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The Marriage of Social Media and SEO

By Mark Evans in Social Media 2 Comments Tags: , , ,

When Magazines Canada asked me to do a presentation on social media and SEO, my immediate reaction was “Well, that’s interesting and different” because it wasn’t a topic I had explored much.

In doing research for the presentation, which happened earlier today, I realized I had been spending a lot of time on SEO without realizing it. When you boil it down, the creation of content and leveraging social media to distribute it (and get others to distribute content for you) is a pillar of SEO – at least the organic kind.

Content thrives when it’s easy for people to find it. With the major search engines now starting to embrace and index social media activity, there’s a natural marriage happening between social media and SEO.

In doing my research, one thing was stood out was a blog post by Rohn Jay Miller, which included this statement:

“The fabulous collision between social networks and search engines is the most important change to the Internet in the last ten years. And it’s changing the Internet forever.”

Here’s my presentation, which can also be found on SlideShare.

The Marriage of Social Media & SEO

The Value of Organic SEO

By Mark Evans in Google 1 Comment Tags: , , ,

Search is a funny game; whenever you’ve figured out all the rules, they change them on you….or, at least, Google likes to change the rules just to keep everything interesting.

The latest switch-a-roo happened this week when Google unveiled a new algorithmic improvement that impacts nearly 12% of its search results. In the scheme of things, this is major change that will no doubt disappoint many people who no longer rank among the top results.

Given the power and importance of search, it is fascinating to see how Google can be so nonchalant in not only upgrading its algorithm but how it impacts the digital presence of so many companies.

In my consulting business, search rankings are not surprisingly something that’s important to every client. At some point, they get around to “SEO” and what can be done to make sure they at least rank on the first page. I’m not an SEO practitioner but I suggest the best way to approach search is to focus on organic SEO rather than looking to somehow game the system.

This means a few things, including the value of having a corporate blog given how Google loves the kind of fresh content that blogs generate. As well, blogs can be a valuable tool to attract inbound links, which is at the core of how Google’s PageRank algorithm works.

As someone who believes that content is king, I believe strong content is among the powerful SEO tools because it has the potential to attract attention and, as important, continues to work for you on a long-term basis.

Another important consideration for SEO is making sure your Web site is properly meta-tagged. It means having the most appropriate and relevant keywords embedded into the “guts” of your Web site so that when search engine spider it, they extract words that best reflect the products or services you offer.

There are lots of organic search tools and tricks that can and should be embraced as a way to make sure that your Web site is as search-friendly as possible. These are things you can control so it makes sense to be as pro-active as possible.

For people looking to do more, there thousands of SEO experts happy to come to your rescue for price. But before doing that, make sure you organic SEO efforts have been maximized.

Blekko: The Next Google or the Next Cuil?

By Mark Evans in Google, Search Engines 3 Comments Tags: , , ,

After a lot of hype and venture capital, Blekko launched today. For those of you not familiar with Blekko, it’s a new search engine that like most of the search start-up in recent years has been billed as a new threat to Google.

While I haven’t had much of a chance to put Blekko through its paces, here’s hoping it is able to survive its debut to live another day. In other words, it would be good to see Blekko be given the benefit of the doubt rather than be hit with the criticism that cut off search start-ups such as Cuil and Wolfram at the knees.

Even before Google emerged as the industry Goliath, search has been a competitive and nasty business. Pre-Google, being king of search was a short-lived experienced. One day, it was Lycos, the next day, it’s Excite.

And since Google, the biggest challenge facing search start-ups is that the acid-test has been benchmarking its performance against Google. Wolfram, for example, which set itself up as a research tool, was savaged by critics because it paled in comparison with Google.

Another problem has been many search start-ups have suffered from a bad case of hubris and over-hype. Cuil boasted about the billions of pageviews it had indexed, while Wolfram did little to dismiss the buzz it was the next Google. This is the kind of material that critics love to chew on because it provides a story with drama.

My first impressions of Blekko are that it provides good search results, although the real value of Blekko may be the ability to make vertical searches from an original search query. I haven’t had time to fully explore this feature but it appears to be a smart way to differentiate itself from Google.

I was also impressed by how Blekko quickly responded to a comment that I made on Twitter this morning after I read a New York Times story about its debut. If you are a new search engine looking to win over consumers and technology watchers, being engaged on Twitter is a very smart idea.

Like many people, I did a query for my name. At first, I was surprised to see I ranked second, while Google ranks me first. According to Blekko, Mark Evans Art is the king of “Mark Evans” because it was recently bought by Boing Boing, which is sending a lot of traffic its way.

For more thoughts on Blekko, check out the following
- Danny Sullivan – “Blekko the “Slashtag” Search Engine Goes Live.
- Rafe Needleman: “Blekko Launches the Biased Search Engine”

Much Ado About the Real-Time Web?

By Mark Evans in Social Media 1 Comment Tags: , , ,

real-time-web-300x298I’m doing a presentation this week in Burlington looking at the most interesting technology trends for 2010, and one of the no-brainer items is the real-time Web. The problem, however, is the more time I spend looking at the real-time Web, the more I wonder about why people are so excited.

I get that information published on Twitter, Facebook and blogs will be instantly and readily available. I get that news reporting will be instantaneous, and I get that search will become a lot more interesting because it will deliver up-to-the-second information. That’s all very exciting but is it enough to justify the hype surrounding real-time? In other words, is that it?

I guess it might come across as naive but shouldn’t there be a lot more involved? What is the significance of the real-time Web other than information gets published, delivered and consumed faster than ever before? How does that really change things?

In a sense, it’s difficult not be think that the hype about real-time reflects its potential as opposed to the current reality. Looking ahead, you can see that real-time could have a major impact on online collaboration. As well, the ability to analyze a huge amount of data in real-time will have a major impact on e-commerce, pricing and inventory management.

That’s all well and good but for now, real-time strikes me as interesting but not tangible enough to get caught up on the hype machine.

Could a Google Backlash Materialize?

By Mark Evans in Google 1 Comment Tags: , , ,

The Globe & Mail’s business section had an interesting feature story yesterday about how Google taking “aim at everything” – a thesis driven home recently with the launch of the Nexus mobile phone.

With Google seemingly everywhere and anywhere, it starts to beg the question about whether trying to all things to all people is too much, and whether, at some point, consumers will push back against Google’s dominance. Sure, Google offers great services – most at no cost – but are we getting sucked in too much into the Google empire.

At one point does being too much of a Google user start to get dangerous? And at what point will consumers start to realize that it’s unhealthy to have too much Google in their lives? If that every happens will the pendulum start to swing back to other players?

In some respects, Google is starting to become a lot like Microsoft in that millions of people use its products and services even though they might want, in theory, to use alternatives. You don’t have to necessarily like Google or Microsoft but that doesn’t stop you from buying or using their products and services.

What do you think? Could a Google backlash materialize given the company’s ultra-aggressive strategic goals?

Technorati Redux?

By Mark Evans in Blogs, Search Engines No Comments Tags: , , ,

For the past few years, Technorati has been easy fodder for critics. Once the shining star of the blog search world and a venture capital darling, Technorati stumbled into near oblivion after the service deteriorated to the point where it nearly became irrelevant.

But in the past two years, Technorati has dusted itself off, admitted its mistakes, and been diligently working to restore its luster. Not that Technorati has come all the way back but there are definite signs of life.

Perhaps the most obvious indication was a new design unveiled yesterday that includes some new wrinkles. (See TechCrunch for coverage of the New Technorati.) It was also disclosed that Technorati has raised another $2-million from its existing investors.

Behind the scenes, CEO Richard Jalichandra, who will deliver a keynote at BlogWorld Expolater this week, has been busy, launching an ad network and bought a blog network, Blogcritics.

The blog search engine is still alive and if Technorati can perform well, it has a shot at reclaiming its status as the blog search leader given the market is still leaderless. Technorati is a good example of a high-flyer that could have easily crashed, burned and disappeared. Instead, it clung to life, reinvented itself, and has lived to see another day.

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