Marshall D. Simmonds of Define Media Group has a useful counter to the idea that social is zooming past search as a source of traffic for publishers. That is how the trend lines are moving, but changes in how Google search gets reported as referrer traffic also play a role in how the numbers are moving.

In essence, taking the fact that most mobile search traffic was incorrectly attributed as “direct” for the majority of 2013, the search numbers above should actually be even higher than we’re reporting here…

Not only is organic search alive and well, but it’s more important than any other external traffic driving source…

Are publishers investing less time in SEO? As the data shows, no. Are publishers investing more time in social? Of course – they’d be foolish not to as social traffic is growing fast. We’re not saying social isn’t growing. Clearly it is…

It’s fair to note that Define Media Group sells SEO services; they do not enter this fight dogless.