“SEO Is Dead,” Some Claim

Recently, I noticed a “tweet” on Twitter from a marketing “guru,” who announced that search engine optimization was “dead.” The so called guru linked to an article wherein he wrote that backlinking was no longer a viable activity and as a result, agencies that provided search engine optimization were about to close their doors and shutter their windows.

While it is true that for some of the more “spammy” search engine optimization firms whose methods no longer work, this is not an indication that “SEO is dead,” at all.

Google, over the past couple of years has taken aggressive action against websites that have used very “spammy” (I don’t really like that term applied to SEO) methods of search engine optimization. In the past, “link building” was an obvious fast way to increasing search rankings and as a result, many SEO firms would simply employ a strategy of blasting out backlinks to a website in order to increase their rankings.

We’ve always believed that good quality back links are important, but this is not the sole measure of good search engine optimization. And in fact, we would be embarrassed to obtain good search rankings by simply building backlinks from any site that would provide them, including questionable web pages and properties. It’s something we’ve just never done. One “good quality” back link, even though there may be much more time and resources involved in obtaining it, is much more valuable to us than a thousand low quality backlinks.

For those firms where the only strategy was to fire up back linking software, yes – SEO is dead and they ought to be shuttering their windows. But there is far more to obtaining good search engine rankings than simply going after a bazillion back links.

There are a number of considerations including technical and content quality that Google uses to determine where a website should rank on any given search term. And it is quite likely that going forward, these considerations will become even more important. Legitimate SEO firms have always known this. Considerations for search engine optimization include overall design, compelling content, meeting the “needs” of visitors by providing the information they are looking for, optimized site speed with balance of graphical content to text, naming of URL’s, and much much more.

Recently, Matt Cutts of Google announced a tweaking of their “Page layout” portion of their algorithm. Google wants to provide results to searchers that when they click through, they will not be frustrated by being inundated with ads and other distracting elements before they find the content they are looking for. Our own websites in which we are heavily involved in SEO were not affected by this new update in Google’s search except for some that saw some boost in rankings. These tells us that we’ve been on the right track.

Of course, search engine rankings are not the only way to ensure traffic and increased visitors to a website. Anyone who only focuses on search engine rankings will likely be devastated one day, waking up to a new Google update and finding their site missing from search results. Indeed, as SEO ought to be of a holistic nature, so should all of your traffic driving activities. Today, having an integrated approach with use of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and many other similar properties is also important.

So is SEO dead? Yes – in the sense that if one believed that SEO only consisted of buying up crappy backlinks. But certainly, it is not dead in the sense that there is so much more to SEO than this.

And while worrying about your websites rankings in Google is a concern, be sure to consider the fact that there are many ways of generating traffic and exposure. If you’d like some help with social media marketing, get in touch! It can get confusing out there, staying on top of it all. Spend your time working on your business, while we spend our time helping you!

Learn More About Our SEO (Search Engine Optimization) Services.

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