“Real-time searches”? A real-time search engine will help you see what people are talking about “right now” on sites like Twitter. If you want to make sure your site pops on these searches, you’ve got to “get in the now,” so to speak. Doing so is going to make your website a lot more popular and get you a lot more traffic — which in turn makes you more visible and will bring in more customers, too.
Keywords count Read the rest of this entry »
There has recently been some buzz about what Google has in store next year. According to Bruce Clay, a well known search analyst, very soon you will see that “ranking is dead”. Ranking is the position a website holds on a Search Engine Results Page (SERP) when you type in a search request in Google, or other search engines. Those web pages with higher rank typically get visited more – so ranking is pretty important to those who depend on web traffic for their business’ livelihood.
According to Mr. Clay and other industry insiders, search engines are going to personalize your search results. This could be based on your past search history, your geographic location and perhaps even clues to your initial intent. For instance, if you are a computer programmer and search for “java” you will get different search results than another person in the same room who is a coffee importer. This is the first of many changes we may see early in 2009.
Third party tracking cookies and Google’s ability to research IP addresses are all key factors in what is to come. From your IP address, Google can (and in test markets, already does) return relevant search results that are close to home. For example, say, you live in Dallas Texas, and you search for a Toyota for sale, you will likely see dealerships in and around the Dallas area coming up first on your search page. This has the potential to be very helpful to business and searchers alike.
Another big change coming down the pike will be in the way of Universal Search. The “robots” used to crawl the web are going to become more complex. The variables in this new complex algorithm will tell them how interesting your site is. In other words, do you have video on your site? The ones that do are going to soar in rankings and those who do not… well; the only way left is down.
Web Surfers: Some Benefits/Drawbacks of Personalized Search
For the internet surfer you should see a lot less spam and irrelevant search results. That is good news, no more having to rummage through page after page of useless search results to find the information you want.
The drawback may be that it will be harder to get information outside of your “historical” search. Like the above example, what will the computer programmer do if he really wants to search for java, as in coffee?
There are also the few people left who still do not have access to high-speed internet connections. If the main results are going to be video-intensive, that could pose serious problems for those with dial-up’s infamously slow load times.
Business Owners: Changes will require you to integrate media and fresh content into your web sites.
The good news for local businesses is they will no longer have to compete for search results on a global level. It will be nice for the small business owner who is selling handmade baskets in Montana because he or she will not have to compete with someone in India!
The downside is everyone will have to get on board with video optimization in addition to SEO. This could prove challenging but not impossible. Video marketing is already becoming more common place on the web. The best advice from professionals is to create great relevant content, integrate video and other “sticky” content, and the customers will come.
Overall, it appears that Google is trying to improve web surfing for everyone, the surfer, and the merchant. When it all comes together and spammers have a harder time high skewing our results, we all win.
About the Author:
Ken Ivey, aka “the Web Czar”, is a veteran technology addict, consultant, author, and President of MidTN Technology, a marketing and web design firm.
Hello World. 🙂
Okay, if you’re a techno programmer geek, you get it. If not, Hello World is usually the first piece of software code you write as a beginner. I thought it fit, as this is my first blog post. Well, here anyway. The title of this post might seem a little cryptic, so please let me explain. I’m really accomplishing two things:
Does that make me bad? I don’t think so. As long as YOU benefit from visiting this site, all will be right with the world so let’s get started.
I’ve been fascinated by computers and the internet since the mid 1980’s, when personal computers were making their debut. Can you remember when the top of the line PC was a 286 Turbo, priced around $3500? That was just before Al Gore invented the internet. J At that time, the internet was not much more than an electronic bulletin board, with message turnaround time of about 24 – 48 hours, and a graphical interface like Prodigy was making waves.
At the time, I worked for Laser Computer, Inc., a computer manufacturer and subsidiary of Vtech (you probably recognize the name on your cordless phone, or kids Vflash. Since then, computers and programming have been my passion.
If you’d like to learn more about me and what I’m doing in Murfreesboro, visit the about page. But come back here for the good stuff.
We’ll be talking a lot about Web Design and Social Media, as that’s what we’re all about, but just so you know where we’re going, let’s clarify a few things. Some people call it Web 2.0, some call it social networking , and some call it New Media. But what is it? It’s communication. It’s marketing. It’s experiencing the internet in a more personal way. It’s developing a relationship with your website viewer. It’s a transfer of power from them to you, and more.
We’ll be discussing these issues and more, all in the hopes of helping you boost sales, increase customer retention, and incorporate this exciting new media into your business marketing in a way that is easy, effective, and profitable. Oh, and we hope you’ll let us help you with that. 😉
We run across this all too often. Someone decides to get ‘serious’ about marketing their website, desiring to give up their #629 ranking in Google for greener pastures – especially since the sleazeball in their SPAM email promises to get them to the top of the Search Engines. Unfortunately, they don’t say which search engine, or for what keyword phrase.
Typically, the victim ends up on the first page of GOOBER with a keyphrase so irrelevant that it doesn’t get 10 searches WORLDWIDE in a month.
