It is so gratifying to see that after recent events, common sense and reality might soon again prevail for many in the vaulted world of Realtor web site search engine results page (SERP) competition. Google has slapped down many sites that were using elaborate cross-linking schemes to gain higher positions in search results.

Tricks and shortcuts seldom work in business, no more than they work for long in professional sports. Look how it's finally coming out that some famous athletes reached their much-heralded, and widely lauded successes...not by working harder at mastering their craft, but through subterfuge, through sneaky cheating, emboldened by drugs and steroids.

How could they do that? Was it reaching for success at any cost that drove them to do something that they knew, going in, was abominable? They shamed themselves, sullied their entire sport, threw suspicion on all those who were up to standard, and for what? For a few fist-raised laps around the track as the fans cheered and visited upon them adoring, super-human abilities? For a fatter contract? To win at any cost?

They cheated us. Worse yet, they cheated themselves to the point that whether they'd been found out or not, they'd have had to live with their shameful deceit forever. Those who sold them the drugs are shameful, too.

Now we are engaged in a great SERPal war, testing whether one search engine optimization (SEO) person or any SEO person so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. And lessons have been learned, just as our parents and church and school once told us that we succeed best through hard work and earning what we get.

We have perhaps finally learned the meaning of sayings like, "There's a Sucker Born Every Minute." We may also have learned what Dale Carnegie meant when he said, "The person who gets the farthest is generally the one who is willing to do and dare. The sure-thing boat never gets far from shore."

Agents, seeing the promise of baskets of money, may sometimes behave like the athlete who uses steroids. Nevertheless, fortunately, such agents eventually learn the lesson. They learn to change. They face reality. They learn that there are no free lunches. They learn to apologize.

After all this business about tricks of linking, catalogs that sell PageRank-certainty, and the age of bought-links is long past, we may rediscover that our heroes may not be outside SEO experts, but simply much closer---ourselves----just us, each of us building our own web sites into welcome islands of consumer support, ones that truly serve the visitor. Sites that on that basis alone deserve their high position on search engines.

In December, 2003, I wrote an article for a national realty firm describing the way that my wife and I had worked since 1996 to get her web site to stay number one on Google in our market for the previous several years. (Now it is #1 on Yahoo, and on AOL, too.)

Now, after Google has seemingly enforced justice, maybe you do need to avoid the short cuts.

You just need to build colossal sites like Fran Vernon has done for www.LaCanadaRealEstate.com and www.FranAndRowena.com. Fran worked thousands of dedicated hours, all by herself, on these sites and I know because I watched her---my good friend and fellow night owl---do it. She took no shortcuts, no free lunches.

If you want examples, if you want to marvel at a site that is literally stuffed with regional Los Angeles/Pasadena/La Canada area content, just go visit either of the Fran and Rowena sites.

Clearly, http://www.lacanadarealestate.com deserves the first place award it received last month for "Most Original Content," selected from more than 24,000 Advanced Access clients! Fran, we are not worthy. Way to go, woman!

SEO is the practice of making a Web site come up as high as it can come up on search engines. A RealtorŪ Web site is a point on the Web that serves consumers with information and guidance helpful towards them making wise choices in realty, and in choosing an agent to represent them. It is important to remember the distinctions.