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You Can’t Define Digital Without SEO
It’s almost amusing to see how a new year always brings some new way to look or define something. Many experts figured that “digital advertising” would be one of those evolving definitions that would bring a fresh new look to 2009, and they were right. Be careful when doing business how companies define the word “digital”. Advertising agency holding companies have made very little effort and investment in digital. What they call digital is Flash and Photoshop, what you or your clients are asking for is SEO and SMO. These are wildly different disciplines.
SEO and SMO firms don’t view Flash as digital marketing or advertising, not even close. If you want Flash, I can have you Flash by 3:00 PM today, no questions asked. However, Flash does not spider in search engines properly, requires plugins, doesn’t work on many mobile devices and is practically useless in providing any ROI for clients. You might as well get used to spoon-feeding Flash a healthy dose of “digital” pea mush and tuck it in at night with a bedtime story. Advertising agencies like to use Flash because it is quick and shiny, a temporary solution for a more permanent problem. There are agencies out there that have begun to invest in SEO and SMO, but they tend to extensively invest in Flash and leave a gap in their capabilities.
Next time you are bidding out online business, make sure you ask your bidders to define “digital advertising”. If you don’t get an answer that includes SEO or SMO, keep looking. We specialize in SEO for online businesses and make sure that you are getting the “digital advertising” that your business needs. It’s 2009, and you need to start off the new year with the right strategies, the right goals, and the right partnerships. Give Volacci a call to immediately start building for a better 2009, or to request a free proposal online to begin. Volacci guarantees that by the end of your contract you’ll have enough additional business from your website to pay for our services or we’ll work for free until you do. We do it because your profit is our passion.
Prior to Volacci, our pay-per-clicks campaigns were not producing results that justified how much we were spending. Volacci not only educated my team on the value and importance of proper SEO management, but also tripled the success of our campaigns on less than ¼ our previous budget.
— William Rice
Marketing Manager
e-MDs
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About the author
Ben Finklea
Ben entered the world of online marketing in 1995 when he founded a web design company from his dorm room at Texas A&M University. Since then, he has worked in various capacities in sales and marketing, from tiny start-ups to Apple Computer. In 2001, Ben founded Sprysoft, an e-commerce store that successfully sold over $5M in software online to students, teachers and schools. Ben formed SpryDev Online Marketing in 2005 to use the techniques and processes learned at Sprysoft to help other businesses sell online. SpryDev grew quickly and changed names to Volacci® in 2008.
Ben's book Drupal 6 Search Engine Optimization was released in September 2009 and is available from Amazon.com. In Dec 2010, Lullabot released their Drupal SEO Video on DVD starring Ben.
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/benfinklea
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/benfinklea
Comments
Re: Have to agree to disagree
"But, to make comments like, "I can have you Flash by 3:00 PM today, no questions asked." is insulting to Flash developers."
Thanks for the comment, Preston. My main objection are the many Flash-only sites that were built without consideration of the online marketing implications. This is very common coming from the print-ad world. I take the calls from desperate marketing executives who need search engine traffic but can't get it because the expensive website they just bought isn't crawlable by search engine spiders. Even a typical YouTube page only has a couple of Flash elements surrounded by all kinds of descriptions, comments, etc that are easily crawlable. As you say, Flash is good for frosting. Not good for creating the entire site...at least not if you want the search engines to find you.
Have to agree to disagree
Flash was not developed for SEO. It was built to allow more flexibility to animation online. However, over the years it has grown into more than just an animators tool, but now you see actual applications in use. Would YouTube be as cool and accessible if not for Flash? Or Viemo who allows HD content via Flash? I agree with you that Flash is not SEO friendly. Flash is simply the frosting on the cake. But, to make comments like, "I can have you Flash by 3:00 PM today, no questions asked." is insulting to Flash developers. Adobe is continuing improvements that allow flash sites to be indexed by search engines. You can read about it here, http://www.hochmanconsultants.com/articles/seo-friendly-flash.shtml