SEO becomes obsolete?

Some people suggest that SEO become obsolete as search engines become smarter and smarter. Is this true or not? -ohcnetwork

Only true for people like myself who fail to become smarter and smarter on that subject. It passed me by as I spent more and more time on other things. That's why I study the stuff Jeff posts here on SEO. I'm taking baby steps again. -Gary Boye

Search engines are involving, but SEO has gotten more difficult, IMO. However, at this point, your SEO effort pays off if it's done right. I wonder if it'll be like that 5 years from now ... -ohcnetwork

SEO methods may become obsolete or rendered useless but in my opinion as long as there are Search Engines there will be Search Engine Optimization. -Jeff Blackwell

IMO, as long as webmasters control what is published on a site then there will be SEO. ;) -SEO-LAD

I think SEO will evolve, not become obsolete. The rules may change, but as long as there are search engines, there will be a need to make Web pages "search engine friendly." -Bobette Kyle

Exactly. :) -SEO-LAD

As of right now, SEO does not exactly bring the core quality of website. For example, link acquisition does not bring up the core quality of website fundamentally. Do you think that this trend will change over time? -ohcnetwork

I, for one, hope not. Aggressive link building is a short term approach...can be devalued at any time by change in algorithms. Anything that increases the core quality of a website has many more long term benefits...helping the business in other ways, outside of SEO. -Bobette Kyle

I feel like I fell off the boat somewhere. What prompts you to compare SEO with core quality? :confused: -SEO-LAD

Well, many criticize SEO because it doesn't really address quality of website (informative website, etc.). That's what I brought it up ... -ohcnetwork

Ok, I think I understand where you're coming from on this. Are you referring to the idea that higher quality sites should rank higher in the SERPs but don't because some lower quality sites are gaming the search engines through SEO? -SEO-LAD

I believe so. Not in all cases, but this happens quite often. -ohcnetwork

IMO, some of the responsiblity for poor search results falls in the hands of the webmasters. Algorithm's are built for Information retrieval not mind reading. I'm confident you will agree that an overwhelming number of web pages on the the Internet are poorly structured and/or optimized. I imagine the webmasters of these pages are among the many who are not happy with the SERPs. ;) -SEO-LAD

my 2 cents

Poor content plus poor optimistaion = invisible website

Great optimisation plus poor content = visible in the short term

Great content and poor optimisation = these sites make money

Great content and great optimisation = very rare

My conclusion. Great content is the easiest route to high visibility and earnings.

So if you have to choose then go for great content on your website. We call it 'spider food' . . . keep putting down spider food and the spiders will start to like you. -helisell

My 2 cents worth...

Being a website marketer myself, I come across many websites that look and read great but are not optimised for search terms that potential customers look for.

To win in Google (or any search engine), one word must dictate every effort to be found line - RELEVANCE.

Search Engines handsomely reward websites that are unique, informative and relevant. Why? Because if they didn't "reward" your search query with matching websites, you would probably use another! For this reason alone - SEO will never become obsolete.

How do you make your website relevant?

1) Optimised copy (and product / service information) using keywords that your target audience search for (often)
2) Correct use of HTML tages specifying what your page is all about (Meta Title, H1, H2, H3, Meta Description etc)
3) Links coming into it from well respected, mature, well read websites or directories - links acts as "endorsements" from other webmasters (hence the need for quality, unique, informative content worth linking to...)

That's it in a nutshell - as long as there are more than 1 search engine, relevance will continue to be their no.1 priority and SEO (done correctly) allows web pages to be highly relevant in the search engines highes.

If in doubt, show me a Dog Food Webpage, with Dog Food related Title tag, Meta Description, H1, H2 and H3 headings that has content relating to Bathtubs. Would the page rank in the SERPS for either Dog Food or Bathtubs - nope. The more relevant the websites that search engines offer you to match your search query, the more you trust them, use them and have them as your online friend.

And remember - SEO is primarily 2 parts: On Page (Tags, Validated Coding, Copy, Internal Linking, H1, H2 etc) and Off-Page (quality inbound links, hosting etc).

I would also say that 100% of poor search results rests in the hands of the website owner. A great looking website with a £10k price tag is a waste of money if it ain't found online or doesn't connect with its target customer... and that's why SEO will never become obsolete.... msnwnk;

Tony -Tonyd

Google spends millions making sure people dont figure out shortcuts on getting ranked. Long story short good content = higher rank. Page rank will die before SEO in my opinion. -OneLead Guy

This is an old post but I thought I had to tune into the old discussion.

SEO will almost never become obsolete unless the search engines themselves become obsolete. SEO will change a lot though and today, the search engines have become smarter than ever. But they do want rank sites working on SEO as long as its white hat.

Google doesn't have anything wrong with SEO as long as its according to the book. There are strategies to get other people to link to your site which involves hard work starting out. -JeffSales

SEO will never become obsolete. We are not trying to "trick" the search engines. We are giving them what they want. We provide great content and make that content popular via link building and social media sites. -MyBusinessMarketing

Exactly My BusinessMArketing! As they become smarter, being total white hat and providing lots of content will be the only way to go if its not fully that way already.

-Jeff

-JeffSales

SEO will never become obsolete as it is merely the act of structuring your website to provide the highest quality/information for the reader. The more sophisticated search engines become then the higher quality the top sites listed will become.

SEO therefore will become purely whitehat with very little chance of gaming the system -peter-odonoghue

SEO obsolete? LOL! Not a chance -SEOmarketing

The basics of SEO have not changed in a long time. Good content, titles and summaries are necessary. This has always been true. After that the popularity of your site matters. How is popularity determined? How many people link to your site. Did social media change that? No. When you are sharing links on social media to a site you are usually helping the popularity of the that site.

Now - here is the dirty little secret that most people aren't paying attention to. A lot of social media links DON'T help your site. Why? Because most of the great social media sites love to mask the link or add their URL shortener to the front. So you cannot link directly from Twitter or Facebook to your site. All twitter links are shortened via t.co. All Facebook links comes from fb.me. Next time you see a link on a social media site mouse over the link (don't click on it) and look at the bottom of your browser to see where the link goes. It usually goes through 1-2 (sometimes 3) URL masking programs on the way to your desired destination. -JustAskPatrick

This is absolutely right.

Optimizing a web site will become more about offering quality content that appeals to the person searching for it than a specialized set of techniques used to create the illusions of quality for the search algorithms. The smarter search engines become, the better the internet will be for all serious sources of information and the people searching for it. -thesalesgiant

I think we have kind of maxed out out what a search engine can identify as good content based on the page alone. The small amount of meta information doesn't give the detail of what is the on the page. Example: A search engine can't tell that a list of books on a webpage is a list of books. It is just text. Social Media is helping, but all it can do is give popularity to a page. That is what inbound linking does now. And it can be gamed, just like social media can be gamed.

If you want to pay attention and get ahead of the curve of what is really coming look at some of detailed tags at http://schema.org/docs/schemas.html . A new standard is being built that allows webmasters to identify the details of what is on on a page. So with the new schema a search will be able to tell that an item listed on a page is a book, person, etc.

Pretty cool for the future.

Patrick -JustAskPatrick