As Google Evolves So Must We
August 21, 2007 – 6:29 amIf you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Google is still far and away my biggest referrer. This is the case no matter how many websites I run and no matter what the topics seem to be. And over the last fours years I’ll admit that Google has evolved remarkably. They’re never content to rest on their laurels and leave things as they are, despite the fact that the way they do things is incredibly popular. And that’s the lesson I’ve taken from watching them in action all these years. As they evolve, so must websites that hope to get traffic from them.
Several years ago, the Google algo was basically primitive. Anyone who paid attention to the basic SEO of their website could rank easily. The company didn’t concern themselves too greatly with that many criteria, and anyone with specialized knowledge you could rank easily. In the last few years, the criteria has expanded and changed. Now there are a great number more factors to be considered before you make it to the first page. If you’re still trying to operate on the old paradigm, you already face doom, much like a dinosaur did in times past.
Evolution is the key to staying alive in Google. If you don’t, you’ll be a brontosaurus trying to get by in modern times. You have to keep abreast of all the latest trends and make the changes necessary to keep yourself competitive. Some webmasters are still trying to make a living based on static content that rarely changes. They’re braver than I am.
Personalized search already seems to be changing what we’re looking at in Google most days. Obviously, the vast amounts of data they collect from their various interfaces is being collated and added to their ranking mix. The entire SERPs landscape seems to be permanently shifting. But one thing is certain: many of the core principles of Google seem to remain in tact. Build a website that users care about, and the personalized search metrics will take care of themselves. All in all, you do the best you can on on-page and off-page optimization, and leave the rest of the rankings up to the quality you’ve built into your website.
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One Response to “As Google Evolves So Must We”
Google far and away the best search engine? - not in my opinion. It may be best for some aspects but not for new web pages. I run a bridge site and four week ago I wrote a new page entitled “jump cuebid overcall”. Now this is a unique search phrase and if you search for “bridge jump cuebid overcall” it should appear high up? On Yahoo and MSN - yes; on Google no! Now Google certainly knows that the page exists because they list the link to it (from a PR4 page) but they do not list the actual page (which obviously exactly matches the search criteria) because new pages are necessarily PR0 and so presumably appear at No. 1000 . This would appear to be a fundamantal failure in the Google search algorithm.
It would seem that to get new material to the top of a search you have to add it to an existing (high PR) page and not create a new page. But Google does not like large pages. What’s the answer? Ask Google. For me, I simply search with Yahoo or MSN.
Just to empasise what i just said about having to add to a high PR page, just two days ago I added the phrase to my Squidoo lens and now that appears at No. 15. So it looks like web pages are old hat?
By Terry Quested on Aug 29, 2007