I've been doodling a lot lately (see, for example, the whiteboard illustrations I turned into a slide deck for a presentation this Wednesday) and thought it would be fun to share a set of infographics - some humorous, some serious - about the field of search engine optimization. If you're uninspired by these graphics, I invite you to submit your own; YOUmoz entries with visuals have a very high success rate.
#1 - Pie Chart of SEO Time Expenditure
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#2 - Hat Color vs. Value Scatterplot of SEO Tactics
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#3 - Flowchart of SEO-Friendliness
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#4 - Venn Diagram of Internet Marketing Professions
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Just a quick note - my blogging may be slow this week as I head to Washington DC to deliver a keynote at HostingCon. Sadly, this means I'll be missing SES San Jose, but keep a look out for SEOmoz's Jen Lopez, who'll be blogging the event.
On the order of operations, I would personally do keyword research before designing internal link architecture, otherwise how will I decide what to prioritise?
Other than that, great diagrams, especially the Venn diagram; a very interesting take on the building blocks of different types of internet marketers.
I would have to agree. I'd say keyword research needs to come before anything else.
Yup. Keyword research before anything else... surely.
How about: 80% convincing business owners that SEO is actually difficult and that you need an 'expert' to do it?
Who said anything about alternatingly imbibing caffeine and alcohol? All at once baby!
as LMFAO put it, " I've got a red bull and vodka up in my hand..."
I would swap "Link Acquisition" and "Convincing the Inexperienced that SEO is Worthwhile" in the pie chart. I find that most of my prospects already understand the potential value they will get from top rankings, and my existing clients see the amazing return on investment from SEO from the regular rankings, traffic, and conversion reports we send them. I don't normally have to do much convincing. I do however have to spend a ton of time developing content and acquiring links. It's a never ending job.
Edit: Of course, I realize that the pie chart is supposed to be humourous, and it is. :)
I think it would be interesting to put together a pie chart of time for an agency based SEO vs an inhouse SEO. From experience they would look very different.
I love the scatterplot of SEO tactics but would add monitoring websmaster tools into it (to find broken inbound links and 301 them)
That Scatterplot of SEO Tactics is almost worrying! I might just have to pop down the shops and get myself a new hat (just kidding folks - I would never suggest anything other than whiter than white.
Oh alright then, hows'a'bout "varying shades of Grey?"
(sounds like something mikkel demib would say!!!)
EDIT: by the way Rand, you rank #1 for parasite hosting (here in the UK).
:-D
I did that search too :) ...yep #1
Love it, love it, love it - you got my world perfectly in the 1st pie chart. Although, to make it more accurate I would have to add a slice labelled 'working in my pyjamas'.
The scatter plot is very accurate - seeing it in a different format helps evaluate the importance of what you do every day.
Cheers Rand ^_^
Great post... I believe in the Venn Diagram you should include part Project Manager.
As the SEO becomes more of a focus each phase of the project begins to revolve around whether or not something is working in accordance to the overall SEO strategy.
A strong SEO person needs a leadership quality and the ability to coordinate the efforts of the entire team, both internally and with client. This becomes increasingly important when the focus of a projects begins to shift away from the original SEO initiatives.
holla!
Why is DoFollow Blog Commments under Black Hat? Is that seriously a black hat tactic? I wouldn't think so...
That was my question, too. Surely posting on blogs throughout the industry is a good thing, no? This is one where intent might be hard to determine by the search engines. If I post comments on 10 blogs and half of them are dofollow... does that make me a black hat SEO or does it just mean I'm fully engaged within the industry?
I don't find a reason why do follow blog comments have been put under black hat. What if I find 10 attractive blog posts(that are also do follow) and I share my thoughts there in the form of comment. Does it mean I am using black hat techniques. I don't think this should be a reason to be marked as black hat practitioner.
White and black are just the extremities I understand ... rand had to put a line somewhere in the middle, so I guess he wanted to imply that dofollow blog commeting is 'greyish' :P
In my experience, blogs in the seo community rarely allow do-follow links. This leaves you trolling non-related blogs to post on and insert your links and anchors. I can see why it's on the slight black hat side.
Do-follow blog comments could be construed as black hat right now because of the relatively recent changes in how the attribute is regarded by Google.
Such a high % of blogs have been (until recently) no-follow because of juice leakage phobia.
I theorize that acquiring a sudden mass of "do-follow" back links could be seen as an effort to game the system.
Merely speculation - and I'd say this is definately on the lighter side of the hat - nowhere near black.
i would move "Internal Link Architecture" MUCH further to the right toward "High Value". all the on-page optimization and keyword research in the world won't help a large site if your information architecture doesn't allow / encourage engines to index a large percentage of your pages.
The reason it isn't farther right is because of the value placed on the XML sitemap which is also on the same level in terms of weight. If your not using a XML sitemap the value of "internal link architecture" increases but I think the way in which it is listed is suggesting that "internal link architecture" doesn't include value for indexing but value for passing page rank thus the need for good architecture as you need to control where link juice internally is being passed. Within the scatterplot given as an example I think things are cool as XML Sitemap provides indexing ease that you mentioned and Internal Link Architecture provides the link juice control needed for larger websites. Just my thoughts.
That's an interesting point. I disagree somewhat cause a bad IA can really hinder the crawling and even though I can not prove this, I assume that sitemaps have their limitations. What do you think?
An XML sitemap tells search engines what to crawl. Once your start this practice you're locked in to updating your sitemap as the spiders are going to actively use it to navigate your website. I would say you could have pages with no internal linking structure but an accurate XML sitemap and all of your pages would be indexed. They may not rank well because your home page and other key pages are not passing link juice but they would be indexed. I am in no way recommending this nor have I ever tested this out but it seems if you provide linking to all pages somewhere ( a sitemap in this case) they will all get indexed.
XML sitemaps are *not* on the same level as solid information architecture when it comes to indexing and ranking your pages. take this quote from vanessa fox:
Vanessa: The thing about XML Sitemaps is that they won't help you with ranking but it does help with discovery. If you want to let the search engines know about all the pages on your site, it can be good for discovery. It doesn’t mean they’ll crawl and rank them. https://bit.ly/8dwum
XML sitemaps are just a signal to engines that "here are URLs that exist on my domain."
good information architecture maximizes the distribution of internal and external link juice, and puts every page in the best possible position to be indexed, rank, and ultimately get you traffic.
So you're also for moving IA more towards the right and XML Sitemaps more to the left? Would like to hear Rand's thoughts to this more and more : )
Grasshopper, your second post has nothing to do with your first. You said referring to Internal Link Architecture:
"i would move "Internal Link Architecture" MUCH further to the right toward "High Value". all the on-page optimization and keyword research in the world won't help a large site if your information architecture doesn't allow / encourage engines to index a large percentage of your pages."
The bold face but the comment in general is where I was disagreeing, I believe Internal Link Architecture is very important but if you refer to Rand's Scatterplot of SEO Tactics XML Sitemap Creation and Internal Link Structure are on the "High Value" axis are on the same vertical line thus my comment on "same level as Internal Link Architecture".
I am going to disagree slightly with Ms. Fox who I greatly respect but my disagreement is more conceptual I think. Your pages can not rank if they are not indexed; XML Sitemap is a great tool to encourage indexing of your website--thus X-O-Fact-O it helps you rank. Is it apart of the Google Ranking Algorithmic I doubt it but I do not know for sure, but I do know this if Google likes XML sitemaps then why not drink Google's CoolAid. 'Drink Google's CoolAid' is my metaphor for encouraging people to use it.
I just realized a better and I am sure more agreeable way to look at our disagreement.
Site #1 - Does not have XML Sitemap
This site now relies on great "Internal Link Architecture" for both link juice passing and deep indexing thus the weight of ILA is doubled on Rand's Scatterplot and thus making you correct as it needs to be pushed twice as far to the right.
Site #2 - Does have XML Sitemap
This site relies on XML sitemap for get indexing and ILA for link juice passing and all the reasons you mentioned. Thus the total worth/weight/measure needs to be divided half of the worth for ILA and half for XML Sitemap. Thus why they are plotted on the Scatterplot on the same level in terms of value.
Thus you are right friend if you remove XML Sitemap from the Scatterplot; ILA doubles its value shooting it so far to the right its off the chart. With that said if you remove from ILA the value added by the abilities to provide index because you have a XML Sitemap then its worth only half as much.
This is all my thoughts based on Rand's Scatterplot and he could easily tell me I am full of crap. I was just trying to bring some needed conversion to this page instead of the typical "way cool" comment.
Rand,
Love the infographs! You totally capture the essence of SEO! People who don't do SEO really don't understand the various components that are necessary to implementing a successful campaign. What about reporting? I prepare executive summaries every month for my clients. This seems to eat up time too - maybe just a little less than the caffiene / alcohol segment. :)
I definitely agree with you there. The reporting aspect deserves a piece of the pie. It does take time and my clients love to talk about their sites.
Wow that pie chart is very accurate - I might expand it to 75% though and just call it something like "sales and admin" or whatever. Also the caffeine intake slice shoudl probably be a bit larger.
You missed one very important point off the scatterplot :) It goes somewhere just under the blackhat / whitehat line and right at the top end of High Value.
Yeah, the Google Pray Meta tag ;) [/joke]
Do share....
That would be telling. Come on: you guys must see what's missing...
Link Building? That's kind of covered with the Viral Content/Linkbait point. Maybe it's Social Media Marketing?
But it's not.
True. Developing Viral Content / Linkbait and building links are two separate activities. I agree that it should be added to the scatter plot. I think Social Media Marketing would be good to add as well.
Social media marketing is tied into link baiting and viral content.
Rand, I Think these illustrations are awesome, specifically the Venn. I have never really thought about the overlapping like that. I knew it was tied into the same goal but never broke down the titles before.
Jane - I wanted to be more specific. Link building isn't white or black hat, valuable vs. not - it depends on the type of tactic. I'm also stuck on whether social media marketing is actually an SEO activity - sometimes it is, but not always, and more frequently, the two have separate goals.
Did fix the "wasy" though :-)
I was referring to buying quality links: thought that would make it on there because of the directory point... people still do that, right? ;)
That's exactly what I was looking for. I know you said you guys don't buy links anymore, but I believe most still do (me excluded of course!)
What tool can I use to make good looking graphs, like these ones?
looks like Office 2007 Smart Arts to me..
One thing I don't see on there is reporting. I think any SEO worth their salt should be able to provide good reporting to their clients which takes some time to put togehter. There's no better way to convince your clients that your services provide a good ROI then by showing them a chart that shows it to them in black and white.
no mention of reading industry sites and joining forums etc to gain useful insights into current trends and practices...
You just cut into my actual SEO time Rand. This post would be alot funnier if it wasn't so true!
nice, thanx. You forgot "The Dangers of Nofollow" ;-)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsU4U37bavQ
Every day from your blog in the article was a lot of inspiration
First off, great post. Only complaint concerns the last graphic. The last graphic places SEO in the middle of the intersection of "all things internet marketing" and seems a bit much... While some use the monicker "SEO" as all-incompassing, not everyone does. There are those that practice other disciplines (for instance, PPC) that could just as easily be supplanted at the intersection. Just a thought.
Thank you Rand! I'm a white hat SEO, oficially, yay!
Haa! Love it :) Especially the first pie chart. That is so True!
I do hate the 65% of my job - convincing people that SEO is worthwhile and getting resources for it.
Imagine what we could all get done if that pie wasn't so blue.
What a great article. These graphs are very good in explaining the inside workings of SEO.
Thanks.
Kris
Spell check probably missing from graphing tool...
Resources to successfullly ...
I love the infographics! I would like to share one of them our sister company designed. It explains SEO vs PPC and it is very nice looking. It can be found here: SEO PPC Infographic
Excellent inforgrams! I would love to use/show the SEO tactics one in a meeting but worry that I'll get quizzed about the supporting data/research. Do you know where/how the weighting of each area was achieved? (I know it all looks pretty solid and sensible).
M.
The venn diagram is my favorite. Great work, these are funny and useful!
Unfortunately chart #1 is dead on -- especially in the agency world!
I cited and linked your pie chart infographic in my article "SEO vs. Content Strategy: and the Winner Is?" on imarketingclass.com.
Many thanks for helping me add visual interest and relevant information to the article.
really useful as a guide and something to refer clients to
I disagree with the first chart where "convincing the inexperienced and acquriring budged/resources" takes about 70% of the time and "Link Acquisition" takes about 7% of the time (a little bit more that "Imbibing Caffeine + Alcohol)". This is a Fun-Chart right? You got me for one sec! Link Acquistion should be replaced with the blue field and then you have a more accurate chart.
On the Scatterplot, How do badges and widgets help? Is in terms of the issuer or in terms of the site that embeds it? Sorry if this is a stupid question. My Office liked the graphics.
Oh, also, I don't think that Automated content generation is low value SEO. It depends on what you target and try to accomplish. If you have some simple blog to generate AdSense money it is one thing. Often we call it splogs.
Some automated content generation networks became quite successful and provide useful information. Take Zimbio for example.
Love the Venn Diagram Rand... the best of all graphics!
Great infographics. I luv them. It's like a reminder list for me. :D
I disagree with the last chart where SEO seems to be the most balanced and Social Media Marketer is "Tech + Marketer".
If anything, SEO is closer to that since SEO need to know more about code and how servers work than SMM.
Stats are a key part of SMM, if not more important to SEO because SMM need to analyze Social Media traffic and see what works and what converts. SEO is older and has needs to be tested less.
My .02
The only thing is missing... online and offline integration. It is important to show value proposition of your product or service in offline ads and drive people to specific keywords on search engines.
Whole process is designed to bring potential customer on your website or landing page and avoid "leaks" in conversion funnel.
Nowhere near enough proportion for the "Alternately Imbibing Caffeine + Alchohol"...should be at least half the blue section...
Does that make 100? :)
Looks about right - I only do SEO for my own site and can see the application.
These are great graphic, Rand and completely correct. The first one is so funny and the scatterplot is well thought out.
i love charts and graphs!
I have small issue with your pie chart but I could be misunderstanding "On-Site Optimization".
For me let's say your client's SEO budget covers 80% off SEO factors but as a responsible SEO you use the budget in the manner you believe to be most effective to your client. To me the 20% of SEO that remains to be done or that is needed falls into "On-Site Optimization" but I also think that you need a second section of the pie for conversion and actual page optimization which I feel is still part of the SEO Hat.
So if your pie section for "On-Site Optimization" includes both factors then I think the section should be bigger or maybe landing page optimization isn't considered an SEO Time Expenditure but sales. Either way I agree with everything else but I try to ensure the clients understand that the budget allotted for SEO covers 'Y' and 'X' is really needed thus we try our best to fit 'X' in while also suggesting actual landing page optimization.
This thought process maybe a gross mix-up of roles and "hats" as I work for a small firm or maybe a adjustment to the file is needed. Either way I am glad that I am not the only one who wishes you could transfer your understanding and knowledge to each client over and over as the "just trust me" line rarely works.
Great post! This is great "link bait" too, I might just have to blog about it myself :)
Sadly the pie chart is pretty accurate.
And SEO isn't alone - replace the text in blue with sales/sales support and you've got the work breakdown of almost all work a digital agency is likely to undertake.
ye ironically the pie chart is so not how SEO are supposed to work.
Great infographics, guys!
Nice infographs. Is it possible to reuse them (giving credits)?
Thanks for the pie chart. That is going to be my entire weekly report from here on out.
Really nice post Rand.
I love the last picture, it just demonstrates SEOer has to learn everything lol.
Keep it up, nice work.
Shouldn't #4 of the "Flowchart of SEO-Friendliness" be "make it easy" instead of "make it wasy"?
Great post Rand, I really like the scatterplot
Rand these are awesome!
Sparked off a discussion in our office anyway. I couldn't agree more with the professions Venn Diagram. It about getting that balance right.
Thanks again!
p.s. in the order of operations - is "wasy" some new American word that hasn't reached our shores yet?!
The venn diagram is very useful. I never thought about those professions in those terms. Btw, can anyone recommend a good book / resource on practical / online-marketing oriented statistics?
Wow, this is AMAZING, Rand! Thanks so much! Now I can evaluate what I'm doing and what needs to be changed/emphasized more. What a relief. Thank you again. :D
No, dofollow is blackhat? I know of a secret CMS (meaning my lips are sealed) that...well...many PR6-8 sites use that dofollow comments. Miraculously, I see very little spam. Maybe the moderators are good at filtering it.
It's just so...
hard....
to...
resist....
Don't make me change hats, man.
Drupal?
pm me son pm me
Excellect infographics, guys!i like the Scatterplot of SEO Tactics Diagram, Very informative
Awesome post, loving the charts and diagrams Rand
Well done, Rand! Great visuals.
Awesome - I really enjoyed the charts though I agree with the increasing of the caffiene portion of the pie chart.
Love the white hat/black hat scatterpoint...sometimes it can be difficult to get through to people that certain tactics they are employing can be more harm than good...now I will just send them this chart and save myself the time :)
I like the infographics! Simple, colourful and effective! I like the flowchart of seo-friendliness, and the concept behind the white hat/black hat, although the latter leans a bit more towards personal opinion I still largely agree.
Love the last graph - I've been trying to explain SEO to my coworkers and that's it. I do everything!!
Love the charts! In the Order of Operations chart, I would take care of the keyword research first. Otherwise, you'll be going back in and duplicating a lot of work later, rewriting content and editing other on-page elements. SEO (including keyword research) should always be part of the development process from the beginning!
Why is dofollow blackhat lol? Also what happens if half the web is no follow?
How SEO's spend their time?
Rand, you left one thing out. Even after all the sales pitch, when clients sign an SEO up, there is a huge amount of time explaining why we do what we do and how it can help (especially key phrase enriching texts and links development) again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again.
They seem to keep forgetting and then need the whole thing explained to them again.
I think that my explanations are very clear and non-technical and easy to understand .... but maybe not?
Hi Mr.G...
I have only three words... you are great[Google]
beautiful post..