Search: thought leader

The model of using keywords to promote web sites is not as effective as it used to be. Most people will agree that Google has become the dominant search engine on the Internet. However what does Google think about keywords?

In September 2009, Matt Cutts with the Google Search Quality Team posted an article on the Google Webmaster Central Blog entitled Google Doesn't Use Keywords Meta Tag in Web Ranking. So if Google doesn't use keywords, then what do they use? According to the article Google doesn't completely disregard all the meta tag data, however their web search engine primarily focuses on things, such as "links pointing to a web page."

Now how can you generate more links pointing to your web site from other sites. Two suggestions would be to utilize blogs and social media. Through these two mediums, links to your organization's web site can be generated. This can serve several purposes.

Some people have taken on the concept of striving to be an online content expert, also known as a thought leader, for their specific field of expertise by posting regular articles on their blog and spreading the publicity of those articles through social media networks (such as Twitter and Facebook). For more information about one way to do this, read my post about the Open Graph Protocol.