Does anyone feel like an SEO Slave?

[MrSS]

I think you are not enjoying what you are doing.

I firmly believe that the road to success is finding something you love to do and then finding a way to make a living doing it.
If you’re not having fun working, you may be in the wrong line of work.

From: http://blog.v7n.com/2011/09/27/have-fun-doing-it/

Though SE's are doing some playful thing in return of our hard work, take it as a challenge to strive and do harder. Remember SEO is not about ranking the website, it's helping your website to stand on it's own, helping to generate traffic and backlinks organically, ultimately SEO is for "people" not for search engines.

[garriours]

I always feel this. Seo is very addictive.

[Netspider]

"I always think of seo like a high mantainence girlfreind."

You will enjoy her company but you are not sure of getting anything out of seo.

[virtueinfo11]

Originally Posted by donnyw1967

I always think of seo like a high mantainence girlfreind. You try to give them everything they want, you are never sure if you gave them something they liked and they are always changing their minds. But, yes, I feel your pain

yes, you are right SEO is like "a high mantainence girlfreind."

we are doing more and more activity for link building but after changes on algorithms, we have to do more and more.

that's why "a high maintenance girlfriend"

[Turkey Property]

Originally Posted by searchbliss

You feel like a "slave" because you're putting too much into getting and keeping backlinks. It's a big
waste of time. Create content worth linking to, and people will link to it. Some may disagree, or want the "quick fix", but in my
experience, the organic backlinks my main site has acquired over the past 12 years have done far more in generating actual traffic
from "interested" visitors.

I am certainly not going to disagree with you, but I think this needs to put into perspective. Your site is 12 years old, which puts it into a different position from many others. For example my site is less than 1 year old and it is there to help me sell houses.
I can't afford to wait for years for organic backlinks, I need to sell to keep my job and that is the reality faced by many.
Prior to my launching my new main site last May, I had two other sites that I had inherited, both were started in 2007.
No off-page SEO had been done on either of them and they weren't in the top 50 for any of the keywords they were aimed at.
They had no natural backlinks because few people ever found them, and even if they had, they did not offer anything of service or benefit to anyone to merit mentioning in this way. I couldn't do anything with them because they were registered to an outside webmaster who wouldn't do anything without money changing hands, and who spoke little English. So I ditched him and the sites and started over.
By spending time link building I have page 1 SERP for 19 targeted keywords and this wouldn't have happened in the same timescale if I hadn't made it happen. I know this because of the experience of the previous sites. Most of my content is property adverts ( I do have various information pages but although they are uniquely written, the same information is easily available elsewhere) and these were kept to the same format, it is not an authority on anything and to be honest there is no real reason for any authoritive sites to link to it naturally. People only visit if they are interested in property in my location, and mostly they just browse the listings.
Not all sites are the same, they offer different things to different people and often it isn't something that is of benefit to the community, it is purely commercial. People want to sell, and people want to buy. To be competitive means getting a good SERP position quickly and maintaining it, and in the present system that is (rightly or wrongly) achievable through link building. I don't feel a slave to it, it is just part of my job.
As I said at the start, I am not disagreeing with you, just trying to put forward a point of view to explain why myself and others do go for the (relatively) quick fix.

[chaharfasl]

its really important

but i also agree that its importance may change as google rules changes

and one important rule , even more important than backlink is to keep your site fresh with useful content

[Sokun]

Building inbound link is a tedious job, but it is worth doing so, I experienced. But the best of all is by writing useful tips and techniques that truly help improve the quality of readers' lives.

Readers will be impressed by your sincere content. They like you of course. Remember when you like someone, how did you feel.

So, to me, what I'm thinking priority is how I share my knowledge to the people within my niche more effectively and efficiently. This is my 70% focus and 10% focusing on building relationship and networking through forums and blog posts. And the 20% left for article marketing, submitting to directories.

[directorking]

I do not know about the SEO slave analogy but yes it is difficult and an ongoing process.