that your site will garner more hits than others containing more mundane words and maybe no celebs at all. For instance, if I was political I'd toss in Biden and Trump or if I was writing about contemporary music, Usher, Beyonce, Ariana Grande and Megan Thee Stallion would get a nod as they are tracking on Spotify. Oh, and did I mention Taylor Swift?

Okay, so to get into the weeds a bit here, the process is called Search Engine Optimization (SEO), an actual full-time job for a whole slew of theme creators who specialize in content optimization to help make your material as compelling as possible to people online. This is now a huge industry garnering megabucks to make sure their clients' content dovetails nicely with Google's algorithms, which, by the way, no one's privy to (except Google) and, yeah, they're being updated all the time so don't even try to crack the code. Anyway, the deal is you hire these people, they figure out the keywords regarding your particular theme or business to attract others looking for your services and the next thing your site is being visited in a much more robust manner thus enabling you to increase your profit margin. Sounds like a win-win situation, right? Someone trending would probably agree. Someone like Adele, maybe?

So that's where I'm at here; armed with all this knowledge and a frugal demeanor (the word "cheapskate" has been used but I prefer "frugal"), I figured it's DIY time. How hard could it be to name names, right? Hell, even Kim Kardashian could pull it off. Likewise, Jay-Z. I mean, it's nowhere near the difficulty level as being a contestant on, say, the upcoming "The Voice", starring John Legend, Chance the Rapper, Reba McEntire and Dan + Shay (yeah, I checked and they really do use the plus sign). And just so ya know, I'm totally cognizant of coming across as selling out just for the online attention and have thus taken great pains to remain judicious, always keeping to my through-line, never deviating with the aforementioned keywords in a name-dropper capacity. Know for sure if I bring up Patrick Mahomes, Miley Cyrus or Elon Musk it'll be relevant.

And BTW, if you're wondering about this blog title it was originally "Taylor Swift's Secret Wedding" but in checking I found the word "Google" placed in the top ten keywords consistently so... Voila!... I added the question mark and put it on the back end as kind of a call to action (and to eliminate any potential lawsuits from the Smith camp). Also, there's the added chance that if you google "Taylor Swift's Secret Wedding?" my blog will come up. I don't know, just figured that's something a few of her exes, like Joe Jonas, Taylor Lautner, John Mayer or Jake Gyllenhaal might do. Or even her new beau, Travis Kelce. Again, no name-dropping, only relevant stuff here. Just sayin'.