NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwire - December 13, 2010) - As a year dominated by Social Media comes to a close, Searchmetrics, the world leader in search analytics software, reveals its insights and predictions for the SEO landscape in 2011. Looking back at the evolution of web usage and trends in 2010, Searchmetrics notes the game-changers to look out for, while providing an expert opinion on some of the top challenges the industry will face in 2011.
"As social media continues to stake its claim as the dominating force of the Internet, the entire landscape of SEO will have to change to accommodate it," said Dr. Horst Joepen, CEO, Searchmetrics. "We offer extremely comprehensive, precise data to our customers. To be able to offer this level of data means that we need to stay a step ahead of the industry and add a functionality to our product before the client even knows they want it."
Searchmetrics' predictions and insights for 2011:
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SEO will have to grow and change for Social Media.
Since SEO is now being affected by Twitter and Facebook, data is going to have to include concise social media metrics. Additionally, the application used to collect this data will have to evolve. Currently, agencies and businesses are using anywhere from 5-10 different monitoring tools and many continue to use Excel to compile different data and different sources. This is too complex of a process for a marketing professional and can cost an agency approximately 40% of their monthly budget. 2011 will bring an onset of tools to streamline this process, providing the information that is needed to monitor and analyze items such as keywords and domains at a fraction of the time and cost it currently is. -
Social Media Optimization (SMO) will take a strong role in leading campaigns.
In 2011 marketers will also be using the term SMO when referring to their online initiatives. Companies and agencies that will come out ahead of the game are the ones that start leveraging social media for scalable link-building efforts. -
The Bing-Facebook Partnership may end up being the biggest game changer in the industry.
This partnership has the potential of making Facebook an individual's (and a corporation's) go-to social network hub AND search engine. Previously, if you searched a company or name that wasn't on Facebook, you would have to leave the site to conduct additional research. Facebook currently has about 500 million users, and with Google logging approximately 2.5 billion searches per day, most people were leaving Facebook to search with Google. But with the Bing integration, leaving Facebook and choosing another search provider will no longer be needed -- a user's Bing search results are now listed along with Facebook search results. This underscores the power that Facebook has on the Internet at the moment. Right now we can only speculate on how this will pan out, but if executed efficiently, this could change searching for information online as we know it. -
Don't rule out Google completely: Google Instant and Google Local will also play a major role in the changing SEO landscape of 2011.
The main change to traditional SEO we see with Google Instant is that fewer keywords are now being used in searches. But, from a SEO perspective, the technical aspects and the amount of bandwidth behind these types of searches will come into the light. Additionally Google Local adds another element, allowing for maps results, video results and funneling traffic through Google's YouTube property, can change the click distribution on search engine results pages (SERPS) -- putting your site in the spot on a SERPS that gets most clicks -- which is what SEO is all about. This changes the rule so that now the site that has the most attractive/relevant preview will generate the higher number of clicks, so adding in location-based keyword analysis is going to become even more important. -
2009 was the year of 'linkbait'; 2011 will be the year of 'trustbait.'
In 2011 search marketers are going to need to focus on more sophisticated link building strategies. While in 2009 it was all about 'linkbait,' in 2011 it's going to be about 'trustbait.' That means that organizations will need to develop links from more 'neutral' sites such as news portals or by appearing in a search engine's own news stream.
About Searchmetrics
Searchmetrics delivers the most comprehensive, integrated suite of search analytics available to help companies move their web content into the top positions of all leading search engines. With one of the world's largest keyword databases enabled by a globally distributed cloud-based infrastructure that constantly refreshes the keyword data, Searchmetrics replaces conventional single-purpose tools and manual processes with an integrated cockpit of sophisticated search analytics views. The results are unprecedented competitive insights and actionable recommendations for targeting SEO investments with predictable ROI.
Headquartered in Berlin, the company's wholly owned US subsidiary, Searchmetrics, Inc., delivers real web intelligence to a growing North American customer base from offices in New York. You can follow Searchmetrics on Twitter @Searchmetrics or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/Searchmetrics. For more information, please visit: www.searchmetrics.com or call 646-290-5268.
Contact Information:
Contact:
Marina Greenwood
Activa PR
415.776.5350