Trying to keep up with technology shifts and changes to Google’s algorithm can be dizzying, even to those of us who have worked in the internet marketing industry for years. In this disruptive time, the recent shift to a focus on developing and distributing compelling, relevant content offers a reprieve of sorts – a shift back to consumer rather than search engine-centric marketing. That is, by focusing on providing consumers with the content they need and want (or haven’t yet realized they need or want), not on search engine optimization (SEO), we can most effectively market our products and services on the web while improving our search engine rankings.
This relatively new focus on good old fashioned content has a hitch, though. Besides being able to write good content or hiring someone who can, you have to distribute your content using multiple social media channels. Experts now advise using Google+, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest regularly to distribute compelling content. Of the five channels, perhaps the most important and least leveraged is Google+.
It makes sense that posting compelling content and images on Google’s social media channel and driving up your +1s will also improve your Google search engine rankings, but Google+ is still new and many businesses have yet to make this important connection. A study done by a global search analytics software company in 2012 did, in fact, conclude that Google +1s have a strong correlation with search engine rankings, but because Google+ did not have enough users for the findings to be considered reliable, their report did not list it as the most significant social media channel for driving search engine rankings.
My experience of posting content online tells me that compelling content distributed through social media channels – especially Google + – is today’s best online marketing opportunity. Stay tuned for more on this topic.
