Ask any blogger, online business owner or marketer what they want most for their website and you are inevitably going to hear a chorus of the same response, "more qualified traffic from Google."

More qualified traffic equals more success, more money, more of whatever it is that they want. As David Ogilvy, founder of the legendary advertising firm would say, "you don't save souls in an empty church." 

Le Web has empowered the everyday individual in a way never before seen. It gives out free microphones and speakers and allows anybody with access to its network to broadcast a message to the entire world. As such, the path to success has done an about face from the way it used to be.

Sweet memories of the way it used to be

Before Le Web the conventional path to success was defined by the inside relationships you had to 'get to' Oprah (pyramidism), how well you could manipulate another's thought process (propaganda), your cold calling skills (intrusion) and how in alignment you were with the status quo (pretension). If there are others I missed, as I'm sure there are, leave them in the comment box below.

It's a brutal, unkind picture that reduced Nature's most sublime creation into two unnatural, unbecoming and co-dependent categories: advertisers and consumers. Blech.

Web technology, a shadow cast by the macro-evolutionary trends of Self Realization, Truth and Unity has shattered this model ... for the better.

Now the path to success is about your individual authority or mastery on a given subject, your personal integrity and the degree to which you come from a giving or service-minded consciousness. I like to call this simply, being awesome. Believe it or not, Google has a lot to do with this shift.

Also: there is a strong tie between Le Web and the Return of Gift Economics to be noted, as evidenced by the open source software movement, as well as the so-called freemium business model (that Google also pioneered) but that is the subject for another day.

How Google gives you props online

Achieving a #1 ranking on Google is no small feat for a subject covered in the mainstream. Fringe subjects such as the best toe warmers for 3rd generation Eskimos, that's another story (but not always as niches can be equally competitive now).

To achieve a top spot on Google, Google must consider your website (the shadow you cast) an authority on a subject. It's Google's goal to provide their users with the most relevant information their users are searching for. Authority is a key measure of relevancy in their eyes, naturally.

Google deduces your authority primarily by how many sites link to your site and especially how authoritative those other sites are. It's just like the voting system, where inbound links are the equivalent of a vote in your favor.

An example. If I have a website that gives out stock advice and the Wall Street Journal links from their site to mine, that one link will be worth 100,000x more than, let's say, 20 no name sites with no authority that link to me.

With an inbound link of this quality, Google will assume that my website will give its users higher quality information and thus rank me higher. Even more so if Wikipedia, power bloggers and the like link in to me.

Of course, for other websites to link in to me in the first place, I have to be creating 'link worthy' content. In other words, I have to be awesome in some way, as my content is but another shadow that my character casts.

It's democracy in its truest form, as there simply isn't a way to scam this system at scale. Choices are made by real people with no intermediary based on their impression of the quality of the content you're putting out.

So, the name of the game is authority and the path to success now looks something like this.

Create Awesome Content

Awesome Content = High Likelihood People Will Share Your Awesome Content

High Likelihood People Will Share Your Awesome Content = More Inbound Links

More Inbound Links = Authority Status Given by Google

Authority Status Given by Google = Higher Google Rankings

Higher Google Rankings = Success

Success = :)

What is authority? Being awesome, that's what

If you want to know what authority means, just look at the root word ... author. What is it to be an author?

It is to be committed to a certain subject. Passionate about it. Enough so that you will dedicate your life to the study and research of this subject, no matter if people pay attention or not.

Being an author is about following your calling, it's a state where your mind, heart and body are acting in unison.

Being an author is being a creator. The etymology of the word author is 'originator.' It's about creation, original creation ... your unique signature. Author is synonymous with artist.

Being an author or an artist is being a giver. You create for the joy of creation, profit is not your motive. Excellence is.

Authority is simply a title other people give to you based on the value they associate with your content, the worldly production of your artistry: written word, spoken word, product, whatever. It's like an award, sometimes it's justified and sometimes not.

The path to success that Google and Le Web have paved really boils down to the path of Self Realization, that's what being awesome is actually about because, at the core, we are all magnificent beings with something unique to contribute to the world. Such is my faith at least.

In order to succeed online and indeed in general now-a-days, you have to be yourself. People will detect a lying marketer from a mile away because they're sick to death of them, as they should be. You have to be original. You have to be passionate. You have to be real.

And the kicker ... you have to be fearless enough to let other people see who you really are.