Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Every 24 hours, 2 million unique blog posts are published. In light of this statistic, the quest to claim the #1 spot on Google’s search results for key terms in your industry suddenly seems harder than ever, doesn’t it?

Google’s search algorithm uses myriad different factors, known as “signals,” to determine quality of content. The factors and their relative weights are all a closely-guarded secret, but you’ll be pleased to know that content creators aren’t completely left out in the cold. It’s critical to not just acknowledge Google’s quality guidelines, but to also make them an integral part of how you approach the production of web content.

What Are the Quality Guidelines?

Matt Cutts and the rest of the web-spam team offer webmaster guidelines, with a stated intention to “help Google find, index, and rank your site.” The site covers technical and user experience tips before delving into content quality, with a clear caveat that the guidelines aren’t intended to be comprehensive. It’s definitely in your brand’s best interest to avoid using deceptive principles just because they’re not illustrated on the list, and uphold “the spirit of the basic principles.” There’s no substitute for reading the guidelines, but the points consist primarily of the following...

There’s been a lot of talk in the search industry over the past year regarding the overlap of public relations and SEO, particularly in the area of link building. As a Public Relations major, this couldn’t make me happier — not because I feel like my college degree can finally be justified to my parents; but because, as an industry, we’re finally embracing PR and learning from it, even though it’s always been a part of SEO.

Public relations professionals have spent years perfecting their outreach strategies, building relationships and finding press opportunities for their clients. Search marketers have also spent years doing outreach and finding opportunities for our clients — we just called them “links.” They weren’t always the best opportunities, but we’re getting better — and that’s where we can take a cue from our communications-minded friends in the PR industry. Here’s how....