Ok so I missed days 5 and 6, get over it.

And since today is the day after Christmas, and my head is still spinning from rum and egg nog, I thought I would drop a light post on where I think search is going in 2009.

1) We will see an increase in search products that continue the slow death of the golden triangle. If you are not focusing efforts on video, images, local search, and other microformat based search concepts you had better.

2) I think mobile search will become a topic a lot of small business become interested in, as it has huge foot traffic potential attached to it.  i will not call this “the year of the mobile” , as that term has been overblown, but the search concept will hit the radar of those with limited marketing budgets.

3) On an industry level, I see a new breed of search proffesionals rising up to meet the demand of the small to mid sized businesses that will be moving their advertising dollars from traditional media sources to the more effective search marketing.

I think a lot of other things will continue to develop, such as the importance of social media in terms of search, but these are the three things that I will really be looking for in 2009.

 

“I don’t wish to be everything to everyone, but would like to be something to someone.” ~ Ali Javan

This quote is pretty much the extent of what I want to share with you 4 days into my return to blogging.

I am an advocate of being a well rounded Internet Marketer, but I am in no way an advocate of trying to advertise myself as an expert at everything in the field.

Find what you are great at and strive to be better than anyone at that singular concept. Do not put blinders on to the rest of what is going on around you, but if you try to push yourself forward as an expert on everything you will likely be mediocre at everything.

This is becoming especially true with the emergence of the “social media guru.” Some people are dropping their bread and butter to jump aboard the social media train, having no idea where it is even heading. 

Stick to what you are good at. 

Learn new things, and apply those concepts, but do not overstep your abilities.

Some great examples of people that adhere to this concept are:

Andy Beal – Master of Online Reputation Management. Andy is obviously skilled in other areas, but he has really honed this art.

Rae Hoffman – Branded affiliate marketing. Rae defined this concept. Branded, sustainable properties monetized through affilaite revenue. She is obviously one of the best minds in search, but the branded affilaite concept is her specialty.

Matthew Inman – I am not sure there is someone better in the Linkbait arena than Matt. He has the proof to back up the rep. He is a uber talented designer, but again this skill only helps him in linkbaiting.

Avinash Kaushik – He is THE most brilliant mind on this planet in terms of analytics, how to decipher web based data, and creating process from that information.

The list could really go on and on.

But look at these few, and then look at yourself. 

What is your glaring strength?

Begin to hone that, do not leave the rest of your talents under utilized, but realize you can’t be everything to everyone. 

Everyone has heard the mantra “Content is King” enough times that they now want to vomit.

Or is that just me?

The reality is that you do need content for many reasons, first and foremost being that without content your visitor has no reason to be at your site.

Content from an indexability standpoint has and is largely a text based entity. 

However, with the growth of semantic tagging, the power of social news, and other social media rich concepts, the power of non-text based content has grown.

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One thing I have noted across the board in talking with Small Businesses is that conversion is somehow the last thing on their mind.

Seems like a strange reality.

But it is a reality nonetheless.

When they approach search marketing they are usually chasing the success of larger companies, and often attribute this success to organic rankings.

But the success that fills the coffers is what the rankings beget, conversions.

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In an effort to force myself back into blogging I have created this stupid idea that I will add an Internet Marketing insight everyday from now until the end of the month.

Like with all things I do (SnydeySense, Scary SEO, IM Spring Break) I have given this effort a goofy name, The 12 Days of Daveness.

Today’s tip, and really in my opinion the foundation of any well rounded analytics campaign, is make your approach to analytics based on actionable data.

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