Search Engine Academy of South Carolina

If you utilize a copyright notice on your Web site don’t forget to update it this month.  The search engines like to see the current year on your notices so double check all your Web sites and make sure you have 2008 listed.

This time of the year we all should take a good look at our Web sites and figure out what our goals and strategies are going to be for the coming year. 

As business owners we all know the importance of having a Web site but if that site is not directing any business our way then what is its purpose.  This is a great month to dedicate some extra time to developing a plan to direct the search engines toward our sites.

The Internet is changing and search engine optimization and search engine marketing are changing along with it.  We really need to understand what the engines are looking for along with what type of search engine marketing we need to be doing to keep competitive in 2008.

Here are a few tips to getting you started:

1. Check your Web site and make sure it is compliant with the W3C? 

2. Is your site targeting the right Keywords? Have you done keyword research?

3. Are you up to date with understanding the changes that the engines are making with Personalized & Universal Search? Read my articles on Googles Personalized Search and Universal Search

4. Do you know the difference between the Art & Science of SEO and how it is going to affect your Web site? Read the article Understand the Difference Between the Art & Science of SEO

5. Plan on including some Web 2.0 strategies to you site this year. It could be anything from bogging to videos just make a true effort to venture into this new age of Search Engine Marketing.

6. Lastly consider attending one of our 3 Day SEO BLitz Workshops and learn first hand how to make the search engines stand up and take notice of your Web site. Contact me by email for a discount code to take $200.00 off our next sheduled workshop at tracy@searchengineacademysc.com

 These are just a few things to get you going but the best thing is to dedicate a bit of time this month to your Web site and your optimization and marketing efforts.

Take a few minutes to stop what you’re doing and listen to Ginette Degner a top researcher and a very sharp Affiliate Marketer. In this 4 Part Interview with talk show host, Cindy Turrietta asks Ginette to talk about some of the best free online tools and where you can find them. Great information.

Maximizing SEM With Free Internet Tools

Many changes took place in the Internet this past year and as normal practice at this time of the year lets do a quick over view of last years changes.

We could label last year the year of Social Media Marketing or maybe name it the year of blended search with Goggles introduction of both Universal Search and Personalized Search which Yahoo! and MSN/Live followed suit.  Some are even saying it is the end of SEO as we all know it.  It is defiantly not the end but search marketers and Web site owners will need to change they way they look at optimization.

Many are saying it is the year that the Internet stood up and took notice of the world around it.

The Year of Social Media:

Looking at the popularity of social networks like Facebook and Twitter, social elements of networks like Flickr and YouTube, the rise and fall of social news sites like Digg and Netscape, and the beginnings of social search sites like Mahalo and Search Wikia, it would be fair to call 2007 the Year of Social Media. Even Google got involved, with the launch of its OpenSocial APIs. 

The Year of Blended Search:

One of the most significant changes for search engine optimizers (SEOs) this year was the introduction of universal or blended search results. Instead of the familiar “ten blue links,” searchers are now beginning to see more than just HTML pages mixed into search results. Video and images, news stories, blog posts, local business data, and more are now appearing alongside other sites.

Beginning of the End of SEO:

Search marketing is changing, both expanding into areas like social media and moving away from old stand-bys like on-page optimization. Not that on-page SEO is obsolete, but its importance has diminished, first with the increasing importance of inbound links in search engine algorithms, and more recently in the changing search results pages themselves.

Universal and blended search results are now requiring search marketers to think beyond the basic Web page to consider optimizing images, videos, and other types of vertical content now showing up for many search queries. Besides that, many of the search engines are beginning to experiment with personalized and customized results. 

All in all 2007 was the year the Engines focused on its users and they way we are using the Internet today.

It’s been a busy holiday season and it is good to have the hustle and bustle of Christmas and New Years behind us and the excitement of the New Year in our midst.  I had taken a few weeks off and am now well rested and ready to get back to work.  

I look forward to sharing with you any new techniques or principles that will affect your optimization efforts along with any new tools or guidelines I feel will benefit you.

I hope you had an enjoyable holiday and are as ready as I am to jump in 2008!