The History of Search Engine Optimization

Author: Ryan Frank

Author: Ryan Frank

The history of SEO spans almost 15 years, starting in the mid-90s, when webmasters started to realize the value of having their sites listed on the first page of search engines results pages. Since then, SEO practices have evolved, as search engine ranking algorithms have become more sophisticated and complex. The Early Years In the beginning, SEO firms had it fairly easy. As in, it didnt take much to get your website into the top spots on search engine results. All that was usually needed was to insert the right keywords and keyword tags, in the right densities, into your web page. The actual term search engine optimization did not come into use until 1997, but webmasters had already started experiment with ways of working off search engine algorithms to maneuver their way to the number one spots. A lot of these early SEO services in New York were trial and error testing, but it was enough to do the job fairly decently back then. The Problem The problem with early search engine ranking systems is that they only took into account on-site factors when determining a websites rank. That meant that most of the things search engines considered were things that webmasters had direct control over (like keyword density and placing). Naturally, this resulted in a lot of search engine spamming. Because content didnt necessarily have to reflect search engine rankings, users would often find highly irrelevant sites appearing on the front pages of their querys results pages. As webmasters and content providers started to figure out how to actually crack search engine ranking algorithms, they found new ways of easily manipulating them. In 1997, several algorithm crackers successfully decoded the entire ranking algorithm of the then-popular search engine Excite. A Shift Something obviously needed to change in order to make search engines into actual, useful online tools that users would want to actually use. Thus, search engines started coming up with more complex algorithms that took into account off site features, like links and directory age of a web page. In other words, things that webmasters would have a harder time manipulating. Google Arrives When Google was founded in 1998, search engines were still struggling with keeping their search results pages spam free. Googles ranking algorithm, known as PageRank, proved to be completely revolutionary. It took into account things like the quantity and quality of a websites inbound links (a.k.a. backlinks) to determine its value and its relevance, and thus its ranking for a particular search. Needless to say, Google was an instant hit with users. By 2001, most people were fleeing from early search engines like Lycos, AltaVista and Excite and flocking to Google Search. Still, the inbound-link ranking method was not immune. Scrupulous webmasters and black hat SEO providers were finding ways of manipulating inbound links by exchanging, buying and selling links on a mass scale. Google has since continued to improve on their PageRank algorithm, now taking into account undisclosed factors when determining rakings in order to make it harder for would-be spammers. In 2005, Google started customizing searches based on users past search history. In 2007, Google announced it was campaigning against paid links. Today, Google, basically dominates online search. Over 70% of search engine users use Google, and as Googles ranking system becomes more nuanced, SEO firms are continuously having to rely less on short term gimmicks and more on actually making client sites competitive and valuable to users.About the Author:

Ryan Frank is an avid writer and blogger living in San Diego, CA.

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