We recently heard the shocking news that Bill Slawski, an SEO expert, teacher, and pioneer, had died.
Slawski was the SEO Research Director at Go Fish Digital, a digital marketing center. His company recently shared the news of his death on Twitter, a while ago.
We are sorry to share that our colleague and dear friend, @bill_slawski has passed away. Words cannot describe our feelings. We are forever grateful for the opportunity to work with Bill. We will share more details and settings as they become available to us. pic.twitter.com/5mD6jqw7XR
We do not know much about his death. He last worked on Twitter on May 16 and passed away on May 17.
What we do know is that it leaves a huge void in our industry. Slawski was a treasure trove of knowledge. Many SEOs are better off – directly, and indirectly – because of his advice, insight and experience.
About Bill Slawski
Slawski did SEO before Google. Heck, he did SEO before SEO was called SEO.
He started when all of these online things were simply known as online advertising and online advertising, in 1996. He provided consulting services to help make websites more accessible online, at help make them easier to use, and increase flexibility and revenue for customers.
Throughout his career, Slawski has worked in all kinds of non-profit areas – Fortune 500, educational institutions, e-commerce, professional services, consumer goods, B2B and more.
Prior to starting his advertising career, Slawski obtained a Juris Doctor degree and was a law and technical officer at Delaware’s highest court for 14 years. Slawski lived in Carlsbad, California. .
SEO by the Sea
For many in our industry, Slawski may be best known for researching, analyzing, interpreting and writing about Google and the rights to search and algorithms in SEO by the Sea. He started SEO by the Sea blog in June 2005.
In SEO near the Sea, Slawski covered it all – from classics (PageRank, TrustRank, retrieval information) to the present day (machine learning, Knowledge Graph, organizations).
Contributions to the search community
In addition to writing on his blog, Slawski has contributed to the Go Fish Digital blog and other search engine publications. Slawski was a contributing writer here at Search Engine Land from December 2006 to July 2008. You can read Slawski’s publications here.
Slawski was also a well-known speaker at several research conferences, including several SMX events. He also did several webinar presentations and was a much-needed guest for many SEO podcasts.
Slawski was still active in SEO forums, including serving as co-host of Cre8asite Forums.
Besides all that, he was very active on Twitter, sharing his thoughts and stories, as well as from others. He talked a lot about clarifying SEO myths and misinformation.
‘Our teacher, our professor, our mentor’
That is how Landman Barry Schwartz described Slawski in 2020.
After Slawski suffered a stroke, Schwartz set up a tax site: billslawski.com. Schwartz asked SEOs for stories of how Slawski helped them in their work. And they did deliver.
This website is full of hundreds of stories and ideas, published recently, from December 15, 2020 to May 10, 2021.
One of those stories came from Slawski himself, who improved society through his position:
Thank you to everyone who took a moment to write something, or send me something while I was in the hospital. I had a small brain tumor, and now I was taking aspirin as a blood thinner. The injury caused a stroke, which had the effect of losing the balance center, making it difficult to walk and making me nervous about falling. I was in the hospital for 2 months doing 3 hours of rehab a day. Many of them were to learn to use a wheelchair and a crutch to help me walk. By the time I was released, I had begun to walk away helpless. At home, I spent a lot of time without a walker or walker. I am weaker than before but I can walk well. I ride a 40-minute bicycle a day, and I follow in my footsteps. The injury did not affect my ability to think, speak or do SEO. Linguists consulted me on the matter, giving me sound advice to deal with to make sure I could. They were genetics that could have been included in the spreadsheets, and for someone accustomed to spatial analysis it was not a big challenge – they always said they needed advanced books.
A call to my Go Fish Digital team, who sent me plants to watch, and to a few local SEOs who sent me succulents and several Doordash gifts so I could order breakfast on directly from them. I was able to keep my connection with Twitter active at that time, and several people in the area finally helped me make sure I got home, and I noticed some things about DMV and to pay my bills during the hospital stay. . After 2 months from the computer, it took me several tests to write and send e-mails. I have written about a number of rights that already exist, and now I chat weekly about SEO. I agreed to chat this week about the future of SEO, 9 years after Penguin, on Twitter Spaces. You have to learn to use that first. I hope to talk to everyone soon Thank you for setting up this website, Barry. It was really nice to see a new post in it every day as I continued to work on learning to walk again.
Community reaction
We are all still scared and dealing with this devastating loss.
News was immediately spread of Slawski’s need for Twitter and word of mouth. Here are just a few examples of comments from the research community, when they heard about Slawski’s death.
Bill was a beacon for all those who wanted to understand search rights often complex. And SEO in general. I knew and appreciated his kindness and consideration. This is a terrible loss. Ideas for his family, friends and colleagues. You will miss it, Bill. https://t.co/yXRzVQEAvj
So, sorry. 😢 He was a wise and generous man. A true myth to SEO. We will all miss him very much.
RIP Bill. He has been a great influence on me, and I am grateful that he saw me when I spoke at the time I formed a large part of my presentation in gratitude for the thought patterns I learned from him. . I’m so sorry to hear this.
So sad. I have known Bill for over 20 years. He recently sent me a letter when he found out that my new HQ was in San Diego and I should go there in a few weeks. I really appreciated our long-term friendship, and such a great contribution to the industry. RIP Bill.
I just talked to him a few weeks ago about our meeting here in San Diego. She seemed healthy and in good spirits.
I was honored to call Bill a friend. A strange loss personally, and professionally. My deepest sympathy.
I offer my condolences to his entire family, and to our entire industry. Bill had such a unique view of SEO that it made everyone stop and think again about what we thought we knew. You will miss it.
Few people have been as influential in the SEO industry as @bill_slawski. The place would not feel that way without him.
I need words… I have no words! My dear friend, mon ami, my trust in SEO, copyright, algo’s, flowers, sunset, sunrise, my chatter with a friend is over ?! You will miss Bill, R.I.P.❤️
Bill has provided great knowledge and love to the SEO community. Your kind and generous spirit will be sorely missed.
This is very sad news, thoughts for his family. And our industry is losing a very important person, who has passed a lot of knowledge to our great SEO community around the world. Bill will leave a very large gap. Thank you for your generosity!
Sleep in peace, Bill. We all miss you.
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About The Author
Danny Goodwin is the Editor-in-Chief of Search Engine Land. In addition to daily writing about SEO, PPC, and more for Search Engine Land, Goodwin also manages Search Engine Land listing experts. He also helps organize our series, SMX – Search Marketing Expo. Prior to joining Search Engine Land, Goodwin was the Editor-in-Chief of the Search Engine Journal, where he spearheaded editorial efforts for the title. He was also an editor at Search Engine Watch. He has spoken at many major research conferences and real-time events, and has gained his knowledge through a wide variety of publications and podcasts.