PORTER’s POSTULATE: SEO (search engine optimization), provided proper fundamentals are in place, will naturally improve in quality (e.g. inbounds) and quantity (e.g. geometic mean page sat.) if systematic SMO (social media optimization) is embraced and bred into the web team’s DNA and creatively injected into the system and measured. In many ways SMO is a function of a stategist’s creativity. SEM (Search Engine Marketing) should not be confused with SEO (Search Engine Optimization) SEM is really a tool to fill in the gaps- at least in my humble opinion.

Want to fix your SEO problems? I hear that all the time. Focus on your creative social media optimization! It really is that simple-well in theory simple- it is the creative aspects- the mashups, the aggregation, storytelling, the new approaches that can make it difficult for some. One dynamite idea can treble SEO.

SMO, a concept coined, i believe, by Rogit Bhargava, of VP Interactive Marketing with Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, is all about it.

His first five rules make perfect sense to me:

1) Increase your linkability - This is the first and most important priority for websites. Many sites are “static” - meaning they are rarely updated and used simply for a storefront. To optimize a site for social media, we need to increase the linkability of the content. Adding a blog is a great step, however there are many other ways such as creating white papers and thought pieces, or even simply aggregating content that exists elsewhere into a useful format.

2) Make tagging and bookmarking easy - Adding content features like quick buttons to “add to del.icio.us” are one way to make the process of tagging pages easier, but we go beyond this, making sure pages include a list of relevant tags, suggested notes for a link (which come up automatically when you go to tag a site), and making sure to tag our pages first on popular social bookmarking sites (including more than just the homepage).

3) Reward inbound links - Often used as a barometer for success of a blog (as well as a website), inbound links are paramount to rising in search results and overall rankings. To encourage more of them, we need to make it easy and provide clear rewards. From using Permalinks to recreating Similarly, listing recent linking blogs on your site provides the reward of visibility for those who link to you

4) Help your content travel - Unlike much of SEO, SMO is not just about making changes to a site. When you have content that can be portable (such as PDFs, video files and audio files), submitting them to relevant sites will help your content travel further, and ultimately drive links back to your site.

5) Encourage the mashup - In a world of co-creation, it pays to be more open about letting others use your content (within reason). YouTube’s idea of providing code to cut and paste so you can imbed videos from their site has fueled their growth. Syndicating your content through RSS also makes it easy for others to create mashups that can drive traffic or augment your content.

My comments:

1) Brochureware- the bane of the web…I would add that putting in a blog is not always a “great” first step- it is a major step and may require alot of thought. White papers are cool, but I think to think in terms of software- it travels fast using just PAD files.

2) See how he does this on his blog? Attacking both non-hierarchal news sites and social bookmarks.

3) Totally agree- not only is this is good SMO, it is also good signaling. I still am firmly in the camp that blogging is strategic and the coin of value is influence.

4) I agree here and the best way to do this is the Tom Sawyer approach- convince others it is more fun to carry or create your content.

5) I am warming up to mashups, then again that is another story….

Others have contributed to SMO theory. I’ll capture them all here for ease of reference:

Jeremiah Owyang adds at this blog:

6) Be a User Resource, even if it doesn’t help you
Add value to users, including outbound links to areas that could help them with their goals and purposes. Deployed corrected, even if you link to competitiors you stand to gain as the communities first source of information finding. How will this help SMO? Folks will link to your social site and tag is as helpful or the ‘ultimate’ guide in that space. As this adds up, it will become more and more relevent in search engine results.

7) Reward helpful and valuable users
Often helpful or popular users will be influencers and champions within your social site, devise ways to elevate them buy promoting their works on the homepage, or develope a rating system. Sometimes a quick email or note in private telling them you appreciate them can go a long way. Some folks have done that to me, and for communities I run, I do that as well. Only do if sincere. Perhaps this is not truly SMO, but it will help to keep the most valuable members of a community closer to your site.

6) I love strategies where all i can do is agree- it is best that the resource help be at least tangential to your business.

7) UGC and UGH- User Generated Content and User Generated Help- I think Joe’s Whuffie system might be ideal for this. These are uber-fans and in turn plant the seeds of uber-fandom- treat them like gold.

Cameron Olthuis then comes in SMO Rules 8, 9, 10, and 11.

8. Participate - Join the conversation. Social Media is a two way street, lets not forget that. By conversing with the community you are creating awareness and prolonging your buzz. You are keeping it going and this often results in a snowball effect. Participating helps your message spread further and faster.

9. Know how to target your audience - If you don’t even know your target audience you are in trouble. I would love to have everyone using my product too, but you need to be realistic. There is always going to be a certain audience you can appeal to and others that you can’t. So know your appeal and who it is appealing to.

10. Create content - There are certain kinds of content that just naturally spread socially. It does not matter what industry you are in and what boring products you sell, there is always some kind of content that can be created that will work. Whether it is creating widgets, making people laugh, or writing a whitepaper, it can be done. Know what type of content can work for you and create it.

11. Be real - The community does not reward fakers.

Pretty much echoes Doc Searls and the ClueTrain gang, but i agree. The Web is merely a conversation. It doesn’t matter where you have it- as long as have it.

9) Self Explanatory. You can’t assist those you don’t know.

10) Content creation is great, although tough to scale sometimes - I just prefer content to be an ASP or software, or an interactive tool or a game…or what I really like is good storytelling. A good example of that was a piece I did years ago about the Brady Bunch and Adware it resonated, radio stations called it up for readings, computer clubs to print and passout.

11) Not only do they hate fakes, they love true humans- if you make a mistake be honest about it- beat yourself up and they’ll appreciate the fact you take yourself to task.

Loren Baker of Search Engine Journal adds 12, 13.

12. Don’t forget your roots, be humble : Sometimes it can be easy to get carried away being a BlogStar or industry talking head. Remember those who helped you along the way, and that respect will help all involved.

13. Don’t be afraid to try new things, stay fresh : Social Media is changing and morphing by the minute, keep up on new tools, products and challenges in your social sphere.

12) Agreed. We all put our pants on the same way in the morning or at least most of us. People are merely people.

13) I really believe every company should be spend 20-25% of their time in R&D and experimentation.

Lee Odden has added Rules 14, 15 and 16

14. Develop a SMO strategy - define your objectives and set goals. Be fully aware of what your desired outcome is as a result of performing these tactics. Reputation, sales, influence, credibility, charity, traffic/page views, etc.

15. Choose your SMO tactics wisely. Be cognizant of what actions will influence the desired outcome with the most impact.

According to Hans Peter Brondmo of Plum during the SES San Jose session “Marketing with Social Media“, 1% of those involved with social media are creating content, 10% will enrich that content and 90% will consume it. That’s a lot of influence wielded by content creators and those that reblog and mashup. Think about what you can do to enable content creation as well as the repurposing of that content for what might possibly be the most productive outcome.

16. Make SMO part of your process and best practices. As with good SEO, SMO tactics should become part of your organization’s best practices. Find ways to incorporate SMO tactics at the “template” level of document creation and as part of information distribution. Minor things like encouraging social bookmarks and rewarding incoming links as a standard practice across the organization can go a long way.

14) Exactly why I was researching this- many companies are wandering around in marketing 1.0, some 0.05. Canonized strategies aren’t out there so be prepared to really “roll your own”.

15) I make note of this “According to Hans Peter Brondmo of Plum during the SES San Jose session “Marketing with Social Media“, 1% of those involved with social media are creating content, 10% will enrich that content and 90% will consume it.” Interestingly enough this isn’t even close to Pareto distribution, a power law probability distribution found in a large number of real-world situations. A.K.A. the Bradford distribution. One sector defies this- The Grid- virtual worlds like Second Life where over 50% of users create content. yes- the book is coming.

16) I would emphasize SMO over SEO and SEM. SMO encompasses much of Customer relations and effectiveness of the storytelling paradigm.

Of course I can’t resist throwing in my .02 on the sixteen which are great- but where possible measure SMO- clearly a new set of metrics and tools are needed as SMO is often merely shadows of how we communicate reflected into different parts of the datasphere. Then again I have to wonder if tools like this are good bad or neither- depends on if they are used responsibly? Perhaps like PPP.

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