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    Home > News > Digital Marketing – Evolution Of SEO

15^th Nov 2011 | Author: James Knight

Digital Marketing – Evolution Of SEO

When search marketing was first developed, many digital marketing professionals believed that organic search traffic was free. They would simply design a website, add some features to improve user experience, and make a few technical changes so that their website would be crawled by the search engines. Their main digital marketing strategy seemed to be ‘create it and then forget it’. Compared to paid search that required big, actively managed investments, SEO was comparatively free-of-cost. However, as more competition for audiences developed, companies began seeing the need to optimise SEO.

This led to the second phase of search marketing, in which digital marketing professionals were hired to actively manage the organic rankings of a site. This phase saw the emergence of best practices for organic search, as digital marketing experts began managing technical aspects such as meta-tagging and website structure. Such professionals also began checking the density of selected key phrases in content written for digital marketing purposes, as well as building links to increase website authority. This resulted in SEO moving from the technical field to the marketing field.

Along with the evolution of SEO, came the need for additional funds to pay for the continuous optimisation of content and link-building activities. According to leading digital marketing research firms, in 2010, more than $1.5 billion was spent by companies to ensure high quality traffic from organic search, and to be ranked ahead of competing companies. This led to the third phase of search marketing, where digital marketing professionals were required to justify the need for spending funds on SEO rather than on other forms of digital marketing.

In recent months, increasing importance is being placed on the ROI from SEO campaigns. At the DOMAINfest, a leading digital marketing conference held in Santa Monica, a panel of SEO experts were asked what they thought was the biggest SEO change in the previous year. Their answer was that SEO was finally being subjected to the same demands of ROI and accountability, as other marketing tools in a portfolio.

Nowadays, marketing companies get frequent requests from their clients regarding ROI metrics, making it clear that funds for optimising search rankings are not being sanctioned as freely as before. In fact, companies now hold their digital marketing consultancies accountable for the marketing strategy created, and demand to see the return on all new spends.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing agency and can be contacted on 020 8891 2077 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

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