In much the same fashion as content marketing and inbound marketing (aka marketing automation) are on the way out, SEO is on the way out. But it’s not on the way out because it’s proven its irrelevance, a la inbound marketing/marketing automation. Nope. It’s on the way out because search engines are doubling down on SEO to create SIO (search intent optimization, if you can believe that).
Before we get to SEO/SIO, let’s start with inbound marketing/marketing automation. According to “Unstoppable trends every B2B marketer must embrace to drive growth”:
Many of us “bought the dream” that marketing automation was the answer to move marketing from a brand and product-focused discipline to demand and revenue-driven department … But the lack of integration, meager innovation by the providers and the realization of what was truly required is now slowing us down.
Dang! I hate it when that happens. And lack of integration and meager innovation, of course, are the sole reasons inbound marketing/marketing automation is going the way of the dodo. Its demise has nothing to with the fact that emailing people back to the Stone Age (to paraphrase the late Curtis LeMay) was a bad idea from the moment some ham-handed huckster hatched it.
And that brings us, illogically, to SIO.
Act Now!
The good people at the Content Marketing Institute (CM, the Institute part isn’t terribly important, I guess), the relevance of whom is apparently hanging by a slender, fraying thread, would like you to know you disregard SIO at your own peril. Hence, this — “Why You Shouldn’t Ignore Search Intent Optimization” — whence derives this:
Search intent optimization is all about giving the best answer exactly the way your target customer needs it. In other words, it’s about meeting your customers’ immediate needs and hence winning their hearts … Search intent reflects why a user is performing a web search.
Got that? And to make sure the folks who search for your intent aren’t stymied by the perpetual shell game of Google’s search algorithms — and for a limited time only — the CM will sell you a complete SIO kit that includes a Ouija Board, a crystal ball, a bloodhound, and your very own personal shaman. The kit will enable anyone who’s selling anything to divine the best answer exactly the way your target customer needs it, no matter what the hell the question is. Seriously. Can you beat that?
To get your kit, have your credit card ready and call 1-800-SIO-SHAM. Operators are standing by. But act now! Quantities, as you might have guessed, are limited.
RIP
You can sell your soul to the content-marketing devil if you like. As Faust might tell you, it’s on its way out. But it’s not on the way out because its proven its irrelevance, a la inbound marketing/marketing automation. Nope. It’s on its way out because search engines are doubling down on SEO to create SIO. Ya gotta believe SCO (search clairvoyance optimization) won’t be far behind.
SEO, SIO, inbound marketing, marketing automation, and content marketing are like Keith Richards: They’re already dead. They just don’t know it yet.
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Image by geralt, courtesy of pixabay.com.
