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Search Engine Optimization is Online Marketing

“SEO is Subset of Digital Marketing”

SEO & Search Engines for NewBies

SEO or search engine optimization is a subset of online or digital marketing a method of facilitating awareness, consideration, and sales online. SEO activities gear up for harnessing business potential nearby or in proximity that could be a town limit followed by positioning at National Level.  Thus local SEO is the first stage of search engine optimization followed by the presence on the National level before going global.

SEO, in order to understand better, is developing and editing a website such that it conforms to search engine guidelines. The objective of the exercise for the owners is ranking in the first twenty of related search terms if not in the first ten a position that is achieved after a long haul. Achieving the objective results in high traffic from the right audience, and then it is all marketing principles that apply. The game of engagement, consideration, and goal conversion is on and the onsite attributes enact the role of the hero.   

SEO Activities

  • Topic Comprehension (White Board Stage)
  • Content Creation
  • Site Architecture
  • Website Analysis 
  • Keyword Research
  • On-Page Optimization
  • Off-Page Optimization
  • Search Console Verification
  • Analytic Integrations
  • Grind

Off Page SEO is Marketing

An important aspect of search engine optimization lies off the page. It is here the campaign enters the marketing phase. Unlike on-page optimization which is carried out on-site, off-page optimization has wider scope since it employs diverse publishing platforms including social media.

Here is an opportunity to build inbound links using effective content. When content is marketing on social media it leads to web saturation, and hence online reputation and popularity. How much search engines value the content and social signal that emanate from them is not well known but this type of marketing certainly impacts indexing and ranking.    

While the content in off-page SEO targets external link acquisition by natural means, it is created somewhat differently for content marketing. Nevertheless, SEO encompasses all forms of marketing strategies as an important subset of digital marketing. This is not the end game as the impact of advanced natural language processing and AI on algorithms is still at a nascent stage and is least understood.     

SEO & Sand Box

Websites that do not conform to search engine guidelines that help facilitate crawling for indexing and enhance ranking metrics are usually listed way back on the SERP or the search engine result page. Those that violate the guidelines and turn spammy are penalized and sent to the sandbox, a form of archive.

Whether the SE algorithms revisit to check if reforms have been carried out or not is a mystery.  But sites seem to recover whence properly reformed hence there is hope.

SEO & Search Metrics

Search engines do not reveal the ranking metrics that are said to be over 200 nowadays but do publish a standard guideline for websites.

Guidelines are attributes that a website is endowed with in terms of content, coding and programming, and the site and link architecture. There are more than 1.7 billion websites on the World Wide Web, and not all are active. Some are badly optimized while millions are literally dead with no optimization being carried out.

Indexing & Ranking

The search companies like Google, Yahoo, and Bing to name a few useful programs that comprise a set of algorithms to index and rank websites in relation to relevant search terms or keywords. Keywords are words and phrases that users or visitors type on the search box in the browsers for information retrieval. In simple terms, the visitors seek the answer to their queries based on intent. The search engine responds by listing websites in ascending order that contains the answer for the query, and thus, the one that is most suited is ranked first.       

Thus search engine algorithms act as a librarian who fetches the best book on customer demand.  Customers come to the library for problem-solving or recreation and expect the most relevant or thrilling book to be presented to them. The library that provides the most suitable answer in milliseconds becomes the most sought after in the town. This implies books on diverse topics, massive collection, and presentable for libraries with good performance metrics. These principles apply to search companies as well. They have to produce the best results in a top-down manner the one with the right solution and fast enough is ranked first. Search engine spiders or bots (robots) constantly crawl the www in order to index and then rank websites.

Search Engine Result Pages

The battle on media and top listing on SERPs is like the final denouement. After a long preparation and extensive search engine optimization campaign, the final position is delivered. SEO should result in your website being placed on the top of search results among the ten blue links in response to a search term or query.     

Google search page now lists many other panels, snippets, suggested search terms, and Google Ads to name a few. Except for the Ads, most of the products on the result page are organic including the ten blue links in the center.

Search Engine Optimization is for Organic Traffic 

Distinguishment should prevail between organic media and paid media. SEO and SMM or social media marketing aim to generate traffic free of cost. Free! Well literally, a team headed by an SEO consultant is required to manage diverse aspects of web development, technical SEO, and content creation.  PPC for example is paid marketing and Google Ads are the most popular.  Our aim is to be among the ten blue links on the SERPs.  

The most important metric of optimization is (DA) the domain authority that is obtained by creating excellent on-page content and linking with the best publishing platforms by natural acquisition and by editorial scrutiny of content wrapped links. The easiest way out methods like SEO directory submission en masse and cheap article publishing tactics are now penalized or accorded low value.

Content Distribution on Social Media

It is the phase of content distribution like that in content marketing that accords greater exposure and invites the target audience to engage. Most of the content distribution is done on social media most popular among them are FaceBook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter. The content-wrapped links are also used to create a follower or subscriber base following a niche and thus creating an online reputation. This is brand marketing and projecting a professional profile to enhance reputation as well.

Social Media Marketing creates referral traffic and inbound leads, but some social networking sites do accord SEO benefits.

Most search engine marketing companies seek referral traffic and lead on social media. SEO benefits from web saturation are apparent and marketing brands, products, and services on social media pay rich dividends.

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