B2B SEO is going to “get clever in 2011” as a result off six significant changes. Alex Blyth investigates what these will be and what they will mean for marketers
We all know how important SEO is for B2B marketers. As Jack Wallington, head of industry programmes at the IAB, puts it, “For B2B marketers, SEO is a key piece of the puzzle. In a B2B environment, in particular, there are a lot of people carrying out desk research, and since most users only look through the first three pages of search results, if you’re not in the top 10 on each page then it will reflect badly on your business. Ultimately, if you’re behind in search, you’re damaging your business and its reputation.”
What will surprise most of us over the next 12 months is just how straightforward SEO has been up until now. Despite the very best efforts of some SEO practitioners to make us believe it is a dark art – involving arcane algorithms and profound knowledge – in fact it has simply been about getting your keywords right. Those SEO practitioners have mostly done an excellent job helping businesses understand SEO, get their keywords right and rise up the rankings, but that is all they have done.
In 2011 this is all set to change. B2B SEO is going to get clever, and that means it is going to get complicated. Understand how it is changing, and you will be able to harness those changes to your advantage. Ignore these changes, and before long you will find your website slipping down the search engine rankings.
Here are six significant changes that you should know about.
1. Mobile
Mobile is already big in the world of online marketing, but Eldad Sotnick-Yogev, strategic search consultant at digital marketing agency The Distillery, predicts that in 2011 marketers will need to start thinking about mobile search.
“The phenomenal rise of smartphone usage is one of the most important changes in SEO for 2011,” he says. “Google owns over 98 per cent of the global mobile search market, so B2B marketers need to pay extra special attention to the way they generate results specifically for mobile.”
He continues, “According to [technology research company] Gartner, mobile will outpace desktop computers by 2013, so that in just three years we’ll use 1.83 billion smartphones and only 1.78 billion PCs. With the majority of search shifting to mobile in the coming years, it’s time for all B2B marketers to take mobile search seriously and get ahead of the game now, or face being left in the sidelines by your competitors.”
He offers this advice, “Mobile users use search differently from desktop users and often have very different intent. For this reason, the initial research and strategy for a mobile search campaign should look at demographic, technographic and psychographic research separately to your desktop search campaign.”
2. Google Instant Preview
For others, however, the main change to B2B SEO in 2011 will be the impact of Google Instant Preview. It launched on November 9 2010 but its effect is only just beginning to be felt by the search world. Google Instant Preview predicts what users are searching for, completing search terms in the search box. It allows searchers to roll over their results and see miniature previews of the respective websites.
“The release of Google Instant Preview is the current thing website owners need to pay attention to,” says Lyz Cordon, director at SEO consultancy Diligent Design. “Although introduced in 2010, this will continue to have an impact on click-through rates, which in turn affect rankings. It’s important because searchers can see your website page in miniature without even visiting it, so if your site is poorly designed and doesn’t present information well then you may never even get the click-through.”
She adds, “Now, more than ever before, B2B marketers need to ensure their sites are professionally designed, ideally by a web designer who understands conversion rate optimisation. Make sure your layout is clean and uncluttered. Have a look at your website preview in the rankings and see how it looks. Does it look organised? Do calls-to-action stand out? Does it look inviting? Crucially, does it look easy to use and trustworthy?”
3. Social search
While Google still commands around 90 per cent of UK search traffic, and so it can transform SEO practice with the release of an innovation like Instant Preview, many believe that its dominance will begin to fade in 2011. In particular, a growing number of experts believe that over the next 12 months we will begin to see social networks functioning as search engines.
Katy Howell, MD at social media agency immediate future, says, “Social search is fast becoming a critical component of search engine practice. Now, not only do you want your customers to discover your content, but you also need them to share it. So marketers need to optimise their content for both the search engines and the social networks.”
More specifically, Dr Horst Joepen CEO of Searchmetrics, points to the Bing/Facebook partnership, arguing that it may end up being the biggest game changer in the SEO industry in the year ahead. “This partnership could make Facebook an individual’s and a company’s go-to social network hub and search engine. It means users don’t have to leave Facebook to find a person or company. Right now we can only speculate on how this will pan out, but if executed efficiently, this could change searching for information online as we know it.”
4. Sitemaps
There is a great deal of talk about social media and how it will affect search. There is less talk about the vital role that sitemaps will play in the process. Tim Gibbon, director at PR agency Elemental, says, “Although social media is extremely important, the sitemap protocol – which has been in use for a number of years, but largely ignored – is critical to this because of how it manages content for website owners.”
Gibbon explains, “Sitemaps allow website owners to control multiple pages of their website and the content they publish. They also ensure that website owners can share pages of their website that change, update frequently and may not be as easy for search engines to discover and process. As more sites become content-rich with images, news and video, and mobile devices play a greater role, sitemaps are an effective way to manage such content and provide information to search engines so they can index it and make it accessible.”
5. New generic top level domains
Another major change on the way for 2011, but which few marketers know about, is the impending introduction of new generic top level domains (TLDs). In addition to the existing 21 generic domains such as .com, .net and .org, we will see new ones such as .eco, .sport, .food, .nyc, .hotel and .music. Neil Barton, director at web hosting company Hostway, believes this could present a challenge for SEO strategists.
“There could be a fresh rush to register domain names as they become available later in 2011,” he predicts. “Businesses will again have to make defensive registrations, and may lose some traffic in the short term. On the other hand, smaller numbers of highly specific TLDs representing well-known brands, for example IBM, would go further towards protecting brands by making cyber-squatting almost impossible.”
6. Local
Finally, in 2011 search will become more local. Tom Rowlands, SEO consultant at The Distillery, explains, “On Google Local, results that are closest to the searcher’s location now appear in the centre column above organic results. In addition, the Google Maps widget now sits in the right-hand column, taking priority over paid-for search space. This is a significant change. To take advantage of it, marketers need to make sure their existing business listing is accurate on Google Places, Yellow Page sites and directory sites. Also, encourage visitors to leave reviews of your product or services, as user reviews on Google Places boost your ranking on local listings.”
Remember the basics
There is much change afoot in the world of search. B2B marketers need to be aware of these changes, work out which are relevant to them, and take action to protect or improve their rankings. In 2011, and beyond, search will continue to be one of the most cost-effective ways of generating leads and sales.
It is also important, amid all this change, not to forget the basics. Regardless of whether they are becoming more social or more local, or are changing in some other way, search engines are there to provide searchers with the most relevant and useful results. So, if your site is optimised for the right keywords, and if it contains useful content that is frequently updated, then it will continue to perform well in search engine rankings.
