---
title: "Trends in Search Engine Optimization – Shifting from Search to Social?"
date: 2011-02-28
description: "$( document ).ready(function() { // Handler for .ready() called. $("
canonical_url: https://idratherbewriting.com/2011/02/28/trends-in-search-engine-optimization-shifting-from-search-to-social/
---
# Trends in Search Engine Optimization – Shifting from Search to Social?
![The Dirty Little Secrets About Search, from the NYTimes](https://s3.us-west-1.wasabisys.com/idbwmedia.com/images/google.png)

The NYTimes article exposes how search engines are gamed, and how search engines can also game consumers.

As the NYTimes article points out, the strategies for gaming search engines often involve buying links pointing to your site. I've encountered a bit of this myself. Last week a "reader" offered to write a "guest post" for me on Wikipedia's credibility issue, and how Wikipedia manages this risk. The guest poster only requested that in exchange for the completely unique post, he be allowed to include a "personal link." When I received the post, it turned out to contain a link to an *online university *site. I turned the article down, not only because it wasn't relevant to my blog, but because I get at least one person a month pitching a guest post with a link to an online university.