I came across two really interesting posts today. Coincidentally, they were from the same author, Greg Howlett, a frequent blogger from Marketing Pilgrim. He first published a post titled Is SEO a Dying Industry?, which created quite a firestorm of comments from readers. So he wrote a sequel aptly titled How Branding Will Replace SEO to clarify his controversial prediction.

SEO has no future - As terrifying as it may seem, I find some of his points to be very true.  As a marketing student, branding was deeply imbedded in my course work. It’s truly the life line for almost every successful long lasting business. Think Coco Cola or Nike. So it’s not surprising to see this topic creep up in the search marketing landscape. Besides, search marketing is just another sector of marketing, why shouldn’t it follow the same fundamental practice?

We all know organic search have drastically changed over the years with large name corporations dominating the top spots with their big budgets, manpower and of course their famous brand. As a result, small businesses are left to do what search engines view as shady SEO and the rest are left to suffer from the consequences. So now it seems like search engines are changing up the rules or more like nulling out existing rules by ranking companies at their own discretion, using more complicated algorithms and advanced technology. This impending ranking system will ultimately give big brand companies even more power and the rest struggling to survive.

I don’t believe SEO will die out completely. Most likely it will evolve and take on strategies that have been established by traditional advertising.  I guess the lesson to learn from this eerie prediction is to brace our self for the changes ahead and start thinking brand building rather and less linking building. Once you have a strong brand, the links will come naturally…. as always easier said than done!