Future PR Skills 2008: Advanced Search Engine Optimization

 

As part of a series, I am exploring what skills the next communications professionals need to have in hand to succeed and lead. We once thought search engine optimization (SEO) was a technical, geek activity. Get the guys and gals who talk in 'algorithms' and meta-content together and they'll fix you up. Enter the social web. Now for all the reasons we know too well, SEO is a critical public relations function.

The reasons again:

• 80% of Internet users in developed markets start their online session at a search engine (In North America that is either Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOL or Ask.com)
• Put another way: The Google search results page for your brand is your new home page
• Social media - blogs, reviews, Web 2.0 content, social networks - return really well in search engines
• Despite the algorithms behind the scenes, the key to great search results is great content that is socially connected
• SEO is more than technology and 'advanced SEO' is at the heart of brand and reputation management

I now love Tadeusz Szewczyk. His SEO blog is so simple and straightforward - no, not just the design, but his writing too. He defines very clearly a great definition for 'advanced SEO'

"In basic SEO you just want

• to rank
• get found
• or garner huge traffic.

In advanced SEO you make sure the traffic is viewed as people, customers, multipliers.

In SEO 2.0 people out there do not hate SEO, they don’t even notice it because it just perfectly fulfills their wishes. Advanced SEO is not about cool programming skills only, it’s about social skills."

The Future PR Pro has mastered the critical parts of advanced SEO:

• creating content that is authentically valuable to people (stakeholders, audiences, users, publics)
• syndicating, distributing and sharing content to encourage linking and mash-ups
• building partnerships to gain access to new networks
• creating multimedia content for universal search
• engaging with WOM 'relayers' to build more 3rd party content and links
• integrating SEO with SEM efforts for a complimentary 'boost'
• user experience design to ensure owned Web properties follow the prime directive: be useful and in sync with best-practice SEO design

Resources to help understand Search Engines and SEO:

How Search Works

• Google Guide
• Google Technology
• Search Engine Watch: How Search Engines Work
• Search Engine Land Guides
• Yahoo Ranking

How Search Works with Social Media

• Pandia The Year of Social Media and Search Engines
• Dominating with Social Networks
• Leveraging Social Media Sites for Search
• 10 Q's for David Sifry
• Top Web 2.0 Search Engines

Comments

[sajjad]

Very well said.

[james anderson]

Use innovative methods and time tested strategies to establish links to your sites and most importantly to get better search engine rankings. Do visit dreamworldtech to find more on SEO.

[Erica DeWolf]

great post with many relevant SEO resources! Thank You! I'll be linking to this post and sharing with others!

[EH]

Search engines, especially Google, are getting increasingly selective about what links are actually related to your site. When building links, it is import to remember to stick with sites or blogs that have related content to your own website. If you are linked to unrelated websites, those search engines will discount your website and it will put you lower on the PageRank instead of moving you up like you want it to.

[Search marketing]

Great post. Blogs are a very natural way to attract links. I’d love to see a post on how to get your company to blog. Particularly if you are dealing with a large, conservative company.

[Search Engine Marketing]

very useful articles…..I think seo off site more important and power full for geeting free traffic than seo on site, I already implemented for my web……so I am focus on off site optimisation…thanks

[web advertising]

Well, this is a very valuable post. Thanks for the information you provided. It would be great if got more post like this. I appreciate it. I will share it with other and ask more people to come and view your post here. Good Job!!!

[RichardGarcia]

There are several search engine optimization techniques that you can do to increase the page rank and visitor traffic of your site. The bottom line here is to maximize your website's online exposure. Some would call it internet marketing but some would brand it as spamming. All is fair when it comes to SEO techniques. To some extent, spamming do deliver results but it could be really irritating to a number of people. Your SEO efforts can be prevented from becoming a spam if you focus on quality while maintaining certain level of quantity. You should also be sensitive of the needs and wants of your target market. To know more about the different SEO techniques, you can visit our site: http://www.ultimate-internet-marketing.com

[SEO and Traffic Guide]

Great post! i especially found it useful where you started. Most people that use search engines use only the ten top search results in the first page. Making it to the first page, more so to the top three is a barometer of a sites success in search engine optimization. You will get a higher ratio of probability in being clicked on when you rank high. The more traffic for your site, the more business you rake in.

But, it is essential to grab a hold of that spot or make your ranking even better. As I aforementioned, each day is a new day for all e-commerce sites to make them selves rank higher using search engine optimization. It is imperative to make your site better and better everyday.

So just what is search engine optimization and do you have to use it? The answer to why you have to use it is an easy one. You need search engine optimization to be number one, or maybe at least make your site income generating.

Thanks for the tips!

[Los Angeles seo company]

this site is nice. thanks for the information..

-faith-

[Sydney SEO]

Personally, I agree that digital should be very important in the mind of a PR pro. At times I wonder if we in the digital space give it a little too much credit. Is it just as important for Health Care PR as it is for Tech PR?

[Joseph Primm]

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Joe

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