While predicting trends for the year are not like fortunetelling, they do tend to be a means of gainful employment! The changing pace of the SEO world throws up interesting tendencies each year. Each year provides  landmark changes. Let’s see what changes are predicted in the search engine optimization industry for 2009. I’ll like to break up this list into two parts: Tactics & Strategy and the Industry Trends.

Strategy & Tactical Trends

Content = KING (Still)

Links are valuable SEO currency in the kingdom of content. So, the best way to succeed online is to have content that pushes you higher on the ranking ladder. The higher you rank, the more authority you have and vice versa. Whether you are a product-based online business or a service-based one, you must share your knowledge and experience in the form of blog posts, articles, eBooks, or other types of unique content ideas to attract authority links. Also, try to vary your content offering. Don’t just stick with articles and blog posts. Go on and experiment with video clips, news, images and more.  Creating quality information that is informative, unique and providing authoritative information will help you succeed without constant effort.

Go Video!

Videos have much more appeal than content only. Don’t believe me? In October 2008, more than 100 million people visited YouTube, while an average visitor saw 90+ videos the same month. As astonishing as these numbers are, video marketing is one of the most happening SEO trends for 2009. Don’t wait too long, or your competition will beat you to the finish line! Videos do a few things for you. They will generate links to your website. They will keep visitors on your site for extended periods of time and lowers bounce rates. I foresee the search engines taking these things in to consideration in the future when ranking websites.

Individualized Search Results

Getting search results that are personalized to your needs has been at the threshold of search innovation for the last couple of years. As it goes mainstream this year, Google gives us stuff like SearchWiki, Preferred Sites etc. You can now search location-wise too. Localized search is HOT! It may not be possible for you and your friend located in two different parts of the world, to see the same search results. So, what does this mean for online businesses? Simply that it’s not about where you rank on the ranking ladder, but it’s more about how much traffic you are generating and what your conversion rate is.

Industry Trends

Greater SEO Awareness

Long gone are the days when SEO could scare online business owners still! Today, SEO is like Cricket. Everyone knows about it; some love it, others love to hate it. But no one can ignore it! With more and more small online business owners showing interest in SEO and the reasons to adopt it, there is bound to be an increase in the competition, putting a premium on choosing between a SEO consultant or getting it done in-house.  Also, more businesses are opting for PPC as many SEO agencies drop the ball for organic SEO clients, leaving them feeling like there is no other option to succeed online in this highly competitive online world.

SEO In-house

Continuing on the same note, it can be said that in-house SEO has never been more accepted or popular than this year. All companies, irrespective of the size are recognizing the need for a dedicated team to come up with and implement the best SEO strategies to get the best results. However, if you can obtain a talented enough organization – you can succeed from the knowledge and fundamentals that an agency can provide.

In our next post, we will continue from where we have left off with the remaining SEO trends 2009. So keep reading…

Joel McLaughlin