Sherelle Salaver

SEO or Social Media? or SEO and Social Media?


When establishing a presence on the internet, what is more important? Search engine optimization or social media?

When writing I try to keep in mind that not every understands the jargon, so by the way,

Search engine optimization - the science of having your site come up higher as a result when people search of terms related to you business. This is easy if your site is about "antique thimbles from the renaissance period" and harder if your site is about "sex". Usually referred to as SEO or SEM (Search Engine Marketing)

Social media - the art of using networking tools on the internet to listen to and reach out to your current and potential customers. This includes blogging, microblogging, videos, photos, and social networking.

It is one of those huge questions: if you are trying to create a web presence, where do you start?

Do you start with the science or the art? Or do you do it on the cheap and mash it all together?

Jason Falls questions that method, telling "Why You Shouldn't Trust Social Media to a SEO Consultant"

I understand his perspective that there's a gap between the science and the art and those who get the science may not get the art and vice versa.

However, some took offense in the comments, saying that an SEO consultant may have the capacity to drive a social media campaign as well. I know that I plan on learning more about SEO myself in the future so I can be more useful on both sides of the fence.

Both are equally important, SEO gets your site seen by people looking for what you have to offer and there is so much competition on the internet that any edge is valuable, however social media gets you exposure in the industry and from customers who didn't know you had what they wanted. It's closer to traditional marketing but fused with networking and word of mouth.

There's also SMO, or social media optimization, the idea that the word of mouth and publicity to social media will get you the links needed to move your site up the ranks, but many SEO consultants would say that it is not enough and doesn't cover all that they could provide.

I suppose one takes a risk with choosing one over the other or mashing the two together, but at least you know your options.

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Richard Baldock Comment by Richard Baldock on November 24, 2009 at 5:32pm
Social media activity will contribute to a SE ranking a website. I suppose it is possible to achieve page ranking without it, but its very accessible and easy to use, so use it not abuse it.
robert falco Comment by robert falco on August 17, 2009 at 2:50am
seo and social media both play important role to rank in google.. i don't know much about seo but i am taking seo services and finally my website is ranking.. the think is that social media is build back link which very helpful to us to rank in google.
Sherelle Salaver Comment by Sherelle Salaver on July 31, 2009 at 10:07pm
#6 Baltimore SEO on 04.22.09 at 10:56 pm PST
SEO and Social Networks are apples and oranges - while SMO is always a good idea to an ESTABLISHED community, SEO is better used on static and not Web 2.0 sites (site that the use is not involved in its content). Therefore, you should not mix between the two since the social network is the SEO de facto of your site.
I’m a Baltimore based SEO for years now, and I saw tons of examples where site owners waste money on creating social network where not needed.

#7 shankar on 05.03.09 at 10:49 am PST
Absolutely seo is the most important thing by which everyone can reach to our website. but know i think……. that SMO is also very important to improve our website circulation.

thanks for this informative article.

#8 Andy on 05.20.09 at 4:56 pm PST
SEO is definatley the most important but it is best to use a mixture of both. SMO can be helpful in the early days of your site, especially when entering a saturated market.

#9 David on 05.21.09 at 8:28 pm PST
Organic SEO has to be the fundamental area of concentration when setting out. Its the more affordable, long lasting way to give your website visability, so I would always spend more time on SEO and then look at the possibilities for SMO. The thing people forget about your basic seo measures, is that although you could complete all your metadata and think its done and thats it, however the world, and the internet is constantly changing, and new “buzz words” are always coming out. Think about having the keyword Credit Crunch 3 years ago, and building on it. There is always something new, and that applies to SMO, as it develops in leaps and bounds, and now will potentially shape what we come to call web 3.0, when social network aggregation takes place.
Sherelle Salaver Comment by Sherelle Salaver on July 31, 2009 at 6:21pm
#1 Atlanta Real Estate Agent on 03.14.09 at 8:30 am PST
As a real estate agent much of my internet presence is a pure numbers game. If i had a choice between SEO or SMO I would choose SEO every time. It seems probable to me that an effective SEO campaign would drive a larger number of visitors overtime to my site than SMO. The word of mouth aspect of SMO has some value as I believe they tend to be more loyal. However as I said before the greater number of users utilizing a search engine versus the relatively smaller number on any particular social media site makes the choice easy for me.

#2 Words that begin with “S” « Social Media dictionary on 03.17.09 at 2:30 am PST
[...] (”organic” or “algorithmic”) search results. (Wikipedia, Search Engine Optimization) Also: Search engine optimization - the science of having your site come up higher as a result when people search of terms related to [...]

#3 Christopher Hales on 03.20.09 at 3:32 pm PST
I have just recently started my own tattoo website and I know that the market is saturated so although I am doing everything I can with SEO I know that it will be a very very slow process. For now I am spending a lot of time on SMO. It is still very slow but starting to build up quite nicely.

#4 Fred Hoeffner on 03.20.09 at 6:35 pm PST
Great comparison. I prefer the SEO part for my website but once you reach the first page for all of your target keywords and have nowhere else to go that is when you start focusing your whole attention to SMO.

#5 Mike Hype on 04.01.09 at 10:26 am PST
I agree with Fred. SEO is the most important part for my websites, but reaching the first page for ALL of my keywords has been difficult. SEO will pay off better in the long run than SMO.
Leo Vidal, JD, MA, CPA Comment by Leo Vidal, JD, MA, CPA on July 6, 2009 at 10:02am
Well, I've decided to go full time from financial and tax consulting to Internet Marketing for local businesses, and I've done a tremendous amount of research on this. The truth is that no local business can survive with SEO. They have to be present where their customers are looking for merchandise on the web. They have to turn their website(s) into another branch, another store.

But the social networks are where the customers hang out, and you have to be there too. A presence on social networks leads to traffic to your online "store" and that's how your sales will increase. So they are complementary in that sense -- both bring you new customers. But I think you have to start with SEO as the first cog of Local Internet Marketing

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