As the influence of search on Web users’ habits increases, understanding how to create content optimized for search engines is increasingly important. That is especially true for professional communicators who create online content.

In news, media companies have hired search engine optimization professionals and are training journalists at all levels of the organization to write in a way that search engines can easily digest. Recent data from Hitwise indicate that search engines are responsible for more than 25 percent of traffic to news sites.

Tribune Company, for example, increased its traffic from search engines from 14 million monthly visits to 34 million in two years by optimizing its content. When Boston.com, the The Boston Globe‘s website, was on the cutting edge of SEO in 2007 it was ranked by Nielsen as the fourth most-trafficked news site in the country despite ranking 15 in print circulation. Executives attributed that ranking to SEO.

In the online world, where pageviews equal money, SEO translates into profitable growth. Tribune achieved its growth with the help of a full-time SEO professional, but the responsibility to create search engine-ready headlines and content is spread throughout the company. It is another way that journalists are becoming more responsible for driving traffic to their content.

For newspapers, this often means leaving catchy headlines for the print edition because they only serve to confuse search engines. As blogger Patrick Thornton writes, “Headline writing (in print) is treated as an art form, where editors work tirelessly to find the most creative headlines. Headline writing on the Web is a science.” As a result, many newspapers now write separate headlines for the Web that are rich with keywords that users are likely to enter. That means writing “Michael Jackson dead” instead of “King of Pop dead at Hollywood home”.

Some journalists think that writing for search engines is peddling for traffic — and some sites have been accused of doing so. But Brent D. Payne, who oversees Tribune’s SEO efforts, argues that writing for search engines isn’t as much of breach of the journalist’s code as some make it out to be. He argues that good SEO is just another way to draw readers in.

“Consider the news stand of today. Even though you write a great article, if no one sees that article it doesn’t really matter,” Payne said in a case study published by Wordtracker. “Online you can take a news stand and put it in the middle of Times Square by doing good SEO, or you can take your news stand and stick it in the middle of Kansas by doing no SEO. It’s your choice.”

That’s why some journalism schools are beginning to integrate SEO into the classroom. In fact, Robert Niles, who writes at Online Journalism Review, argued recently that writing for search engines can be as important as AP style for student journalists.

“SEO provides the key to reaching an audience not motivated by existing print brands, including younger readers and readers outside a publication’s traditional search area — folks who might not know to seek out a newspaper website, but who would nevertheless be interested in its content,” Niles wrote.

Additionally, many of the techniques employed by search engine optimization experts resemble techniques that have long been taught at journalism schools. That’s because for many in the SEO profession, writing clearly in the inverted pyramid format is one of the first steps in getting a website to the top of Google’s pages.

How much time should journalists be expected to spend on SEO and how much are journalists responsible for the traffic they generate? If SEO has a place in journalism schools, should it be taught in Web design courses like other Web technology or as a part of writing classes, just like AP style? Does search engine optimization matter to news organizations of all size or just big organizations that cover stories that garner significant search volume? Do news organizations that employ SEO employ methods to turn casual visitors into regular ones?

Additional reading

• For some basic tips on writing for the Web, see this page on Mindy McAdams’ site.
• Robert Niles at Online Journalism Review also has a tip sheet on writing for the Web that includes information about how to write for search engines.
• This Search Engine Land article provides a comprehensive list of SEO techniques, including those of a technical nature that are of importance to web designers.
• Poynter’s News University has a webinar on attracting online readers that covers many aspects of SEO.

As search plays a bigger part in the life of Internet users, search engine optimization becomes increasingly important to professional communicators.

No doubt communications professionals, whether in journalism, advertising or public relations, are used to working with a wide range of specialists – photographers, copy editors, designers, sales representatives, etc. But there’s a new position in many organizations that has grown out of a need to put professionally-produced content in front of new readers: the SEO.

Search engine optimization, commonly known as SEO, has evolved into a big business as search engines have become an integral part of accessing information on the Internet. Search is now accessible on most mobile devices, and even by text message. As a result, media companies have hired specialists in the field and some are schooling writers and editors on the basics of SEO. Some journalism schools are also trying to integrate SEO into coursework.

A 2008 study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project shows a steady increase in the use of search among Internet users over the past six years. From 2002 to 2008, the percentage of Internet users using search on a typical day increased from about one-third to 49 percent (10 percent more than look at news every day). According to Pew estimates, that means as many people may soon be using search as are using email on a daily basis.

With more Internet users turning to search every day, effective placement in search results is becoming increasingly important, both for brands that benefit from beating a competitor to the top spot and for news organizations whose profits are often tied to the number of users they can draw in.

Ruud Hein of Internet marketing company Search Engine People points out that search engines have significantly altered the way that many find information for several reasons. He writes: “… a side effect of using modern search engines is information reduction. That the information is ranked creates a perception of relevance which lowers our exposure to and engagement with the additional results even further.”

AOL released data from users’ searches in 2006 (they later apologized) that reinforced Hein’s assertion. Analysis of the AOL data showed few users went past the first page. On the second page, for example, the first result was clicked 0.66 percent of the time, compared to 42.3 percent for the first page.

Simply put, the farther down the search engine results page (SERP, as it’s often called) a piece of information is, the less it matters, so getting to the top has value. Getting to the top of the page involves two key tasks. The first is to optimize a site for search engines, which ideally pushes a site to the top of the list for relevant searches. The second is to close the deal by providing relevant text to cause a user to click on the result. So contrary to popular belief, a great deal of search engine optimization is optimizing for the human searcher.

Next week’s post will examine how news organizations are using SEO, and a following post will explore ways that universities are teaching SEO in mass communications programs.

With that in mind, how do professional communicators balance the need to write algorithm-friendly articles that are also written with the human user in mind? Will SEO by performed by specialists within organizations or will become part of the process from the bottom-up, employed by writers and content creators? Should SEO skills be taught to journalists and public relations professionals? As users become more comfortable with search, how will their changing habits affect current SEO practices?

Additional reading

• For general information on search engine optimization and how search engines work, see this Google page on the topic.
• To learn about SEO as it relates to news organizations, see this presentation (PDF link) from Tribune SEO guru Brent D. Payne, which discusses many of the technical aspects of SEO. His personal blog is updated often with SEO information.
• And to follow news about the search industry, visit popular industry blogs Search Engine Land or Search Engine Watch. Search Engine Land often covers search-engine developments as they related to the news industry.

in March 2010, according to Nielsen data for the top 10 U.S. search providers.

in 2008, the last time the company publicly announced the size of its index, according to the official Google blog.

Google Insights generates reports on search volume, allowing you to see what people are searching for online.

Determining the public’s interest in a subject has become increasingly easy in the Internet era. One of the tools that facilitates these measurements is Google Insights. The site allows you to input terms and receive of a graph of “search volume” on any given topic over a period of time. It mashes the results up with relevant news stories to attempt to provide causes for a chart’s peaks and valleys and can be narrowed down to particular geographic areas. For a similar service from Google with a slightly different feature set, check out Google Trends.

To see Insights in action, check out this page with an Insights report for the term “Fort Hood”. You can see how the searches spiked as the news of the shooting broke, and see related terms people were searching such as “shooting”, “texas” and “fort hood victims”. The page also includes a map that allows you to see how the search happened over time geographically, which illustrates a nationwide peak with sustained interest in the state of Texas. This information can be helpful in everything from in understanding your users and even in headline writing.