One of the hardest things to explain to people when we're discussing SEO nowadays is that its not about the h1 tags, nofollow links and managing Page Rank. Aaron Wood summed this up well by saying that for the modern marketer, PR should stand for "personal relationships" rather than "Page Rank". Even more accurate is this quote from Seth Godin

"Yelling with gusto used to be the best way to advertise your wares. There was plenty of media and if you had plenty of money, you were set. Today, of course, yelling doesn't work so well.

What works is leading. Leading a (relatively) small group of people. Taking them somewhere they'd like to go. Connecting them to one another.

It's enough if the tribe you lead knows about you and cares about you and wants to follow you. It's enough if your leadership changes things, galvanizes the audience and puts the status quo under stress. And it's enough if the leadership you provide makes a difference."?

We can all think of companies that have tried to enter our markets by putting down rivals. The hot-head loses opportunities for partnerships, for links, for publicity. I've seen hate-bait (deliberately posting a blog that makes people angry in order to get attention) fall away as people see it for what it is.

How do you know if you're leading and being a successful modern SEO? If you're being copied. Its so easy to replicate ideas nowadays that the question isn't if someone will copy your business model, but when. Imitation is a form of flattery. The time to worry is when no-one is copying you ... if no-one thinks you're worth following.