This Search Marketing expert answers all your questions

In the need of basic answers to some questions on Search Engine Optimization? Firsthand knowledge provided by a Search Engine Marketing expert.

1. Can you briefly outline what exactly Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is all about?

Simply put, SEO is the process of applying various techniques to a website to improve the volume and quality of traffic to the site from Search Engines via "organic" search results and also improve the overall ranking of the site in the Search Engine Index.

2. Is it a continuous battle between yourselves and changing search engine algorithms?

To get your site into a higher ranking on the Search Engines will always be an "ongoing battle". Changing Search Engine algorithms is not the only thing that affects ranking. To deliver quality and targeted results for the keywords and phrases searched for is the aim of the Search Engines.

The integration of "mixed" or "blended" results where related news or videos or pictures or blog posts are shown together with web pages have become the common trend lately. Whether it is video content, blog content, news content or web page content, the Search Engines will always want to deliver the most relevant or most accurate page to you. You are now not only competing against rival or competition sites; you are also competing against UGC (user generated content).

Traditionally, updated fresh page content, the amount of quality one-way links, on-site optimization and off-site optimization were the only important factors which the search engines used, but now the game has changed and you have to not only compete by optimizing your site, but also compete on the Social Media or Social Networking space.

3. What kind of demand for this service is there in South Africa?

Many people have used SEO before as it has been around for quite some time now, but I believe the demand locally is growing. Companies - from SMME's to large corporates - all realize that competition is heating up in this new space called Social Media.

Social Media together with Social Networking is distributing "user generated content" all over the web and the "integration" of video, blogs and photos are becoming the new trend in Search Engine Result Pages.

This is where the Web is heading and everyone wants to move into this new space. Gone are the days of traditional marketing and optimization methods to just focus on your one page or product.

4. How important is it to be in the first page of a search engines results?

It has always been important to be on the first page of Search Results, however, the introduction of "blended" results have made it even more competitive and thus more crucial to be ranked in the first top 5 positions of any search result page. This is vital as recent studies have shown that people don't really look further than result 3, much less click beyond page 1.

Two International Search Marketing Firms have conducted a joint eye tracking study. This has shown that the vast majority of eye tracking activity during a search happens in a triangle at the top of the search result page. This indicates that the areas of maximum interest create a "golden triangle." The study shows the importance of page position and rank in organic results.

Websites at positions 1, 2 and 3 are most important and looked at the most.