2011 is sure to bring many changes to the SEO industry and the internet in general. Here are some things to get you started in the new year.
- SEO is not dead.
This is maybe the most important thing to know as we head into 2011. SEO is not dead. In 2010 there were many discussions about how social media is an SEO killer. May people stated that people will go to Facebook or Twitter to find things now and not use search. Actually, year after year we see more searches performed by more searchers. Below is an interesting graph from Google trends that shows the trend for searches performed that include Facebook. - Search and social are complementary.
This one relates to number one. If done correctly search and social media are complementary marketing tools not competing. One of the things that the search engines put heavy emphasis on when ranking pages, is their incoming links. So, links from other sites. They count each link as a vote for the quality of the site it is linking to. Guess what one of the things is that you get from social media.. yep you guessed it, links. On the flip side, many people may go to their social networks to get opinions about products, services or topics, they then use search engines to find out more information or to find places to purchase the product or service. It’s also possible, with the advent of ‘real-time’ search, to influence what keywords a site will be found under by using keywords in discussions on social platforms. - Even the big guys see themselves as complementary.
Their have recently been some changes in both the social and search industries that support this.- Both Google and Microsoft have a stake in Facebook.
- Bing is now using results driven by Facebook.
- Google launched real-time search.
- Google Universal search includes social media platforms.
- Real-time search engines have become popular with startups.
- Get local to get found.
In 2010 location apps received a lot of publicity, plus Google made it clear that they are very interested in local with the bid on Yelp (last year), then the attempt to buy Groupon and finally the launch of Places. Google is also directly contacting businesses to get them setup and using the Places. So, what can we learn from this? Getting your business listed locally can be a great way to bring traffic to your website as well as your door, or at least raise awareness of the company. - SEO is more than just text.
Google’s Universal Search has been around for some time now and Bing is also showing results from multiple types of media. Using videos and images can be a great way to show up multiple times in search results. Just make sure you use Alt tags so the search engines know what the image/video is about.
