Introduction
Is SEO dead? I’m not sure whether Halloween is on everyone’s mind or the classic “what to expect in SEO next year” posts are starting to appear in my newsfeed, but beyond the outlandish statement, these blogs seem to be hitting a chord this time around.
Just to clarify - I don’t believe SEO is going to be dead anytime soon, but it’d be naive to think its role isn’t changing more than it ever has before.
Andrew has touched on the topic in the past few issues. In the B2B world, I’m seeing its role changing even more. Forward thinkers in the B2B sphere are realising that offline channels (think events and PR) are increasingly influencing SERP’s, traffic and any revenue that is attributed to their online efforts.
If you’ve ever wondered why an old-school software vendor with a poorly optimised site is sitting pretty in #1, it’s pretty evident that it's not their SEO efforts that have got them there.
With Google's algorithm becoming more sophisticated and its understanding of “brands” improving, perhaps your 2019 planning needs to think beyond subtle on-site optimisation if you’re wanting to have a significant impact.
Fingers crossed some of this weeks content will help get you started.
Post of the Week
How PageRank Really Works: Understanding Google
A tweet in 2017 by Gary Illyes confirmed that Google is still using PageRank in their algorithm (After 18 years!). In our Post of the Week, the guys at Majestic illustrate what PageRank looks like in the wild, applying their representation of the model to a small Internet system with 5 nodes. They've done a great job of trying to simplify one of the most famous and complicated facets of Google's algorithm.
Tech
Top 35 Technical SEO Statements By John Mueller in 2018
John Mueller has weekly Google Hangouts answering questions on SEO and all things Google. If you don't want to sift through the multitude of YouTube videos, Oncrawl has compiled a handy collection of his top 35 technical SEO statements from 2018.
Generating custom photo-realistic faces using AI
I've went off topic slightly here, but this was too cool not to link to. I think this shows how powerful AI is, and the advancements being made in image technology. This fascinating model, developed by a PHD student, can draw photos according to descriptions, such as smiling, hairline, or nose size. How is this related to SEO, and how on earth can it be applied in real life? Well, potentially, it could help scale imagery across eCommerce websites - you could insert products naturally onto images of models, or you could even test whether a 'smilier' face across all imagery has an impact on engagement.
Outreach
17 Killer Link Building Strategies for 2018 (with Examples and Scripts)
As always, a hugely in-depth and actionable post by Robbie Richards. As a sneak peak inside his 17 linking building strategies, have you ever considered converting homepage links into deep content links, to boost blog posts or 'money pages'?
Tools
29 Best Free SEO Tools (Tried & Tested)
This isn't a link to a tool, but another post about tools. Thanks to Joshua Hardwick of Ahrefs, for saving me a ton of time this week. In this post, you'll hopefully find something you haven't used before. I know I did!
Keyworddit - extracts keywords from a Subreddit.
Da Vinci Tools [Chrome Extension]
I really love this Chrome Extension, and it has lately been given an upgrade. For those of you that don't know what it is, it essentially makes your life much easier in Google Analytics. Here's a few of the cool things it can do:
- Highlight high/low points in overview graphs
- Heatmaps on tables
- Confidence Test calculator
And much more. Check it out!
See Differences Between Live URL vs Internet Archive [Free]
This is a useful free tool from SEORadar where you can test a live version of your page against a legacy version from the Internet Archive (Wayback Machine), and see what changes have been made!