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I love what Guy Kawasaki said in his baccalaureate speech to the 1995 graduating class at Palo Alto High School. No, I wasn’t there, but thanks to the Internet, we can time-travel back and gain from his insight.
In what later became his 10 Commandments of Innovation, point #8 of his speech— “Challenge the Known and Embrace the Unknown”—speaks to the future of SEO.
One of the biggest mistakes you can make in life is to accept the known and resist the unknown. You should, in fact, do exactly the opposite: challenge the known and embrace the unknown.
Let me tell you a short story about ice. In the late 1800s there was a thriving ice industry in the Northeast. Companies would cut blocks of ice from frozen lakes and ponds and sell them around the world. The largest single shipment was 200 tons that was shipped to India. 100 tons got there unmelted, but this was enough to make a profit.
These ice harvesters, however, were put out of business by companies that invented mechanical ice makers. It was no longer necessary to cut and ship ice because companies could make it in any city during any season.
These ice makers, however, were put out of business by refrigerator companies. If it was convenient to make ice at a manufacturing plant, imagine how much better it was to make ice and create cold storage in everyone’s home.
You would think that the ice harvesters would see the advantages of ice making and adopt this technology. However, all they could think about was the known: better saws, better storage, better transportation.
Then you would think that the ice makers would see the advantages of refrigerators and adopt this technology. The truth is that the ice harvesters couldn’t embrace the unknown and jump their curve to the next curve.
Challenge the known and embrace the unknown, or you’ll be like the ice harvester and ice makers.
Disruptive Technology
Harvard Business School professor Clayton M. Christensen coined the term in his 1997 best-selling book, The Innovator’s Dilemma. Disruptive technology displaces established technology, shakes up industries or creates completely new ones. It’s digital cameras displacing film. It’s PCs displacing typewriters then becoming displaced by mobile devices.
It’s the iPhone displacing Blackberry and creating an industry of app developers. It’s Google displacing Yellow Pages and creating the SEO industry.
Is SEO “Evolving” or Being Disrupted?
“SEO isn’t dead; it’s just evolving.” So say the multitude of SEOs and Internet marketers. (Heck, I’ve said it myself.) But perhaps it’s neither dead nor evolving.
Case in point. Google’s Hummingbird “update” wasn’t an update at all. It was a fundamental change in how their algorithm processes information. It’s the first step towards Google becoming an answer engine instead of a search engine. Sounds more like disruption than evolution.
Think about it. Every person who types a phrase in Google’s search box is looking for an answer to a question or a problem. For example, earlier today I typed do i need to cover my air conditioner in the winter. That’s because mine died and after spending too much money on a new one, I want to be sure I take care of it. (BTW, the answer is “no.” Question answered, problem solved.)
Voice search applications like Siri and Google Now are making conversational queries more common. It’s teaching us to ask questions rather than type a string of keywords.
And search engines are continually adapting to encourage these new habits. For instance, did you know that a simple setting in Google Chrome enables hands-free, desktop voice search?
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Natural Language Processing, Semantic Search and Artificial Intelligence
Natural language processing (NLP) is the ability of a computer program to understand human speech as it is spoken. NLP is a field of artificial intelligence and linguistics concerned with the interactions between computers and human natural languages. As such, it will be the driving force behind the advancement of semantic search.
Semantic search is rooted in semantics, a sub-discipline of linguistics that studies the relationships between words and how we construct meaning. Semantic search attempts to understand the meaning of the query and searcher’s intent.
Was this Google’s purpose behind Hummingbird, artificial intelligence?
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