Coming Soon To A Search Engine Near You!

The evolution of search marketing is similar to the evolution of television. In the beginning, only a few big players could afford to advertise on TV. Eventually, advertising opportunities for small advertisers came into play. This is the same pattern we are seeing with search marketing now.

We know that organic search engine optimization (SEO) and paid search network advertising are proven effective search marketing strategies. At least this holds true for 1st tier search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN. However, since search engine algorithms are constantly updating, we need to be aware of other available search marketing options that can affect the way we utilize organic SEO and paid search network advertising in the not so distant future (sooner than you may think).

Below are 3 other options that you should keep on your company’s radar.
1.  Content Options
     -News & PR – always optimize news and press releases with hyperlinked URLs to your website
     -Social Media – this can have a positive effect as an SEO strategy in that ‘social networking’ can provide valuable links
     -Local Search – likely to be the next “big thing” for search marketing; relevant for small companies, even some localized large companies
    -Feed Based Search Marketing – allows direct dialog with search engines (i.e. Yahoo Web paid inclusion)

2.  Ad Options
     -2nd Tier Alternative Search Engines – gives a company the advertising ability to expand beyond Google and Yahoo; however, traffic quality and quality of leads can be lower (e.g. 7search, etc.)
    -Content Network Ads – ads distributed to online content sites; usually not as effective as search network ads
    -Ad Exchanges – auction style exchanges to facilitate transactions between advertisers and media buyers

3.  Platform Options
      -Video – search engines can read meta tags and embedded URLs in titles and inserts within the videos
      -Podcasts – increasingly getting picked up in search results; can optimize ID3 tags; place podcasts on your website or blog; create rich content on your podcasts and submit to RSS feeds
      -Mobile – mobile search is in its very early stages; just keep it on your radar for now

The point is to be aware of all the different search marketing channel options.  Not all of them may fit your business’ strategy. However, they need to be on your company’s radar as potential search marketing opportunities in the future.