The Changing Search Landscape

“Every Monday, SEO is a new industry.” Those are the words of long time search industry specialist Bruce Clay. He tells WebProNews that search results are changing, links are changing, and social media is impacting search in many different areas.

First of all, although social is growing in popularity and value, Clay says it is still hard to determine the extent of its impact on search. Both people and businesses are still learning how to use it. He believes there are two different camps on social. The first is similar to PPC since users can leverage ads in their social networks. This way can be thought of as an ad network, and it allows users to drive traffic and raise awareness.

He classifies the second camp as being closer to SEO since it can be used to encourage people to link to you. In addition, it can be used for reputation management. Just as SEO and PPC are more effective together, using both camps of social media are equally important. He says marketers will miss out on valuable opportunities if they do not utilize social media.

Linking is another area that has changed. As Clay discusses, there are several ways to do links such as stimulating people socially, begging for links, and being a link magnet. Social media is tied to the aforementioned stimulating people for links and also to link begging, since it could provide a target through a social relationship. As he points out, link magnets are the best method because marketers create great content that people want to link to.

Although link networks are also included in linking practices, Clay believes they could become a serious problem. These networks allow one user or company to have some level of control over a group of different sites. Although he has no direct inclination from Google, he believes the search giant will crack down on this practice. He thinks Google has no choice but to either lighten up on its standards, which he believes is wrong, or enforce stronger regulation. If link networks were eliminated, he says there would be a “massive change in the linking structure and rankings.”

In regards to changes in search results, Clay recalls that Google offers more options, maps, and more in the SERPs. He predicts that searchers will be able to selectively turn on live feeds and engagements objects (video, images, etc.). Google has also made efforts pertaining to search intent and behavior. With linking practices changing as well, he believes we will see many new developments in search results. Additionally, he says these changes will continue and traditional SEO will lose its effectiveness.

Are you accommodating these changes?

Mobile Marketing Trends and Why They Matter

Mobile is definitely on everyone’s mind these days. In this interview with WebProNews, Cindy Krum of Rank-Mobile talks about some popular mobile trends that people should watch closely. Applications are one of the big drivers to mobile and, incidentally, not just iPhone apps. Google’s Android and other platforms are creating their own marketplace as well.

In regards to apps, she points out that many people use them for search, which essentially takes away from search engine traffic. For this reason, she advises local businesses to optimize for apps in addition to optimizing for mobile search.

Krum also discusses the idea of augmented reality, which is typically in the form of an app. If a user points their phone toward an object or location, it puts a digital layer over it that provides information. One example of this is Wikitude. It lets users know if there is a Wikipedia article on the object or location.

Geolocation is another hot mobile area with sites such as Foursquare and Gowalla on the rise. Krum believes these platforms can be very valuable for coupons, loyalty programs, and more.

To compile her mobile ideas together, Krum also recently wrote a book entitled Mobile Marketing: Finding Your Customer No Matter Where They Are. She says it provides a comprehensive view of how mobile marketing is more effective when all aspects are used together.

Linking offline marketing with mobile efforts is just one area of importance that she covers in the book. As she explains, when people are offline, they don’t have access to their computers. However, they do have access to the Web. As a result, marketers can incorporate elements such as QR codes to tie the two areas together, which will ultimately, reach consumers.

Are you keeping up with these mobile trends?

Paid Search to Overtake Organic?

The organic and paid search dynamic has changed dramatically in recent years. With these changes, many people within the search industry have continued to maintain their strong position in choosing one over the other.

As Andrew Goodman of Page Zero Media tells WebProNews, those on the organic side argue that 80 percent of clicks come from organic. Those on the paid side, contend that more business revenue comes from paid as opposed to organic. For example, Microsoft conducted a study in which it found that 60 percent of revenue across thousands of sites was driven by paid and 40 percent of the revenue was driven by organic. However, Goodman says all these reports are misleading.

He does point out that specific verticals indicate a trend in favor of paid over organic. For instance, if you do a search for “San Diego tours,” the top 3 results are paid, there are paid listings on the right side, and there are also local results that could have a paid element. In addition, these practically take up all the room above the fold.

As a result, Goodman says, “To not do paid just basically means your competitors are there and you’re not.”

He went on to say how he believes that organic will begin to lose its meaning over time. Taking it even further, he says it’s getting difficult to clearly define the “10 blue links” as either paid or organic, since results include news, YouTube, and more.

Because the search environment is being flooded with personalization, localization, and other new factors, Goodman says people need to realize that the “fixed 10 blue links” do not exist anymore. That said, he thinks paid search is more reliable moving forward.

As the search dynamic continues to evolve, what do you see happening to paid and organic search?

Avoiding Data Pitfalls in Local Search

According to Eric Enge of Stone Temple Consulting, one of the greatest challenges with local search is the data. The reason for this issue is due to the fact that there are many errors and inconsistencies. For example, people fail to update their data after mergers, acquisitions, change of brand name, and more, which results in duplicate and bad data.

Fortunately, Enge shares tips for cleaning up the data. First of all, he suggests going to the search engines. Companies should get listed with the engines and go through a validation process. Once users are validated, the engines are more confident that they have the right data.

Secondly, he suggests going to major data aggregators such as InfoUSA, Acxiom, and Localeze. These aggregators provide data to many sites, which the search engines crawl. As a result, it is very important that they have correct and updated data.

Lastly, Enge advises users to go to major portals such as SuperPages, Yelp, YellowPages. Once your business is correctly listed in all these places, your data problem will likely be solved.

Incidentally, Eric Enge co-authored a book entitled, The Art of SEO: Mastering Search Engine Optimization. He says he delves deeply into topics surrounding local search in the book. For more information on the book, visit here.

Yelp: Closing Gap between the PC and Business

As mobile grows, we also see the rise of local search. Dylan Swift of Yelp spoke with WebProNews about this phenomenon recently at SMX Advanced. He explains how companies such as Yelp are helping to close the gap between the PC and local business. These companies are doing this through the mobile device.

From Yelp’s mobile application for the iPhone, it can see that there is a phone call happening to a local business every 5 seconds of every day. Another statistic they are seeing is 27 percent of all the company’s searches are happening through their app. In addition, a little less than 1 million mobile searches for directions to a local business have occurred in the last 30 days.

In other words, Yelp is helping bring consumers and local businesses together. With the continued adoption of smartphones, Swift does not see mobile traffic dropping for a while. For example, the company saw 1.8 million unique visitors through its mobile app in the last month, which is up from less than 1 million 9 months ago.

Yelp also has an app for the iPad. Swift says it is similar to what users see on their website, since they have a more real estate to work with on the iPad. Although the majority of Yelp’s mobile traffic comes from the iPhone, Swift pointed out that the company is investing in Android as well.

Next Page »