A few years ago, we perused a slim tome on the subject of Search Engine Optimization — and decided that there was not much that SEO could honestly do for us. Claire Cain Miller’s look at how cleverly SEO techniques are put to work at The Huffington Post merely confirmed this judgment — possibly because we have never been quite sure just who Christina Aguilera is.

The ultimate prize for most Web publishers is loyal readers who go directly to their site, without passing through a search engine. They are more likely to visit on a regular basis and stick around.

Some Web publishers say that these days, the most effective way to build that following is to find readers on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, an approach known as social media optimization. That could improve the quality of articles, they say, because the best way to get links on Twitter is to write a story people want to share with friends.

Drop me a line at rjk@dailyblague.com
This entry was posted on Friday, February 11th, 2011 at 8:00 pm.