Universal search has forced publishers and digital marketers to expand their definition of search engine optimization (SEO). Pioneered by Google, universal search integrates different types of content (text, video, images, maps, etc.) on search engine results pages. Expect even more content added to the mix as Microsoft and Google begin indexing real-time feeds from Twitter and other social media sites.
What does this mean for publishers? Optimizing all of your site content takes on increased importance as more information sources and content types compete for top rankings on Google, Bing and other search engines. Here are some tips culled from various sources on optimizing different content types to increase their universal search rankings.
Video
As search marketing expert Julie Ross notes, search engine algorithms cannot read lips. Keywords have to be available to search engine spiders in text form. In addition to optimizing video titles and surrounding text, Ross suggests including an edited transcript of the video.
Because interesting videos can quickly go viral, Ross also recommends integrating social media sharing tools into your videos. “Social media sites can form the backbone of your video SEO campaign, driving waves of inbound links to your site,” Ross writes. Those inbound links will increase your search rankings, as they speak to the popularity of your content.
Images
As with video, the more textual clues you can include about the photos and other images you publish, the better for search engines. Including alt tags is a critical step in optimizing images. O’Reilly Media’s “The Art of SEO” also suggests optimizing the text immediately preceding and following each image: “This is what the user most closely associates with the image, and the search engine will view it the same way.”
Another option from the O’Reilly book: optimizing through Flickr and other image-sharing sites. Syndicating your images on these types of sites can give you multiple listings in search results – the original image source on your site as well as the image-sharing sites to which you’ve posted.
News
With news articles now integrated into Google’s universal search results, publishers should be leveraging their news content to improve their rankings. Search strategist Adam Sherk offers these best practices for Google News optimization:
- Articles must be on unique, permanent URLs with at least 3 digits
- Don’t break up the article body
- Put dates between the title and body
- Titles matter – the title should be “extremely indicative of the story at hand.”
- Separate original content from press releases (and other forms of non-news content)
- Publish informative, unique content
Your publication’s PR function also plays a role with SEO, as press releases also compete for search engine real estate. As such, press releases from your organization should also be optimized. Here are some tips from TopRank’s Online Marketing Blog:
- Research keyword phrases (1-2 per release)
- Add phrases to the title, subheading and body copy
- Add media to the release (images, video, audio) as well as alternative formats of the release (MS Word, PDF)
- Post the release to the company online newsroom
- Write a blog post version of the announcement and include a link to the press release
- Distribute the release via a wire service such as PRWeb, Marketwire, PRNewswire or Business Wire
- Encourage bookmarking of press release pickups
Local
Local search is less about how publishers can optimize their content for local, but how they can help businesses optimize their listings for local newspapers. SearchEngineLand’s Chris Silver Smith writes about the role of newspapers in local search and offers three tips to help businesses leverage local papers for search optimization; local publishers can use these tips to think about how they can attract small businesses to their site.
Here's a cool chart from Internet marketing agency ProspectMX that summarizes other universal search optimization tips from SEO experts.
