50 replies to this topic

[jehochman]

Does anybody know who coined the phrase "Search Engine Optimization?" I am looking for a source, such as a newspaper, magazine article, or a forum post (at a respectable forum).

I think I know the answer to the question, but it's darned hard to find the source because SEO is such a wonky search phrase.

<on edit>
This is a respectable forum. If you answer here, that will be a citable reference.

Edited by jehochman, 20 October 2006 - 11:01 PM.

[Jill]

I was around long before that time, and I have no idea who coined it. I'd guess Danny, but don't know. He did coin search engine marketing.

[qwerty]

A post at SE Roundtable points to a thread at SEW (that doesn't appear to be there). In the snippet, Danny points to a couple of events in '97, but doesn't attach any names, but if you happen to know who was 72880000@aol.com you could ask them.

Then there's this recent article. I'm not familiar with the author, but he writes, "Some industry watchers say that [Bruce] Clay, who's been doing SEO since 1996, invented the term 'search engine optimization.' "

Edited by qwerty, 21 October 2006 - 01:28 AM.

[CTPhil]

Does anybody know who coined the phrase "Search Engine Optimization?"

Al Gore?

[arteworks]

That is hilarious CTPhil!

[donp]

You just made my day! LOL

[jehochman]

Qwerty, yes, that's the rumor. Her's an example of lazy reporting.

Some industry watchers say that Clay, who's been doing SEO since 1996, invented the term 'search engine optimization.'

"Some say" is a way to pass off opinion as fact. You'll find that phrase used a lot of you ever watch Fox news. Instead of "some say," a professional journalist will chase down the source and get an actual quote.

Bruce says that Danny Sullivan once studied the question and decided that Bruce was the first. I am hoping that Danny said this somewhere "on the record," but so far I can't find it.

(spelling)

Edited by jehochman, 21 October 2006 - 09:12 AM.

[qwerty]

I managed to find the proper URL that SE Roundtable was trying to link to: http://forums.search...19&postcount=10

[jehochman]

Thanks, Q. The evidence doesn't seem to support what "Some say."

[Ron Carnell]

I just checked some very early issues of Jim Wilson's newsletter for the VirtualPromote site, and didn't find the term used at all during 1996 or 1997. That surprised me a bit.

I'm curious about something, though. Are we trying to find someone to credit for the term or someone to blame?

[jehochman]

Ron, I am trying to fact check the Wikipedia article on Bruce Clay.

According to Bruce, he was working as some sort of sysadmin doing mainframe computer optimization. When he moved into this field, it was natural to call it "search engine optimization."

[Jill]

Maybe archive.org can give some clues by who was using the phrase on their site first.

I would have guessed that the term might have been coined by Webmasterworld or someone over there, if it wasn't Danny. Not really sure about whether it makes sense for it to have been Bruce as he wasn't writing a lot of articles (I don't think). But Bruce did have a lot of info on his site, so looking for an early reference could help prove or disprove whether he first coined it.

[jehochman]

What was your site called back then? HR seems to have started around 2001.

Bruce Clay was an "Executive Consultant" back in January 1998, the earliest archive available for his site. Here's his generously long title.

bruceclay.com - Conejo Valley Web Design Information: Marketing on the Web - Free Advice Site for All Web Designers

[qwerty]

That would be rankwrite.com, which now redirects to this site. But archive.org has pages from the site going back to 2000, which isn't much help. There are articles in there, and a number of them use the term, but they don't indicate the dates they were originally published.

[Ron Carnell]

Ron, I am trying to fact check the Wikipedia article on Bruce Clay.

According to Bruce, he was working as some sort of sysadmin doing mainframe computer optimization.  When he moved into this field, it was natural to call it "search engine optimization."

Sorry, Jonathan, I was probably being a little too flippant about credit and blame. It's just that a lot of people have spent most of the past ten years bemoaning the term SEO as a very poor description for what we do. I'm not sure attributing it to someone is doing them any big favors.

I would have guessed that the term might have been coined by Webmasterworld or someone over there, if it wasn't Danny.

I don't think so, Jill. Brett was still posting at the old SEF, prior to starting his own forums, when I was first active there and I'm "pretty sure" that SEO was already extant at SEF if not ubiquitous. I'm "pretty sure" we had a general purpose forum called Search Engine Optimization when Brett was there.

Then again, clearly, the ol' memory isn't what it once was. (Okay, so what's the third thing to go?)