Have you ever seen the movie Patch Adams starring Robin Williams? If you haven’t seen it at all or if it’s been a while, I highly suggest that you watch it again. What lessons you can learn!

At the beginning of the movie, Patch commits himself to a psychiatric hospital as a suicidal patient. While in the hospital, one patient kept going up to other patients holding up four fingers. He would ask how many fingers he was holdling up, and everyone responded “four.” The man would yell, “Idiots!” and storm away.

Patch found this fascinating, so he learned more about the gentleman. The patient was a high profile, wealthy businessman who had checked himself into the hospital. He found it difficult to deal with other people who didn’t understand him.

One night, Patch stopped by the gentleman’s room. He first fixed the man’s cup, which the man watched intently. Patch then asked him the meaning of the fingers.

The patient held up four fingers and asked Patch how many he was holding up. Patch shrugged and said four. The man patiently told Patch to look at him, the man, instead of his fingers. Patch studied the man for a long moment, and he finally said, “Eight.”

The man smiled and said, “That’s a good answer.” Someone actually understood him.

Notice that he didn’t say, “That’s the answer.” He said it was a good answer, as if there could be other answers as well.

Try it yourself. When you look at the man and not the fingers, you’ll see twice as many fingers. You’re seeing beyond the obvious.

What on earth does this have to do with you and your Web site?

Let’s take this scenario to the Web.

Some Web site owners think that the only content they can provide on their site is their products and services. They don’t add any extra content like we’ve discussed on this blog:

1. How to articles

2. Tips and strategies

3. Games and items for kids

4. User-generated content (like forums or where users submit content to be added to the site)

5. Contests

6. Quizzes

7. Videos

8. Audio tutorials

9. Podcasts

10. Blogs

11. Area information, if your Web site is about a specific region

12. Maps

13. Statistics

14. Check lists

15. Myths

16. Misconceptions

17. Predictions

18. Whatever information your potential customers want to see on your site (which should ultimately be your goal)

Those site owners are stuck looking through four fingers, while the sharp site owners who have created a well-rounded Web site loaded with valuable content and a hook to get potential customers to come back again and again are rocking with visibility and building link popularity the easy, natural way. After all, it is harder to get links to a site that is purely commercial with no additional information built on it.

Tomorrow we’ll cover Part 2.