Social is Part of SEO

I have heard from a lot of people over the last year or so that SEO is dead.  Or, SEO is dying, or this “thing” is going to kill SEO.  I’ve said this in the past, and I will say it again, “Shut up!”

Let’s look at what SEO stands for, Search Engine Optimization.  So what does that mean.  It means that you are optimizing your website, your content, your brand for the search engines.  In the past, social media “stuff” didn’t show up in the search results.  Your tweets or Facebook comments or YouTube videos were not in the Google search results when you searched for “steakhouses in Miami”.  Well, guess what shows up in the search results now?  Social freaking media!

Social is part of SEO.  Think about it, I’ll say it again.  Social is part of search engine optimization.  Why?  Because social statuses, profiles, tweets, videos, comments, statuses, they all show up in the search engines, and therefore should be optimized.  So how is SEO dead or dying?

Is the way an SEO, whether in-house or agency, creates a strategy different than what it was just last year?  Absolutely.  It is not just all about meta descriptions and titles and obviously not keywords.  It’s also not just about an XML sitemap, an HTML sitemap, 301 re-directs, canonical tags.  Although all of these items are still extremely important and are must haves, social media is now part of an overall SEO program.

If you are doing both SEO and social in house currently, than these two departments or employees should be holding regular and frequent meetings to make sure that all tweets are optimized, all YouTube videos are optimized and that all social media has a purpose.  Same thing goes to those that work at an agency.  Your SEO and social media teams should be working hand in hand creating overall search engine strategies.

So please tell me, is SEO really dead?  Or has it just evolved and is now bigger and more important than ever?