SEO is Dead! Everyone Panic!!

Posted by inetseo on December 13, 2009 · 1 Comment

Published by iNET SEO – Search Engine Marketing specialists

And Breath! SEO is far from dead. It has evolved and nothing more!

I keep reading articles on how Search Engine Optimisation is dead and how everything from here on in should be all about social media! To those nay-sayers, I say “get a grip”!

Web Marketing Overview

The term for any web marketing is Search Engine Marketing, or SEM. This covers, amongst other things, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), building back links, Social Media Marketing (SMM), article writing, blogging… in fact anything to do to try and ultimately increase the web traffic to your website.

Where should I put all of my eggs?

Just as a quick analogy, take any large financial institution, like a bank. This bank wants to make money (hopefully!) and invests in stocks, shares, bonds and plays many stock markets. Do you see them putting everything into Pork Bellies and Frozen Orange Juice? No! And that is because they know it is not wise to put all of your eggs into one basket.

Where should your on-line marketing be concentrated?

Should you spend 100% of your time doing SEO? How about 50-50 with SEO and SMM? How about 25% SMM, 25% Backlinks and 50% on-page SEO? The simple answer is that they are all equally important.

OK Â - take a step back here and think to yourself, if SEO were dead, how are we going to find a plumber in the future? Bit of an extreme example, but stick with me here…

Are you going to hop onto Twitter and see if anyone has Tweeted about a plumber who is in your local area and able to fix washing machines?
How many plumbers do you know have the time to maintain a LinkedIn account
Whilst a plumber may have a personalÂ FacebookÂ account,Â wouldÂ you know how to find them?
Digg hates businesses trying to promote themselves, so no hope there!
Google “plumbers in Manchester”?Â Ahha!!

I know it is an extreme example, but does anyone really think that Google, or any other search engines for that matter, is doing to do away with what they do best, i.e. allowing people to find information they need quickly and easily!? No chance!

So what next then? What do I do with my web marketing?

Firstly you can accept that there are some pretty big changes happening to the way information is being captured. It is not just from your own website now – it is also being found from social media web sites where information is updated second by second.

Once you have done that, you can start looking at the bigger picture because if you stop concentrating on your website and plough everything into Social Media, you might not get what you expect.

However, there are some kinds of businesses that will thrive through social media, but these are not your typical run-of-the-mill business. Can you see Ford never concentrating their efforts in evolving their website? What happens if someone searches on Google for “Ford Mondeo” and it suddenly wasn’t a link to Fords website, but to people “Tweeting” about their own cars or experiences? There are a million other example and more like this.

It simplyÂ wouldÂ not work!

Social Media has its place and its uses! It is great for building a brand! It can get a news article around the web faster than the time that it takes to blink (OK, a slight exaggeration, but you get the picture!). It can work in a way that updating your website never could, has wonderful applications in business and personal lives and absolutely shouldÂ not be ignored!

So, concentrate on everything you were concentrating on before but do not push Social Media to the bottom of the pile – everything now fits nicely together and this is one of the biggest turning points since search engines started to make an appearance – embrace it!