SEO Or SEO Not - Do We Really Need To Redefine Or Rename SEO ?

Author : Bharati Ahuja



The SEO blogosphere every year is bombarded with posts about “SEO IS DEAD” but from  Jan. 2012 and infact from the last quarter of 2011 there is a new trend of acknowledging the fact that “SEO IS VERY MUCH ALIVE” but is packaged with a message about :

•  How it is different ?
•  Why it is called as the NEW SEO ?
•  How SEO is facing an identity crisis ?
•  What are the new awesome metrics to measure SEO success ?
•  Why it needs to renamed as something else ?
•  Why Content Marketing is the main mantra ?

Image via Wikipedia

I think this is because people who have invested in SEO campaigns are expecting results which accrue as a result of an all round web presence over a period of time. Without an ounce of doubt an over all quality web presence if planned and executed well in the long run has the potential of rewarding the business with an influx of the exponential online opportunities available on the web.

An over all web presence can be attained by an over all online marketing campaign.

What is an overall online marketing campaign?

Assuming that you have a reasonably well designed website ensuring a good UX then

An Overall online marketing campaign = SEO + Blogging + Social Media + PPC (At the right stages of the website journey and purpose) + Content Creation + A/B Testing for effective landing pages + The Study of Analytics for regular analysis and improvement

Every website is different and has to be also analyzed and assessed, as per its purpose and the potential it has for it to be successful. Usually people hire SEO services and think that they will win the online market by just ranking high for the targeted terms. But, the reality is that your SEO may be working on the many ranking factors and may be successful in achieving the high rankings for your site but just ranking is not enough , once you rank high the next step is to assure that the ranking gets the click, once it gets the click then the conversion or the execution of the call to action of that page has to be the metric which needs to be looked into, once the conversion takes place only then the calculation of the ROI is possible.

If we analyze the whole cycle above each and every step is inter-related and when all the people involved at various steps work in coordination , understanding for each others’ scope of work and communicate effectively only then the true success can be achieved.

Every journey starts with some destination in mind and by selecting the mode of transport to reach there. Once you decide to create an online presence for your business and tread on the virtual sands of the web world focus on what you want to achieve with the website you already have. Hence, Putting the the right team in place to achieve the goals of your web presence is the first and foremost task.

Business owners usually appoint an SEO company or a PPC company and wait for the results to accrue. But, it is very important to have a strategy and a basic plan in place with the scope of work for each party clearly chalked out.

If your agency has a proper team of web designers, developers, social media experts, content writers, landing page A/B testing experts, Analytics experts,etc. then the company may be able to justice to the job . But with such a high end team the charges also for such a campaign will be sky rocketing which only companies with very high budgets can afford.

For SMEs who have small and limited budgets usually appoint individual SEOs who comparatively charge less because of their low cost of operation. But, they need a lot of support from clients for any all round campaign.

Panda or no Panda CONTENT IS KING since the day the first web page was published on the WWW. It is Google who has become capable in picking quality content in 2012 and hence wants to reward sites with quality content with more visibility.

Today the public opinion is also woven into the social fabric which adds to the quality factor which Google is giving importance to.For the social media signals and content marketing to accrue SEO benefit to the site the overall online presence is necessary, it is this correlation which has set the inter-connectivity between SEO , Social media and content marketing.

Yes, as we said above “SEO IS VERY MUCH ALIVE “ and I think it cannot die as long as people are using search engines to find information on the web. SEO does not need a new name and is definitely not facing an identity crisis. Just like the on-page factors and the off-page factors which have been responsible for ranking , the social media signals and the freshness of content (On site and UGC) have been added to the list of ranking factors and the SEO needs to have a strategy for ensuring that the right and strong signals are generated via these platforms for the site.

Content marketing and social media presence are not the new SEO or are replacing search ,they are supplementing SEO along with all the other on-page and off-page factors on which we have been working on till date.

Every marketing campaign is about results and returns, but SEO is a part of the whole online marketing puzzle and to complete the full picture every piece needs to be placed in the correct place and the correct order.

Integrating The Print Media, Mobile And The Online Media With QR Codes

Author : Bharati Ahuja



The user is always at the nucleus of any online marketing campaign. The user wants the most relevant information at the most easily accessible option which involves the least navigation and search activity in the whole process of finding the relevant information.

The challenge today is to reach out to more and more people via all the available options possible. We talk about integrated marketing and also integrating search and social but integrating print and online media via mobiles is something which has an easy accessibility and one can reach out to the targeted segment more effectively.

QR (Quick Response) as the name goes it can generate a quick response and is very cost effective. The use of the QR code can enhance the print media by empowering it with the digital dimension. QR Codes can be added to the newspaper Advertisements, coupons, visiting cards, leaflets which one distributes, etc. so that people can add the contact info or view your site readily from their smart phones without any delay and at their convenience.

For example below is the newspaper advertisement of a garment store and under the QR Code they make it very clear by mentioning how to use it and the reader can directly go to the latest collection on their website.

Key Points To Keep In Mind While Using The QR Codes:

· See that the reader reaches the most relevant landing page as per the content on the print media

· The landing page should have the call to action like a form, a buy button, contact details, subscribe button or whatever is the purpose of the page

· One can easily track the ROI from such a campaign as the page can be easily tracked and monitored via analytics and one can even create a special landing page for such a campaign to calculate the ROI and study the response to the Ad.

This is gaining popularity and soon becoming the norm for integrating the print media with the digital media for easy accessibility and a wider outreach.