You may remember when we talked to Bruce Clay back in November and he made some pretty bold statements about the state of search. He talked about ranking being dead, and changes to search results based on behavioral and intent-based data.

Mike McDonald sat down with him for another interview at Search Engine Strategies, NY, and picked his brain about that and some other things.

Bruce talks about some tools he has that actually show some of the things he predicted are actually happening. For example, one tool lets you look at results seen as they would from other locations, which are often varied. For example, a Search Engine Optimization professional could look at a query from LA as if it had actually originated in New York.

Bruce says he’s seeing behavioral search everywhere on Google, and it is not dependent on whether or not you are logged in. He also talks about why SEOs have to be careful.

Eventually the subject shifts to social media. Bruce sees Twitter as a communication tool, but has trouble defining the service completely at this point. He says it could be a replacement for the press release. It’s good to communicate to people who would potentially link to you, but not necessarily for the direct links themselves.

He talks about how companies have a hard time grasping even that “online” is important, let alone Twitter. Top-level executives often are still wrapping their minds around search, which is measurable, and have a hard time justifying putting much time and energy into social media, which is not so measurable.

He says it’s like a poker game. It’s either “all or nothing, but every hand is all in or fold.” Regarding social media, Bruce says, “It’s a leap of faith.”

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