SEO EVOLUTION 2014 @iacquire

HISTORY: LAST 36-MONTHS Laying the Foundation

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36-Months of History

•  Panda & Penguin

•  Webmaster Notifications •  EMD & QDF Updates

•  The Knowledge Graph •  Hyper Localization

•  Mobile Optimization

•  Google Now

•  Google+ & +1 •  Authorship & In-Depth Articles

•  Schema and Rich Snippets •  Big Data & Tools

•  (not provided) •  PageRank Death

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Let’s Talk Business First

THE SEO PROFESSIONAL The Evolving Role of

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4 Types of SEO Professionals

•  Local SEO •  Mobile SEO •  Video SEO •  Social SEO

•  CMS & Hosting •  Page Speed •  Asset Optimization (images, videos, code)

•  Markup Implementation •  Code and Content Implementation

•  Content Strategy Full •  Content & Meta Management •  SEO Copywriting •  Content Navigation •  Asset Optimization (images, videos, pdf)

•  Business Case •  Governance •  Measurement •  Project Management •  Content Strategy Lite •  Tactical Strategy SEO

Strategist

Content

SEO

SEO

Specialist

Technical

SEO

via iAcquire Research

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4 Types of Business Professionals

•  Departmental Individual Contributor

• Vendor Management

•  Department Management •  Vendor Management •  Resources Champion •  Communication Champion

•  Acquisition & Retention Strategy

•  Voice and Tone •  Channels & Tactics •  Budgeting •  In vs. Outsourcing

•  Market Share •  Acquisition & Retention •  Trajectory •  Market Perception

Ideal (C-Level & VP)

Strategic (VP & Director)

Tactical (Contributor)

Organ-

izational (Manager)

via iAcquire Research

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Maturity in The Organization

Ideal Strategic Organizational Tactical SEO Strategist 30% 40% 30% Content SEO 10% 30% 20% 40% Technical SEO 50% 50% SEO Specialist 20% 20% 60%

an iAcquire Guideline

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SEO Market Opportunity

Small Biz SME Large Biz Agency Consultant SEO Strategist 2 3 8 9 9 Content SEO 5 7 7 10 9 Technical SEO 1 2 6 8 8 SEO Specialist 5 7 8 6 8

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

10

10-Point Scale

an iAcquire Guideline

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Market Selection is Key to Success

ORGANIC SEARCH AS A MARKETING CHANNEL

Organic Search Matures

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The Old Consumer Decision Journey

Elias Lewis (Advertising Agency Hall of Famer) invented this model (AIDA) in 1898.

via Wikipedia

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The New Consumer Decision Journey

via Google ZMOT 2012

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ZMOT Study Says Search Most Pervasive

via Google ZMOT 2012

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Historically Prevalent Thinking:

“SEO Is Something You Do to Your Website After You Build It, or

Redesign it.”

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SEO As a Tactic (Historically)

Engagement (Channels)

Earned Media Paid Media Owned Media

Content Management

Creation Integration

Content Strategy

Voice and Tone Governance Content Plan Measurement Plan

Market Research

Audience Decision Journey Competition

Image by iAcquire

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Current & Future Thinking:

“Organic Search is a Channel That Touches Every Marketing Medium.”

Engagement (Channels)

Earned Media Paid Media Owned Media

Content Management

Creation Integration

Content Strategy

Voice and Tone Governance Content Plan Measurement Plan

Market Research

Audience Decision Journey Competition

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Organic Search As a Channel (Future)

Image by iAcquire

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CMO’s Are Getting Smarter About Channel Integration, But SEO’s Have to Push the Agenda!

RISE OF PEOPLE PAGERANK Are Links The Only Way?

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Read a Quote Time

Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results. The true cost of remaining anonymous, then, might be irrelevance.

– The New Digital Age by Eric Schmidt, Chairman of Google

“ “

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Google AgentRank

http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220110289095%22.PGNR.&OS=DN/20110289095&RS=DN/20110289095

Particular embodiments implement techniques for computing agent ranks on the basis of a corpus of content signed by those agents, where the corpus optionally contains explicit links among documents and signed content. The agent ranks can optionally also be calculated relative to search terms or categories of search terms. For example, search terms (or structured collections of search terms, i.e., queries) can be classified into topics, e.g., sports or medical specialties, and an agent can have a different rank with respect to each topic.

“ “

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Google Has The Best Category System

h"ps://developers.google.com/adwords/api/docs/appendix/productsservices  

•  Over  2,400  categories  (5  levels  deep)    

•  Replaces  old  school  systems  like  SIC/NAICS    

•  Built  for  the  web    

•  Future  of  authorship  may  align  to  Google  categories  

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Google AgentRank

Agent Rank =???

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How Is AgentRank Calculated?

Courtesy of Mike Arnesen

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Matt Cutts Told Us to Expect To See Agent Rank This Year, and Also Reduction of Authors in SERP’s.

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Authorship In Flux

Via Moz Cast data

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Cutts’ IS Following Through

JANUARY 2014 IACQUIRE AUTHORSHIP STUDY

More about AuthoRship

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An iAcquire Study (January 2014)

•  Top 70,000 Digital Publications (blogs, magazines, news sites)

•  Analysis includes 250-10,000 of last posts (ex: iAcquire Blog ranked 37,651 – we analyzed 250 pages, 8,949 for economist.com)

•  Presence of G+ on page

•  Presence of Twitter handle on page

•  MOZ Domain Authority

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An iAcquire Study (January 2014)

Usage of Google Authorship •  Usage (across all sites) = 16.37% •  Usage (across top 500) = 37.8% •  Usage (across top 2,500) = 24.8%

Posts with Google Authorship Markup •  Unweighted average % of posts with markup = 82.31%

Usage of Twitter Handle •  Usage (across all sites) = 22.43% •  Usage (across top 500) = 50.2% •  Usage (across top 2,500) = 37.84%

Domain Authority of Top 500 •  Sites Using Authorship = 85.30 •  Sites Not Using Authorship = 83.03

Image by iAcquire

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Authenticated Digital Signatures Are Superior To Links. Google is moving from Strings to Things.

THE KNOWLEDGE GRAPH More About Strings to THings

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Current Knowledge Graph •  Movies & Shows •  People •  Places •  Answers •  Images •  Weather •  Nutritional Info •  Medical Info •  Comparisons •  Flights •  Autos •  Census Data

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Future Knowledge Graph? •  Recipes

•  Mortgage Rates

•  Colleges (EDU)

•  Computer &

Cell Reviews/Specs * They have experimented with some of these already.

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Affiliates That Rely on Public Data (Like EDU, Auto, Travel, Etc.) Are in Trouble Long Term.

REVIEWS MIGHT FINALLY MATTER Reviews Are Getting Attention

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Reviews Haven’t Mattered Much

10%

via MOZ 2013 Local Ranking Factors

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Google Places (Reviews) – Newly Launched

Yelp Superpages / DEX Urban Spoon Yellow Pages

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Reviews Will Matter More In 2014

30%

MOZ Local Ranking Factors 2014???

MOBILE & THE FUTURE Mobile Changed The World

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Mobile Makes The Google Dream Real

Modality

 •  Touch  

 •  Voice  

 •  Sight    “a  par&cular  mode  in  which  something  exists  or  is  experienced  or  expressed.”  

Context

 •  Time  of  Day  

 •  LocaRon  

 •  History  

“the  circumstances  that  form  the  se9ng  for  an  event,  statement,  or  idea,  and  in  terms  of  which  it  can  be  fully  understood  and  assessed.”  

 

Intent

 •  Keyword  Intent  

 •  EnRty  Type  

 •  Network    “the  thing  that  you  plan  to  do  or  achieve  :  an  aim  or  purpose.”  

Building The Star Trek Computer A  favorite  line  by  Amit  Singhal,  SVP/Google  

OTHER PREDICTIONS

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Rapid Fire Stuff

•  “Content marketing” titles will be the fastest growing title in digital.

•  “Inbound marketing” will lose some steam. Earned media and content marketing will gain nomenclature market share.

•  “Audience segmentation” and “content strategy” will be the CMO’s two hottest buzzwords of 2014.

•  Google will make Zagat more like Yelp! for deeper restaurant SERP integration. •  Broad knowledge will kill cheap/ineffective/dangerous SEO tactics.

THE END Joe Griffin co-CEO iAcquire www.iacquire.com @iacquire @joegriffin