Digital Marketing - Study Notes:
Three core categories
As we’ve just mentioned, there are more than 200 ranking factors and associated search engine guidelines that should be followed. However, there are three core categories, and these make up the fundamental principles of SEO.
Technical SEO
First, you have technical SEO. In broad terms, this means making sure your website is search engine friendly.
Relevant content
Second, you need to have relevant content. We’re talking here about on-page optimization. This involves thinking about who your customers are and writing or creating relevant content for those customers that targets the keywords you want to rank for and provides a great user experience for the searcher.
Reputation
And third, you need to consider your website’s reputation. This relates to off-page optimization, and all the external factors that build up your website’s credibility, such as backlinks. Backlinks occur when an external website links to yours. We believe backlinks remain the top-ranking factor for Google.
If you get those three things right, your site will perform well in search engines. And we’re going to explore these three core areas in detail throughout this module.
Unapproved and approved SEO practices
It’s important to note that SEO techniques that break Google’s guidelines, or seek to manipulate ranking factors, can lead to a search engine penalty or a de-valuing of the site.
Unapproved SEO practices
People that intentionally, and sometimes unintentionally, break Google’s guidelines are engaging in unapproved SEO practices. Google has a list of guidelines that it encourages webmasters to follow that you can find online. If you break the guidelines, you run the risk of getting a search engine penalty. And that means that you’ll lose a lot of SEO progress that you’ve built up, so it’s best avoided.
Approved SEO practices
Approved SEO practices are the complete opposite. You engage in approved SEO practices when you abide by Google’s guidelines, and that’s what we’re going to be focusing on in this module. You need to abide by Google’s guidelines to make good SEO progress, but we will at times highlight some of the unapproved techniques that you need to avoid.
Clark Boyd
Clark Boyd is CEO and founder of marketing simulations company Novela. He is also a digital strategy consultant, author, and trainer. Over the last 12 years, he has devised and implemented international marketing strategies for brands including American Express, Adidas, and General Motors.
Today, Clark works with business schools at the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, and Columbia University to design and deliver their executive-education courses on data analytics and digital marketing.
Clark is a certified Google trainer and runs Google workshops across Europe and the Middle East. This year, he has delivered keynote speeches at leadership events in Latin America, Europe, and the US. You can find him on X (formerly Twitter), LinkedIn, and Slideshare. He writes regularly on Medium and you can subscribe to his email newsletter, hi, tech.
Neil Patel
Neil Patel is the co-founder of NP Digital. The Wall Street Journal calls him a top influencer on the web, Forbes says he is one of the top 10 marketers, and Entrepreneur Magazine says he created one of the 100 most brilliant companies. Neil is a New York Times bestselling author and was recognized as a top 100 entrepreneur under the age of 30 by President Obama and a top 100 entrepreneur under the age of 35 by the United Nations.
Nikki Lam
Nikki Lam is Senior Director of SEO at Neil Patel Digital, where she oversees the Organic Search offering, leads a growing team of over 20 passionate Search strategists, and assists in award-winning SEO campaigns for NP’s growing roster of enterprise and Fortune 1000 clients.
Joe Williams
Joe Williams teaches search engine optimization at Joe Wills. He holds a degree in Computing Informatics, and he’s been an SEO specialist for over 15 years. He’s consulted and trained many large blue-chip companies including The Guardian, Cosmopolitan, and Sky. He's on a mission to make SEO easy, fun, and profitable. You can catch him on X and LinkedIn.
