[GoodTalk]

I have been curious about this for quite a while. I remember many years ago, circa 2010, SEO was a huge deal, and it meant whether or not you were even indexed by search engines or if you would be included in the top 3 or 4 pages. I haven't really touched SEO in years. How is it now? Especially with the rise of so many easy to use platforms?

[xdude]

Depends on your methods. in 2010 or before apart from Search engines there weren't many other free traffic options. But today there are massive social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest etc. So you can choose which to target, search engines or social media.

Anyway still Google is important so search traffic matters. So SEO does matters too. Only problem is the game has changed a lot since then. Now content has really become the king. Backlinks are important but not same like before. Also now you have to be very careful about from where you get these backlinks because Google is way more strict about those now.

[GoodTalk]

I often wondered how social media affected SEO. But I never could put it into words. I feel as though Social media is a much better driving force for content promotion.

I suppose its good Google has learned to adapt its search algorithms.

I am interesting in the statement you made, One can choose if to target Search Engines or Social Media. I would imagine if you target Social Media especially on well known and reputable sites, backlinks would automatically be generated?

[xdude]

Social media is not about back-links. Also it's not about working hard first for long-term traffic. Also you don't have to worry about duplicate content since you don't both about your Google rank. Also it's not for all niches.

Social media traffic is great for current vibes, trends etc. whole thing is about creating content which could go viral. You need to create topics which sounds so insane people can't help it but clicking and checking the source. Also you need to stay active building up your user base and content for site all the time. If you stop these 2 things then it start going down hill. Cool thing is you don't have to worry about things you can't control like in Google search.

Work great with niches like fashion, fitness, politics, health, celebs etc.

[GoodTalk]

Oh yeah thats right. I guess that's why alot of these blog sites pump out hundreds of articles per month. I've noticed the click-bait titles but I never really thought too hard about them. I will really have to pay attention to it now.

I wonder where SEO will go from here.

[jackluter]

SEO is the king in ranking the website in search results with less cost for a long time period. The techniques used in ranking the website should not against the search engine guide lines, if you do not follow the rules your website will be banned.

[xdude]

SEO is the king in ranking the website in search results with less cost for a long time period. The techniques used in ranking the website should not against the search engine guide lines, if you do not follow the rules your website will be banned.

SEO is only way to rank websites in Google search because that's what search engine optimization is all about. I don't think there are anything other way to rank apart from buy ad space. But search engines are not the only way to receive traffic to your website. There are so many other ways to do it. Probably the biggest way and easiest way to get quality traffic is social media. Cool thing about  using other tragic sources is you don't have to bother about Search engine guidelines anymore. You can use whatever content you want and whatever way to design your sites. Apart from Social Media there plenty of other way to get traffic for your site. Here's 13 other traffic sources which works great,

Traffic Sources For Your Web Site

Each of these traffic sources needs a different approach depending on their nature. For example Yahoo Answers can give you high quality traffic which is great for AdSense and also Amazon. But You need to have a solid long term plan how to use it. Spamming left and right no longer work.

Creating parasite pages is another cool way to do this. You need have to create pages in other sites for small keyword phrases and then use those as doorways to your money site. these semi sites get authority from their mother site  and rank when in search and also you traffic from their mother site. Good example is hubpages, Facebook fan pages etc.

[rawalbaig]

I’m going to start this off by saying that, SEO is NOT dead. It was never dead and it doesn’t look like it’s going to die anytime soon. With many of the social networks; Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest, improving their search engines, this shows that search engine optimization still matters, it’s just evolving. 
Yes, there are parts of an SEO strategy that are dead, like:

• keyword stuffing
  
• buying links
  
• duplicating websites on different domains
  
• optimizing content purely for ranking
  
• and many more black-hat-type tricks
  

But, there are many parts of an SEO strategy that are still the same but have just evolved for how people are using search engines today. Not only should you understand how SEO has changed, you should also recognize the danger in continuing to implement outdated SEO tactics that no longer work the way they did a few years ago. These techniques are really just a waste of your time and your money.

[xdude]

Well some of those suppose do to be black hat technologies are not dead. For example Link Buying. This is still happened everyday like it used to be. Only difference is people no longer bother about Google Page Rank of sites, which had be dead for years. Now it's all about buying links for authority sites or buying links to strengthen your link tires. People no longer buying links for their money sites. That method is gone. New method is creating a buffer between your money sites and back-links.

As the buffer we create set of websites using TLDs and Free Web 2 properties like Blogger.com, Wordpress.com etc. Then we do link building to these buffer sites. If one of these buffer sites hit by Google then we remove that one and make more new buffer sites. So link buying is still happening it's just now we have to manage it between quality and quantity.

Optimizing content purely for ranking works fine too. Well basically Google has started giving priority for content than back links. So as long as your content is unique then it works fine when you optimize it. But you cant use spam methods like keyword stuffing into your content. Keyword density should be kept under 2%.

There are plenty of black-hat methods still in user but many black-hatters have moved to social traffic because from social sites you can get same amount of quality traffic or more than Google gives you. Also in social traffic methods you no longer have to bother about duplicate content, Google penalties etc. All you have to do is building follower bases and share creative content which can go viral.

[meetdilip]

SEO is certainly not dead. And it would be foolish to assume so in recent days. But again, it changes all time along with changes made by Google and flaws detected in their algorithm.