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Google took search engine optimization mainstream with its free optimization guide, which is actually pretty good as introductory documents go. It doesn’t get into advanced optimization techniques but provides a very good foundation in basic search engine optimization.

Frankly, I would recommend Google’s eBook over any other “introductory” SEO books I have read (and maybe written — I tend to write for conceptually advanced audiences anyway).

However, doesn’t it just burn your biscuits to know that the Googlers could have shared more than they do? Obviously, they didn’t write the eBook for experienced optimizers.

But if you look closely enough you’ll find a few gems in the eBook.

But enough about that. What I really wanted to point out was that when you’re up against experienced optimizers (including search engine strategists who seem to feel that “brand value” may be best represented by the obvious made-for-adsense conglomerates Google now routinely promotes in its search results), you have to take your optimization to the next level.

The easiest, quickest way to escalate search optimization is to identify the fringe queries that haven’t been attacked by the well-armed large content made-for-adsense sites that Google favors. Keep in mind that once you demonstrate there is value in those queries the mega sites will move in and eat your query as a quick snack. If you are not pre-positioned to survive the onslaught your site will drop out of the top ten.

So what you need to do leverage the query space to promote YOUR site as the best result before anyone really cares. Now, I’m talking about optimizing for active queries but you have to work on queries that appear to have little to no real brand value.

Your strategy has to consist of creating the brand value in the query. When a query acquires brand value, its traffic increases. If you enjoy taking risks, then you can use your trends analysis skills to look for queries that will assume brand value naturally as much as 6-18 months in advance.

When you’re building brand value in a secondary query space you have to have the resources to tell people about the newly branded space. That is, you have to have the means to teach people to search for your query. You have to have an existing audience large enough to spread the word for you in a true viral campaign (most so-called “viral” SEO campaigns are not viral).

You create brand value by promoting a site with the query for which you want it to rank first, and you of course want it to rank first for that query. You use those keywords to announce and promote that site and you talk about those keywords in all your literature and press releases. In most cases the professional optimizers will either ignore what you’re doing or they’ll look at the estimated traffic for your query and assume it’s not worth their trouble.

By the time they change their priorities your site should have established itself in the niche sufficiently well that even Google’s MFA-favoring algorithm won’t knock you down into the lower-tier SERPs along with the other original content sites that best match user queries.