Written and Published By: Demetrics Anderson, April 8, 2021

Many people are confused about the true inner workings of Blockchain and its impact on today’s markets. Most people seem to think that Blockchain adds trust to every peer-to-peer transaction. This is not true and is a misconception.

Blockchain is designed to remove the need for trust by adding agreement to networks. This protocol will hypothesize centralized things on the network, to determine if agreements can be made in a decentralized manner. This is the foundational structure of Blockchain.

The global Blockchain is a distributed ledger. It contains a user agreement for all participants in a block to acknowledge consciously and responsibly each transaction within that block. The block is then secured, and no other person will be able to alter the contents of the original data that is entered into that block. This decentralized block is immutable, which means that the data entered into the block becomes an irreversible timeline of data that cannot be undone. This transaction is permanently recorded with an exact timestamp and viewable to anyone.

The Structure of Storing Data

When looking at how a database structures its data, you will see it puts data into tables. Blockchain structures its data into blocks that are chained together in chunks. This structure allows all blockchains to be databases but, all databases are not blockchains. I know it seems confusing, but it really is not. The key difference is a typical database uses a table, whereas a blockchain database is a block of data. That is why all databases are not blockchains but all blockchains are databases.  

The Security of a Blockchain

Up until now, It was nearly impossible to hack into a blockchain system. Cyber criminals have become savvier with hacking almost anything un-hackable. It is sad to say that in today’s world of technology, nothing is safe. However, with time, Blockchain will become more secure and cyber criminals will not have the ability to hack into any block of data.  It is said that hackers have five methods of hacking into a Blockchain:

1. 51 per cent attack
2. Routing attack
3. Typosquatting
4. Sybil attack
5. Phishing

However, these methods take time and cannot be done within a matter of minutes. The incredible thing is that the way block chain stores data in a block and each new block is added to the end of the chain, it appears to be a flawless security because each block has its own timestamp. Cyber criminals would not be able to duplicate that. But what they have learned to do is rewrite the transaction history with the 51 per cent attack method. The other four methods are just as efficient for hackers.

Digital Marketing & SEO

The effects of Blockchain on Digital Marketing and SEO are enormous so we will only cover the most important points in this article for reasons of not wanting to confuse you.

Link Building and SEO

Digital Marketing has become one of the most important forms of marketing in the new age. In looking at Digital Marketing, we must consider Link Building and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) because they are the most critical aspects of Digital Marketing. Without SEO, search engines would not be able to index a website to show visitors the most relevant content for their searches. Just that plain and simple.

But what does all this have to do with Blockchain? A lot! Blockchain will prevent unsavory practices in SEO and Link Building. Those “unsavory practices” include Black Hat Link Building. In 2021, there is a new concept entitled “Smart Links” that most believe will become more prominent as blockchain progresses. Smart Links will track when the link was shared and with whom. It will have a “smart contract” attached to it that will be stored in the block, ensuring more ethical link building processes.

Click Fraud

Blockchain will also prevent “Click Fraud” in Ad Campaigns. With Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising being a multi-billion-dollar industry, many sophisticated schemers have learned how to fraudulently undermine PPP Campaigns. Since Return on Investments (ROI) are very significant for businesses that have large monthly budgets, click fraud can be a problem. The problem arises when competitors or bots click ads to drive up marketing costs. In 2021 roughly 20-30 percent of a company’s advertising spend goes towards those fraudulent clicks.

Blockchain will verify that every click is legitimate, and it will ensure that advertisers are only paying for actual click-throughs. Blockchain will also verify that ads are not viewed by bots, but by real people.

Keyword Research and Analysis

Becoming experienced in advanced analytics platforms can be very stressful for a lot of SEO Specialist, Developers, and Marketers. There are so many steps a person must take to create Ad Campaigns, remarket, track, analyze, develop keyword strategies and more. With Blockchain, advanced SEO tools will allow easy tracking of the average keyword positions without much effort. Basically, this will be easy from a lot of different possible scenarios. It will be incorruptible and very easily accessible. Results will be fast and accurate keyword rankings will require minimal analysis.

It is clearly seen from thorough research and investigation that Blockchain will be the end all be all for the Marketing industry and from a development standpoint. It will prevent many unethical practices that are putting a lot of businesses at a disadvantage in their industries. Competitors will be forced to play fair and there will be a level playing ground. The integration of Blockchain will take online marketing and sales to new heights.