SEO expert revisits ‘ranking is dead’

At November’s PubCon in Las Vegas, SEO expert Bruce Clay told WebProNews that "ranking is dead."

In his interview with the website back in November, Clay said any number of people could get differently ranked results for the same query as a result of personalization.

Now, in a follow-up interview with WebProNews at SES Chicago earlier this month, Clay revisited his statement, saying rankings will always have some importance.

However, given the state of the economy, companies cannot continue to just pay for ranking and must look for more return on investment, he said.

Clay told the news provider that regardless of what changes Google and other search engines make to incorporate localization and other factors, the objective of SEO is always going to be how – or indeed if – it improves or increases the profitability of a client.

"I think that we’re going to see in 2009 is an evolution towards traffic, action and ultimately ROI as a measurement of an SEO program," he told WebProNews. "I think clients are going to become educated that it’s traffic that matters."