SEO & RankBrain Merging Technology and Social Distancing
SEO-RankBrain to your aid?
COVID-19 has ushered in the digital age like nothing that came before it. Digital has become the primary media for advertising and we are reaching critical mass in digital connectivity. Over 50% of the world is now active online. Source: see The Why of Digital Media
The Pandemic has made eCommerce leap forward and has affected not only the established online vendors but also local brick and mortar stores. Consumers can buy local via smart phones and can either pick goods up or have them delivered. It has enhanced business in untold ways. Online and offline technologies are merging to create conveniences and efficiencies that are as yet unknown. Yet all is not quiet on the western front!
Video SEO & RankBrain – a Digital Dilemma
While Digital Media Marketing takes center stage with social distancing and lockdowns, it is also undergoing tremendous shifts as modern technology gallops off with the goal post.
As you will notice in this video, Google is not indexing all social media. It’s just too much. With so many marketers posting endless content on the same subject to hundreds of sites, social indexing has lost its value.
Press releases have also fallen into this trap. With social media posts and sharing, the old days of authority journalism have faded into a case of “anything goes”.
The press release was supposed to be NEWS. But social media experts took over and the established media created surrogate sites for all of them to post to. At the time, it protected journalists’ integrity but the surrogate sites soon lost all authority. They too failed to be indexed by Google.
What is Indexing and Why it Matters
Google Indexing
Indexing simple means that your site is added to the Google database.
Google says:
“A page is indexed by Google if it has been visited by the Google crawler (“Googlebot”).
It is analyzed for content and meaning, and stored in the Google index. Indexed pages can be shown in Google Search results
(if they follow Google’s webmaster guidelines).”
If a page is not indexed it will not show up in Google Search results. If you are trying to rank your page in search results, having quality links back (backlinks)to your page will help.
Not long ago marketers created these backlinks using social media to share content and post links back to your site and pages. Now many social media accounts and pages are not indexed. The rule is not universal. Authority sites like Facebook, Scoopit, YouTube and several other pages do show up in search results. This happens when the site is considered an authority and the page content is unique and valuable.
From the point of view of ranking, Social Media pages are just not as valid as before.
What Works Now & What Does Not
As the video notes, it all works if you do it right. Content marketing works but not if it is a knockoff of others’ work. Content has to be Expert, Authoritative and Trustworthy (EAT). RankBrain and AI now evaluate all content ranking on this basis. Cut and paste spun content does not work.
Yet content is still the driving force behind building authority brands. Lizzy Hiller, Manager of Nestle’s Global Data Analytics, explains: “A robust, data-driven eCommerce strategy has become ever more crucial to brands over the past decade as they try to navigate a market that is turning increasingly to digital channels.” Source: eConsultancy
No one can doubt the value of social media but the way in which it is used is evolving. Social sites are alternatives to established media but their authority has diminished in the eyes of RankBrain. Social shares have too often sidelined true Expertise and too many lack Authority and Trust (EAT).
We don’t need a crystal ball to know how to fix this. It is a matter of creating outstanding content, publishing it wisely and selectively and knowing the channel you use. This also means knowing the tools you use and the people who help you. As the video says, too many marketers are using ‘past-tense’ tactics that are futile at best and can destroy your integrity at worst.
Help at Hand with Digital Media Book
Seo & RankBran – the Digital Delema
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