The Future of SEO... What You Need to Know
Posted by Will Byrd on Fri, Feb 17, 2012 @ 08:53 AM
The Future of SEO… What You Need to Know
We can’t really say for certain what the future of SEO will be in 2012 and in the future but if
you’ve been keeping up with the latest developments by watching Matt Cutts’ videos and subscribing to at least one trustworthy SEO blog, you’re probably a few steps ahead of many other people.
If you own or bricks and mortar business you are constantly making sure that the fabric of the building is not going to or harm your business – and you want it to look attractive. People with online businesses also need to stay constantly aware of trends and other factors that may also affect their businesses. Look upon Google as being a landlord who is constantly revising his rental agreement! You don’t want to do something inadvertently and be out on your ear so pay attention.
Content is Still King
Why was the Google panda algorithm change in spring of 2011 such a surprise to so many people? Why, some people moaned, had their 75-page site promoting chicken coop building plans being kicked to the curb? They had, after all, remembered to spin that one dollar PLR article at least twice a week, and had submitted it to thousands of article marketing directories using automated submission. Good grief. Bye. Those were exactly the kind of spam-filled websites that Google wanted to get rid of and many of those crappy article marketing sites took a direct hit too.
Let’s be clear about it, the search engines are there to make money and Google does it very effectively but they can’t do it if the results they serve up are seen as being lousy. The secret to staying in the search engines’ good books will always be to provide high-quality content that people want to read.
Too many people are caught up in tactics designed to fool the search engines in order to get into the top positions in the SERPs. Why? Because people have been brainwashed into thinking that you make loads of money being in that position. Horse hockey. Nobody is going to buy anything from you if you have a poor quality website with content that’s unreadable and offers nothing of value.
To those who think that that particular Panda slap was a one off, you can forget it, all the search engines are working extremely hard to get rid of low-quality sites. Their algorithms are tweaked daily.
People that work hard every day to provide useful and valuable content for their readers will win out in the end which leads us to our next heading which is
Backlinking the Natural Way
Provide people with content they enjoy watching and reading and they will want to share it. It’s not rocket science. It takes time to build a business online – didn’t anybody tell you? Do you think that your six-month-old website is really going to benefit from purchasing that automated back linking software? Okay Google may miss the initial spike in (poor quality) back links but when they do see them they will depress the lever and your business will go swirling down into internet hell. That also means no buying links from spam sites or paying little Johnny to leave stupid comments on hundreds of different blogs and forums.
Why not invest your time and efforts into something a little more positive? That would be writing good articles that people will naturally want to link to. Even if you’re lousy at writing you can pay somebody (and please pay them well) to write articles that can be submitted to article marketing sites and as guest posts. It’s all so simple, I just can’t fathom out why people don’t get it - the only conclusion I can come to is that they’re lazy or they’ve been fed a line of BS.
Personalized Search
Like it or not personalized search is probably well on its way. This makes SEO somewhat more difficult but not impossible. Every search you do online you can guarantee somebody is watching and taking careful notes.
Eventually two people who put in the same search will be served up two totally different sets of results. If you already subscribe to some popular blogs through Google Reader then you may notice that those results appear in your own (now nearly-personalized) SERPs. Some people look upon it as a convenience while others see it as a Big Brother tactic.
Whatever your thoughts, personalized search is here to stay and will only continue to expand. If the majority of search engine customers are happy with what they get then those search engines make more money.
As an internet marketer all you can do is go with the flow and build your own professional network the right way, and that includes interacting on all the large social networking sites - especially Google Plus.
Mobile Optimization
Gone are the days when people only accessed the web via a PC or a laptop. With the huge increase in portable WiFi devices such as smart phones and tablets it’s a good idea to ensure that your website or blog can be accessed by the people who use them. You can guarantee the number of devices and different platforms is going to grow so don’t get left behind. Work on getting a mobile-ready version of your site and maintain an up-to-date profile on Google Places and Yahoo’s Yelp.
Social Activity
It came as no surprise when Google announced that it has started using social signals as part of its ranking process. It stands to reason that Google is probably going to attach more importance to its own Google+ concept. However, there are a number of legal hurdles that Google will have to jump over including laws concerning restrictive practices.
A 132-person panel of SEO experts contributed to the 2011 SEOMoz Search Engine Ranking Factors study that rated social signals at page level and domain level. These were numbers one and two of the top three factors that are most likely to increase in importance. Analysis of a site’s/page’s perceived value to users was third.
It’s pretty obvious that social signals are going to be playing a bigger role within the search engine algorithms. And when Matt Cutts says it’s so then you’d better believe it.
You may begrudge the amount of time you spend (or don’t spend) on social networking sites but you’d better do more of it, especially as Google Plus rises rapidly in popularity.
Just like your website, provide regular helpful information to your target market and build a following who will repay you by sharing your content even further.
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