In his Whiteboard Friday video, Rand Fishkin asked “What is the future of SEO”? Then he goes on to expound on whether or not the social graph will replace parts or all of search algorithms. He finally says he doesn’t think so, but that social media metrics will be included in search metrics “in small ways”.

I sort of agree. I think that search will always be somewhat link-based and keyword-based, but I do see that social media will become even more important than it is today. And if you are a small business person trying to market yourself online you will not make much headway without developing a social media strategy. It is almost a necessity now (and I would certainly add “recommended”). Make that highly recommended.

Another thing Rand mentioned was verticalization. For instance, you are looking for an apartment to rent in Wayzata, Minnesota, you will likely not go to Google. You will go to Apartment Finder or Craigslist. This is not just the future of SEO. It is the present of SEO. There are certain things that Google is good for, but it won’t answer all of your problems, or your customers’. So the question is, what can you do to as a business to make yourself more presentable online so that your customers, or prospects, can find you?

It is likely that in the future you will do SEO, but you won’t stop there. You’ll also engage with prospects off of your website in social media settings and in vertical websites within your niche. Those two may even be combined. Do you have a plan?

Tags: search, SEO, Social Media, verticalization

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 26th, 2009 at 7:04 am and is filed under Small Business Internet Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.