SEO…From Past to Present

8/14/2019 SEO…From Past to Present

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/seofrom-past-to-present 1/56

SEO…From Past to Present

Brent D. PayneTRIBUNE INTERACTIVE



Let’s Journey Back, Nearly Two

Decades Ago When . . .



…There Were No Search Engines

Launched

Circa: 1992



Then… There Were Lots of Search

Engines

Launched

Circa: 1993




Engines

Launched

Circa: 1994




Engines

Launched

Circa: 1995




Engines

Launched

Circa: 1996




Engines

Launched

Circa: 1998




Engines

Launched

Circa: 1999



Back Then… Yahoo! Dominated

55.81%

11.81%

11.18%

8.91%

5.05%

2.76%

1.58%

1.25% 0.85%0.80%

Yahoo! Excite Altavista Infoseek Lycos Go To Snap MSN Northern Light Google

I had less than

1% of the

market in ‘99.



But Now… There are Just a Few



And Google Dominates Market Share

Google

72%

Yahoo!

15%

Bing

8%

Ask

3%

All Others

2%



So How Did Google Do It?

Because I am

just the coolest

of all the

robots…of

course!



Well…First Let’s Learn More About

How Google Works

Well, okay but in

the end… you’lldiscover it’s

because I’m the

coolest robot.



How Does Google Find Content?



How Does Google Store and Index a

Page’s Content?

Can you discoverwhich pages contain

“civil” and “war” and

“reconstruction”?

[Answer: Only documents 35, 48, and 91 contain all three words "civil" and "war" and "reconstruction."]



The Google Differentiator That

Changed Search Engines Forever



Popularity

LATIMES

NYTIMES

CNN

PERSONAL

PROFILES

SMALLWEBSITES

LOCAL BLOGS

Popularity

On-Page

Off-

Page

URL

Link

Text

Popularity AUTHORITY RELEVANCE

Okay…But How Does PageRank Work?



But…We Don’t Know EVERYTHING!

PageRank

Popularity

Authority

Relevance

)()1( 1 k

j

B j j

k

i x N

xi



SEO Is Important If You Want People to

Find Your Content… Did you know

that people

having me

search for stuff

over 2,000 times

per second?



So What Can We Do to Get Our

Content to the Top of Google?

This is a great piece

of content. I can’t

wait to share it

with the world!



First…Googlebot Psych 101

•Googlebot doesn’t understand puns

•Googlebot doesn’t get jokes

•Googlebot is a robot not a buddy of yoursLiteral

•Googlebot only understands what you tell him

•Metromix ‘Get Lucky!’ headline

•Laptop ‘case’ versus laptop ‘bag’ Context

•Googlebot can’t read iFramed content

•Googlebot can’t read images (needs ALT text)

•Googlebot can’t read javascript

•Googlebot barely understands flash files

Blindspots

01100111 01101111

01101111 01100111

01101100 0110010101100010 01101111

01110100



On-Page

Off-

Page

URL

Link

Text

RELEVANCE

Title Tag

H1 Tag

H2 Tag

Bold, Italics

Utilize Keywords

Link to Related Content

NoFollow Competition Similar Sites

Similar Pages

Toolbar PageRankBeware of NoFollow

Structured

Minimal Folders

Minimal Parameters

Keyphrase Focused



It Starts With Keyword Research

Weather What arepeople

searching for?

How can I find

out?

Sports

Local

News Movies

PoliticsFashion

Food

Horoscopes

Travel

<Relevance>

G l K d R h

https://adwords.google.com/select/home



https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Google Keyword ResearchTool

Provides long list of related terms (exports)

Shows approx. searchvolume

Shows advertiser

competition for terms

Shows keywords by URL

G l H t T d

https://adwords.google.com/select/home


http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/seofrom-past-to-present 34/56http://www.google.com/trends

Google Hot Trends:Introduction

Top 40 Search Terms• Shows highest volume

search terms by percentageof increase

• Updated every hour on thehour

Powerful for . . .

• Breaking news• Historical top terms by date

Google Trends Michael



http://www.google.com/trends

Google Trends: MichaelJackson’s Death

G l H T d A I di i




Google Hot Trends: An Indicationof Hourly Search Trends

• Volcanic – Extreme volume, usually high competition

• On Fire – High volume, considerably less competition

• Spicy – Strong volume, not worth chasing unless it’s a

hyperlocal term or you’re a small site though

• Medium – Medium volume, not worth chasing after

Hotness Factor

• Graph – Watch it and catch terms while they’re still peaking

• Related Searches – Use them in your body text,subheadlines, etc.

Other Things to Consider

Google Trends: Compare



Google Trends: CompareSearch Volume by Terms


Compare multiple terms todetermine which termreceives the highest volume of search traffic.

Use the drop down menus tochange the date range andregional data sets.

Export the data to a CSV(Opens in Excel, must belogged into Google Account).

Find Top Vol me Search Terms



http://www.google.com/insights/search

Find Top Volume Search Termsby Category (3 Day Lag)

Discover the top volume search terms bycategory

Discover fastest rising search terms by category

Microsoft’s xRank: Celebrity



Microsoft s xRank: CelebrityKeyword Research

•Updates multiple times perday

•Graph of trend history

Trends Data

•Celebrities•Musicians

•Politicians

Categories

•News

• Images•Videos

Related Articles

http://www.bing.com/xrank

Hmm.

Gates, got

xRank

right at

least.



Relevance

Put The Keywords People Are

Searching for In the Content• The most important SEO field• Communicate loudly but don’t spam

• Must be unique!

Homepage/ContentHTML Title Tag

• Important mainly due to click through

• The goal is to entice the human click to your link

• Write a unique description for each page on your siteMeta Description

• Beat up your designers that use if tor ‘style’ instead of SEO

emphasis

• Should be used for the main heading of the page (i.e. headline)H1 Tag/Headline

• Keep the first paragraph close to the H1 tag in the HTML code• Do not break up the code within the paragraph with other HTML

• All pages MUST have at least a paragraph of textFirst Paragraph

• Use Google News categories for increased visibility

• Bold/italics puts heavier SEO emphasis on keywords

• URL is important for relevance with inbound links

G’ News Categories,

Bold/Italics, URL



PopularityAUTHORITY



Links for‘Topic X’

Article2

Article3

Blog 1

Blog 2

Blog 3Section

A

Section

B

SectionC

Article1

Linking Structure: Unorganized

None of this

content is that

popular. I’m not

going to rank it

well.



Story 1

Story 3

Story 2

Blog 1 Blog 2

Blog 3

The competitor is

really popular for

‘Topic X’. I’m going to

rank the competitor

really well.

Competitor

. . . and why it’s bad for SEO.



Pre-determinedlanding page

for ‘Topic X’

Story 1

Story 2

Story 3

Blog 1Blog 2

Blog 3

SectionA

SectionB

Section

C

Now this is popular

content. I’m going to

rank it well.

Linking Structure: Organized



CNN

FOX News

MSNBC

Reuters NY Times

NPR

Your site has some

really popular and

relevant content. I’m

going to rank it

better than CNN,

MSNBC, etc.

Your site!

. . . And why it’s good for SEO.



Popularity

LATIMES

NYTIMES

CNN

PERSONAL

PROFILES

SMALLWEBSITES

LOCAL BLOGS

Popularity

i i l di h



Popularity

Using Social Media to Improve the

Popularity Aspect of the Google Algo

S i l M di & S h S i l M di



Social Media & Search: Social Media

Vastly Increases Inbound Links

Popularity



Formula: The Social Media Title

The Viral Content Formula:

• [Number] [Adjective/Superlative] [Key Phrase] [MediaType]

Examples:

• 10 Movies that teach you how to commit crimes.

• 10 iPhone finance apps that count.

• 16 Drinks named for authors and their books.

• 25 Reasons it’s great to be an IT guy (or girl).

• Morgan Freeman’s 5 most memorable movie moments.

Popularity



Other Ways to Affect Popularity

Content

• Quality,TimelyContent!

• It Creates

Inbound LinksAutomatically

Link Building

• Make It Easyfor Sites toLink to You

• Utilize Social

Media

Research

• Know WhatPeople areSearching for

• Google

Trends• Google

Insights

Popularity

Th M W t R k I G l



The Many Ways to Rank In Google

Universal Search



I am actually

quite acomplicated

robot.



I serve content

from many

different verticals

on a single page.



I am launchingmore and more

One-Box items, like

the Music One-Box

and Real-Time

One-Box.



• Search Engines Use Links to Determine Where a PageShould Rank In Search Results

• Google is the Dominant Search Engine Today

• Popularity = Number of Inbound Links

• Authority = Quality of Inbound Links

• Relevance = How Your Content Relates to the User’s

Query• There Are Many Ways to Rank Well in Google Via Their

Many ‘One-Box’ Inclusions

Summary

Closing Comments



Contact Info

• Director, Search Engine Optimization

• Tribune Company, 435 N. Michigan, Chicago, IL 60611

• Office: 312.527.8387• Cell: 312.324.3344

• Email: [email protected]

• Instant Messenger/Personal Email:

[email protected] • Twitter: @BrentDPayne (follow w/ caution)

• Driver’s License Number: BDP24456U8

• Passport Number: 443876284

Brent D. Payne

SEO…From Past to Present

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