Chances are, you’ve never heard of Dave Winer. In fact, you would have to go back to October of 1994 to see his early blog writing. Still, Winer’s small-time blog was destined for greatness when he received a personal response from none other than Bill Gates, Chairman and CEO of Microsoft — the year Windows 95 came out!
What Did All This Mean?
In 1998, Google made its first move toward becoming a giant. It opened as a major Internet search engine and an index for websites but, let’s face it, over the last couple of years, Google has made it increasingly difficult to nail down exactly what “effective” SEO marketing really is. Google has unleashed a barrage of wildlife on us from the more exotic panda to the everyday pigeon via algorithm updates.
Beating the Odds
There are very few website and blog owners who managed to forge their way through these updates and keep their fans engaged. However, there are some. What do those who have succeeded have in common? For the most part, you will find that they provide content that is never boring and super simple to wrap one’s head around. Additionally, they almost always foster a strong relationship with their website or blog visitors through comments and social media.
Just How Are They Doing That?
What makes these website and blog owners unique is that they have learned how to harness the power of social media. They understand that fostering relationships with potential buyers and customers can make believers out of them. These sites almost always offer unique content and make it easy to share with others on social media sites. This drives more traffic, helping with search engine rankings.
Why Social Media?
The one problem people have when using social media for marketing their blogs or other content is that they fail to nurture relationships. It’s really easy to stick a bunch of updates into an automated system and have them post to Twitter every 12 minutes. However, this overlooks a very simple reality: if you do not engage with people, they really do not care what you have to say.
SEO and social media really do go hand-in-hand. Studies show an average of 74% of Internet users are using some type of social networking site. These people can be browsers, current customers, or potential buyers. The bottom line is, people are going to look for information based on their own personalized question. Targeted words and phrases used effectively on the right social media platform can help drive these potential clients to read your blog, check out your website, and, ultimately, buy your product. No matter how hard we try, the chance of separating SEO and social media decreases significantly as more people utilize these sites.
Let’s not forget the conversation between Dave Winer and Bill Gates: Dave was uncertain how Microsoft would deal with a new online platform called “Marvel” and Bill Gates responded to him with an explanation of why he thought it would work. However, he also said “I don’t know if online people will make much money.” It appears that time has proven that statement to be completely inaccurate.
Doreen M is a long-term freelance writer who enjoys writing about many topics including making money on the Internet through effective promotion.
