The Bulls Roar » Search Engines

I Hate to Say I told you so… But… SEO Just Changed Forever!

AnnieInfinite — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 04:02:48 +0000

: Image by Robert Scoble via Flickr

and just to be clear, I TOLD YOU SO!!

right here: Internet Lies Designed to Keep you Poor

Today Google rolled out new 'Instant Search" so far only in the US, but be aware it will be rolled out across the rest of the world in short order.

What does this mean for you? Well you won't have to think much any more, for one thing – Google are claiming they can do that for you. How? Something they are calling psychic search, or rather – based on all your previous searches – ever – all your future searches are now predicted. This means that what I said earlier this year, and in this post just last month has come true – no two computers will ever have the same search patterns.

This has changed SEO forever, think about it, if you can no longer predict the pattern of search on anyones computer, how will you be able to optimize for search engine ranking?

I am going to say that again:

IF YOU CAN NO LONGER PREDUCT THE PATTERN OF SEARCH ON ANYONES COMPUTER, HOW WILL YOU BE ABLE TO OPTIMIZE FOR SEARCH ENGINE RANKING?

Here's what other sites have to say about this new Instant (psychic) Search:

First Google themselves:

"Google Instant is a new search enhancement that shows results as you type. We are pushing the limits of our technology and infrastructure to help you get better search results, faster. Our key technical insight was that people type slowly, but read quickly, typically taking 300 milliseconds between keystrokes, but only 30 milliseconds (a tenth of the time!) to glance at another part of the page. This means that you can scan a results page while you type."

and

"Google VP of search products and user experience Marissa Mayer may have been speaking in jest when she described Google Instant by saying, "There's actually a psychic element to it." But Google can divine a user's intent from a few typed letters more reliably than fortune telling hucksters. Google's store of data has become so vast that mysticism is now the most convenient metaphor to understand search science.

"It's not quite psychic," conceded Othar Hansson, senior staff software engineer at Google. "But it is very clever." Information Week

and here at Fast company:

Google Instant transcends the physical speed of thinking, creeping eerily close to psychic territory. To put it another way, the feature doesn't search as you type–it searches before you type."It's not quite psychic, but it is very clever," explained Othar Hansson, Software Engineer in Search Quality at Google.

Steve Rubel:

Here's what this means: no two people will see the same web. Once a single search would do the trick – and everyone saw the same results. That's what made search engine optimization work. Now, with this, everyone is going to start tweaking their searches in real-time. The reason this is a game changer is feedback. When you get feedback, you change your behaviors.

Google Wave is Dead!! Long Live Google

AnnieInfinite — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 02:20:32 +0000

: Image via Wikipedia

Yes folks Google announced it will put no more energy into Google Wave and that it will be dead forever, until resurrected by someone else (Google have also announced they are allowing free access to the code for it, so someone will be sure to make good use of it) by the end of this year:

Official Google Blog – Upate on Google Wave

Loads of great posts about this event can be seen on the web and the best are linked below just for your reading pleasure:

Search Engine Journal – Sayonara Google Wave

Mashable – RIP Google Wave

Personally I loved it! Without paying a cent I was able to collaborate with friends, clients and business acquaintences on conversations, content and so much more.. I believe that people just didn’t understand it or ‘get it’ if they had it would have taken off the way Google expected it to. Just ahead of it’s time – like so many other of the worlds great innovations.

God Speed – Google Wave – come on back now y’here!

The Zen Bull Websites and Marketing

More Meat, less potatoes

Online Marketing Professionals

© AnnieInfinite for The Bulls Roar, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Business, Google, Google Labs, Google Wave, Search Engines

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Internet SEO Lies Designed To Keep You Poor

AnnieInfinite — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 00:56:09 +0000

This post is quite obviously going by the title a little bit of a wrist slap for all you people who think that old tired and ‘Black Hat‘ SEO and marketing methods are going to miraculously put your tiny site on the “first page of Google” which seems to be some hackneyed ideal that every one is still searching for.

The bad news: It WON’T!

Matt Cutts verified this himself: “NO-ONE can promise you the first page of Google any more!”

Unless, yes there is an unless… unless they are promising you to put you on the first page of Google under one keyword, in your locality (small defined area) with two adjectives that creates one long tail search term and most importantly you will be there more often on your computer not others because of Semantic Search practices.

Basically semantic search (and this is Google and Bing and all other search engines are following suit) where the search algorithms take into account your own search history on your IP including your locale, your previous search history and your keyword semantics – the meaning you put on those keywords or search terms e.g. if you search for fishing and your previous history shows you really mean fly fishing when you search the term fishing, your searches will be based around fly-fishing whether you want them to or not, until you show enough search history to Google to change the meaning placed on your ‘fishing’ search.

Please read the previous paragraph several times, enough times for you to fully understand the repercussions to your site and to your SEO practices!

There are heaps of SEO firms out there right now still trying to make promises they cannot keep. Read these vital posts I have collected for you over the past few weeks to validate what I am saying to you:

Don’t Get Google Slapped!

Link Farms – Link farms are a whole bunch of websites set up with one job in mind – to link to other websites and create backlinks. They have minimal or zero useable content and simply link out to other sites. You can usually purchase links from these farms (so as to increase your number of backlinks) for a price, but this is simply not worth it. As soon as the search engines recognize the site as link farm, they ignore all the links. It’s quite possible that you could get “blacklisted” for this sort of thing and end up ruining all your efforts.

When I was new to SEO, I bought 1000 backlinks from one of these link farms and anticipated huge results. Google Webmasters only picked up about 30 of them (out of a thousand!) and within a month or two they were lost (or removed). I was just lucky that I didn’t get banned!

Cross Linking – Similar to link farms, this is the practice of linking between a whole lot of websites that you own. Apart from being ineffective, the cost of this sort of practice is simply a waste of money (considering that you can easily get links from writing articles, etc).

Cloaking – Cloaking essentially involves having two different pages – one that your visitors see and one that the search engines see. This allows you to create a heavily optimized page for the search engines, and a very “pretty” page for users. This practice is strongly frowned upon by search engines and will in most cases get your site banned within a few months.

Duplicate Content – Whether it the same content placed on different pages within your website, or content copied from another site – the search engines don’t like this for one reason – there’s no value to the visitor.

From www.site-reference.com via clp.ly

Understanding Metaweb The Official Google Blog (Semantic ‘Entities’)

Google Buys Metaweb What this means for you!

Metaweb’s technology could change the way Google Search works.

Metaweb is a difficult concept to describe, although the video above does an admirable job. Essentially, it views keywords, the way we search now, as an inferior search method to what it calls “entities.” Words can vary in meaning, refer to different things, have different levels of importance or relevance at different times, and often return inexact results. So Metaweb has created a constantly growing database, or directory, of 12 million “entities,” which are really just persons, places, or things, and all the different ways you might refer to them. Wording isn’t so important with Metaweb, it’s the end meaning that matters.

Once Metaweb figures out to which entity you’re referring, it can provide a set of results. It can even combine entities for more complex searches–”actresses over 40″ might be one entity, “actresses living in New York City” might be another, and “actresses with a movie currently playing” might be another. Instead of searching through that jumble of keywords, Metaweb would just connect you to those three entities, and file down your results.

From www.fastcompany.com via clp.ly

and of course this excellent post on what Google thinks of your Squeeze or Landing Pages:

Google Slaps Squeeze Pages

It’s true: squeeze pages are nothing less than poison as far as your performance in the search engines is concerned. Google and other search engines have been working on ways to discount the rankings of these pages, which are rarely the kind of content that users are actually looking for when they use the keywords which these sites target. It comes down to what it always comes down to when search engine rankings are the issue – relevance. A webpage designed to entice visitors to fork over their contact information simply isn’t that relevant to many, if any, actual search engine queries, no matter how much content you try to cram onto the page.

Speaking of the content, this is something which has changed about squeeze pages in the last couple of years. Once these pages started being penalized by search engines for their lack of content (”classic” squeeze pages, after

all, feature little more than an opt-in form), marketers started turning them into the online equivalent of the long form sales letter – in other words, something no one wants to read, especially not page after page. This unappealing content has led to a further decline in the ranking of these pages in search results, making them even worse marketing tools than they already were.

From www.sitepronews.com via clp.ly

The Death of Squeeze Pages

Google Buys Metaweb for Better Search Results (dailyfinance.com)
How has social media affected search? (simplyzesty.com)
Why Semantics Is Important For Search Engine Optimization – Semantic Web (semanticweb.com)

© AnnieInfinite for The Bulls Roar, 2010. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Google, Matt Cutts, Metaweb Technologies, Search Engines, semantic search, SEO, Web search engine

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Five Reasons Why Therapists And Coaches Need a Website

AnnieInfinite — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 04:02:45 +0000

: Image by lambo via Flickr

Therapists and Coaches often avoid having a website, ususally because they feel theirs is a personalised business and often people in heart centered businesses do not want to seem too commercial. However with the right touch a website can bring you and your clients together in a way you have not encountered before. Somewhere out there people are looking for you.

Here are some of the reasons a carefully stuctured and marketed website can bring the world to your door:

1. Word of mouth can become Word of Mouse: As your happy clients refer others to you, having a website that expresses who you are, what you do and achieves just the right sense of your personality, ethics and values will bring you far more custom than a business card. Your prospective clients will know a lot more about what you do and how you do it before they come to you, thereby alleviating a lot of the tension that surrounds a first time visit.
2. Communication is Easier: A website can help make it quicker and easier for people to get in contact with you, and to communicate with people collectively rather than just on a 1 to 1 basis. Having a secure and professional email address will mean that any pertinent information can be sent and recieved before an appointment and communication about time off or holidays can be given at a moments notice. Newsletters, another great communication device can be sent out giving useful tips and advice to all your customers as well.
3. You will be Perceived as an Expert: Keeping a blog or newsletter up to date with useful tips and advice is perceived by clients and prospective clients as giving expert opinion, if they like what they read they will devour the rest of your information and will return for more. A great way to get new clients who may not hear of you any other way, this often gives prospects the feeling of already knowing you and therefore removes the reluctance some people feel to book an appointment with someone they do not know.
4. Replace Many Labor Intensive Tasks with Automation: Thanks to automation many tasks that normally take up your time can become so much easier. answering the phone, making bookings, advertising events, sending out news, answering queries re: prices, hours of business etc, perhaps even chasing payments. Event things like invoicing, contact list and purchases can be done online if you have a range of products or a book you have written or recommend often.
5. Google is the new Phone book: Many people now jump online looking for local businesses rather than use a phone book, and search engines like Google are the easiest option, if you have a website listed with them under the search terms of your business and your town, you will come up under a local search and be so much easier to find, your clients will even be given a map showing how to find you, and you won’t miss out on the many searchers that come via the internet.

Extra Bonus reason:

6. You can automagically create an online footprint every time you create a post!

The Zen Bull

© AnnieInfinite for The Bulls Roar, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Advertising, Business, Google, Search Engines, Web search engine, Website, Word of mouth

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The Bulls Roar » Search Engines

I Hate to Say I told you so… But… SEO Just Changed Forever!

IF YOU CAN NO LONGER PREDUCT THE PATTERN OF SEARCH ON ANYONES COMPUTER, HOW WILL YOU BE ABLE TO OPTIMIZE FOR SEARCH ENGINE RANKING?

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Google Wave is Dead!! Long Live Google

Internet SEO Lies Designed To Keep You Poor

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Five Reasons Why Therapists And Coaches Need a Website