Comments on: SEO Degrees?

By: Aelizia

Aelizia — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 07:40:14 +0000

Hi,
Its a very informative blog.What the author said is hundred percent correct.SEO should be the part of marketing education.Because we all know the necessaries of the seo in the Internet marketing!We will except this soon!!!!!!

By: Junaid Ashraf

Junaid Ashraf — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 06:49:44 +0000

I agree, but i think SEO should having Certification courses.

By: Scott Clark

Scott Clark — Sat, 26 May 2007 15:15:24 +0000

Since SEM (done well) is a combination of broader disciplines: psychology, sociology, statistics, and language arts, it might be healthier to talk about existing, similar curricula. I think social marketing is far more appropriate as an academic persuit, and not to different than packages of existing courses. SEO, PPC, PPA, PPCall are more techniques to that end - morphing slowly as the web changes, but underneath embody the same essential concepts of social activity. Search, intent, consideration, etc.

By: Jason

Jason — Wed, 09 May 2007 03:09:11 +0000

I agree SEO should be taught in universities- the basics don’t change. I don’t think it’s possible to have certifications at this point because of the rapidly changing nature of SEO unless they are very specific such as the Adwords certification for example

By: Courtney Danner

Courtney Danner — Wed, 02 May 2007 16:14:37 +0000

I agree with the author, SEO should be taught in universities. I graduated about a year ago with a degree in Interactive Marketing from, and one of the major reasons I choose this marketing program was because of my interest in SEO as well as general internet marketing.

After completing the program and getting my first job, I have to say I am disappointed in the SEO education I received because the professors really never touched on the topic, and if they did it was very general. Everything I really learned about SEO I had to research online, learned on the job, or from people who were already working in the field.

Yes, SEO is a rapidly changing, but so are other fields. Professors should be staying on top of latest changes and adjusting the curriculum accordingly. I don’t think that’s too hard to ask.

As for application, yes there is a time crunch to see results during a semester, but hands on training is what you should be teaching students, and no graduate is going to come out as an SEO rock star, they will learn much more on the job, but they need to know the basic concepts and how to apply them first.

In one of my senior marketing classes as a group project were ran a direct mail campaign in conjunction with an email campaign, and when it came time to present our results direct mail responses were still coming in, but it was the hands on experience rather than the actual results that helped me learn.

I think one thing that current SEOers can do is form relationships with Universities, most professors would love it if you would lecture/speak to the class on SEO, my company has gotten at least four requests to lecture over the past year. Lecturing is also a great way to find students who are potential hires or interns.

By: Jaan Kanellis

Jaan Kanellis — Tue, 01 May 2007 03:37:11 +0000

I agree sort of Mike (I guess it is Mike M, don’t see an author on here anywhere). I would like to re-consider my position on this. I very much agree at the very least basic SEO can be taught, but problems do still exist. The university must rely on the professor to go to every conference and keep up on the quickly changing landscape. Remember it is not so much as one day back links work and then one day they don’t. New techniques are introduced all of the time and keeping up on those is what is hard for the average Joe.

Also applying the science is difficult. Imagine student projects. You have to successful get a website to rank in period of time, a semester or two. As I (and hope most) understand it takes time to apply SEO. Most of the time far more than a semester or two to create content and get traction. In fact only the hottest link bait can get ranked in that short of time.

So how would you grade or test students. Just on “SEO facts” and not application? I know plenty of SEOers” out there that understand the basics, but still struggle to rank. If that is all that is taught and the student is sent off to the work force would that really be fair?

By: Mike Johansen | Zoekmachine Optimalisatie | SEO

Mike Johansen | Zoekmachine Optimalisatie | SEO — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 15:42:48 +0000

I agree, i also think that if SEO becomes part of a marketing education the search engine optimization industry will be more accepted. But i think that is gonna take a while… I don’t see it happen overnight.