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SEO Game-changers, Part 2: Expert Interview Series with Mike Grehan

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a fast-moving horse race, and it affects every Internet Marketing professional. You don't want to be optimizing a site today for a 1999 world. Below is Part 2 of my interview with SEO Guru Mike Grehan. Mike will challenge your assertions and push you to think beyond today into what the next big thing is in SEO. I've read over his answers to my questions 4 times and am still thinking about their far-reaching implications. In short, his thoughts are well worth your time. Find the link to Part 1 at the end of this interview. LC

Search Engines Hungry for Video

Larry Chase: Previously, we talked about how important it was to have videos on your company Web site, because the search engines are looking for that kind of content.

You've said that a company shouldn't just host the video on its own site, that it should be hosted in other places. Why wouldn't I want to get all the clicks on my video at my own site?

Mike Grehan: It's true that the search engines are hungry for video. However, your search ranking will be affected not just by the number of plays your video receives but by the number of plays from different geographic locations.

It's quite a draw on your site resources, to have these videos playing on them. You have to have an audience and a reason to do this, and you must have a site that's powerful and able to serve it up repeatedly and reliably.

If you want to show video on your own site, you do have to be ready, to have the software to optimize it, convert it to [a file format called] MPEG and take time to upload to make it available in streaming formats.

You can host the movie or video on another site, such as YouTube, and then embed the code from that site onto your own site. The actual file resides on YouTube. So, you can do both: You have one file on YouTube, and then you embed the code on your own site as well.

Search Engine Anti-Spam Tactics

LC: What can I do to get a higher ranking for my video? Pay somebody to keep clicking on it?

MG: No, because the search engines take steps to discount that.

People keep talking about search engines changing their algorithms, but the truth is, if Google had worked for the past 10 years and had developed an algorithm to provide the most relevant resources at the top of the pile, why would they want to change it?

What [Google and others] try to do is to stop people from spamming them. With video, for example, a video that receives a lot of plays will rank higher in results. To increase my number of plays, I could send a bot to keep playing my video automatically.

However, the search engines take other things into account as well, such as the number of people who have tagged or bookmarked it or embedded the code on their own sites.

This is why, if you provide video content about Internet marketing on your own site, for example, you need to make these videos available to a wider audience. So, other people who publish blogs about Internet marketing can take your videos and embed them in their own blogs.

When your video is embedded in someone else's blog, that sends a very strong signal to the search engines about the originator of that video.

Getting Seen in Local Search

LC: We also talked previously about local search and how it's becoming more important. What can local businesses do to be sure they get seen on Google and other search engines aside from search-engine optimization and paid search?

MG: One of the great things about Google and local search is its Local Business Center. You type in an address and upload your information, and then it appears on all sorts of Google applications, such as Google Maps.

Suppose, for example, you have the OpenTable application [which uses Google Maps] on your iPhone, and you're walking around New York City, and you're looking for a restaurant with open seats. The satellite [which tracks you through your iPhone if you turn on that feature] will see where you are and then will tell you there's an open table at one of its participating restaurants even a yard or so away from you.

Search by Voice

LC: What about applications that use voice-recognition software?

MG: This is also something that people have been working on, again related to an iPhone application. It's coming together in the car. Google is working with both Garmin and TomTom (GPS device manufacturers).

You enter the information about where you want to go, using speech. For example, you click "search" and say "sushi restaurant Los Angeles." The satellite, again, will know where you are, find a restaurant and give a description. You click on it, and the route finder changes the route of your car to direct you toward the restaurant.

Browsing Without a Browser

LC: You've talked about the importance of businesses being seen in applications that rely on search, like those for the iPhone and others. Is that where search is heading?

MG: Browser-based search isn't going away, but applications are the way to go these days, especially the ones that use Google. With the Open Table and GPS locater examples, the user does all of that in an application on the iPhone. You don't need a browser for that.

As I said, though, browsers won't go away, but they will change. Google's new Chrome browser is doing all kinds of stuff with [the] Ajax [application] and new technology. When you install Chrome, it becomes more of an operating system, not just a Web browser sitting on top of your OS.

The old model was using search in a browser that lead to a text page, but searchers don't want just that anymore. They say, "Give me the video; give me a podcast, a press release, or whatever." They're saying it with their clicks. This delivers a richer end-user experience.

The end users, by the way, don't know that all this is going on. They just know that they're having a better time with search than before.

The Future of Search

LC: Okay, we've talked about how different aspects of search are evolving. Now, let's zoom out a couple orders of magnitude. Please give me a 360-degree perspective on where this is all going.

MG: We will move away from crawler-based protocols, the idea of just a mindless bot crawling pages, and have greater and broader relationships with the content producers.

Data created by the end user outweighs that from content creators by about 5 to 1. We see much more materials coming from user-generated content such as blogs, social media, forums, YouTube and Flickr. That's why, for example, you should have your videos on more than just your own site. Ultimately, it increases your visibility.

Resources

Mike Grehan is Global Director of Keyword-Driven Marketing for Acronym Media.

Find Part One of my interview with Mike Grehan here.

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