Confabulations

Any ecommerce company worth their salt should at least be aware of the notion of search engine optimisation (SEO) but may not be quite as familiar with the concept of social media – and how this phenomenon can help their rankings in major search engines. Marketing companies across the UK are now tapping into the resource of social media – but how does it specifically differ from SEO techniques that are presently being utilised?

In my opinion, it is important to see SEO and social media as two peas in a pod and not as separate entities because the merits of one certainly overlap with the other and vice versa. It goes without saying that SEO staples such as sensible use of keywords, long-tailing, unique content and building good quality links will long continue to play a role in propelling websites up the search engine listings – but social media has been invited to the top table now as well and definitely has its own role to play.

The best way of explaining how SEO and social media differ is probably to suggest that SEO deals with those people who are looking for a specific product or phrase and, through the use search engine optimisation techniques, it becomes possible to rank highly for any given search term. From the social media perspective, however, it is more about reaching out to demographics and revealing listings and products that they may not have actively been seeking.

Essentially, optimising a website should be seen as a big picture comprising of many different parts – two of the most important of which are SEO and social media.

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