Warmest Greetings,

:: Wednesday, December 03, 2003 ::

Hot news:
I got this from a very reliable source that DMOZ (ODP - Open Directory Project) has reached the 4 million mark. That's HANDPICKED web pages added to the Directory. Congratulations to the exhausted editors!

Now, about that Google...

If you own a website and have been tracking your SERPs, you're no doubt in a bit of shock. This is especially true for ecommerce sites who rely on the revenue for their businesses. Small and home businesses, who already struggle for some air to breath in a clogged corporate "pay for in your face exposure" search environment are having an even tougher time if their sole SEO attention was placed on Google.

It's so bad that even I'm getting concerned emails from people who knew me from when I was performing SEO services. (I now am strictly focused on website usability testing, which enhances the overall SEO/SEM process by taking it to the next level.)

My personal feeling is that it was always wrong to rely solely on Google and its bubble was bound to burst. When all the attention by SEO's turned to Google, I got bored. I think this hoopla is healthy for the other search engines out there. While Google is making nice to possible investors next year, MSN and Yahoo!, and even Alta Vista, are fluffing up their feathers, ready to make comebacks and if we're lucky, maybe come up with some new innovative ideas.

I would like to see a search engine that LIMITS the amount a company can pay for rank and limits the size of the site too. This would remove the corporate sites with money to burn and permit a search engine home for just home and small businesses. Why would people want to use this engine? Because these smaller business have fantastic customer service, personalized service, hundreds of thousands of products that cut out middle managment and distribution houses (that add to the overall cost of the product) and the craftsmanship of some products is more remarkable than mass production versions. You can do your part for social causes, the environment, single parents, special needs shop owners who can work but with limitations and must do business via the web from their homes, and umpteen other great things that will uplift the planet, not a CEO's wallet.

Okay then.
For those of you who need some uncomplicated insight into the Google Ghost of Christmas Present, here goes:

Courtesy of Andy Beal: Might Google be sued for latest algorithm change?

"If Google has indeed implemented a filter that impacts only highly searched phrases, can it be justified. How long before businesses form a class action law suit against the search engine? After all, this does appear to be discrimination and companies have lost money. If Google bows under the pressure of the pharmacy industry, might it not also cave in to the might of Internet companies adversely affected by the recent algorithm change?"

I pointed to this yesterday and I thank "Glyn" for writing something easy to understand. What "new google" means for SEO Planning...

"Across certain sectors of keywords Google has applied a filter, this filter removes sites that previously were in the generic listings (those not PPC) replacing them with other sites.

If you're in a competitive sector and suddenly find that your referrals from Google have just dropped off the planet, go to you log files for last month, extract the keyword that was delivering the traffic, go to Google and type it in keyword and view the results. Then open another window and type in keyword-aerts leaving the string -aerts.

This will show you if Google is filtering the results for your keywords (i.e., a listing that appears using the query keyword-aerts, will not be appearing to users of Google)."

Danny's take (sorta complicated). Google Dance Syndrome Strikes Again

"Why does this happen? One popular theory is that Google is using a new "filter" to prescreen results for "money words," searches where it hopes to sell its AdWords paid listings. (Snip - sorry DS) Ah ha! Well, more like hmmm. The complication is that there are plenty of exceptions. There are some people who DID run ads before the change who still found they lost "free" rankings. There are also people who maintained their top free rankings after the change despite the fact that they never bought ads. Moreover, the changes have had positive and negative impacts on all types of sites. "Big" sites did not necessarily trump over "mom and pops."

In case you missed this, this is new. "Word Variations (Stemming)
Google now uses stemming technology. Thus, when appropriate, it will search not only for your search terms, but also for words that are similar to some or all of those terms. If you search for "pet lemur dietary needs", Google will also search for "pet lemur diet needs", and other related variations of your terms. Any variants of your terms that were searched for will be highlighted in the snippet of text accompanying each result." (http://www.google.com/help/basics.html)

Jill Whalen's crew. Read. Laugh. Learn. Working With The New Google, How do we adapt to the change?

Andrew Goodman rocks. Prepare to be Monetized, Punk: Google Plays Sherriff with Commercially-Oriented Search Listings

"The presumption here is that "companies" deserve to keep their listings and have every right to explain what they do, enjoy strong inbound links, and have a "presence." But the closer something gets to being a "store," the more sensible it is to make the purveyor pay for a listing. Otherwise, the free listings just become an endless playground for SEO's to squeeze free money out of gaming Google for top rankings."

Gazump indeed. Been Gazumped by Google? Trying to make Sense of the "Florida" Update! (Thanks Fantomaster!)

"Thousands of web pages have been suddenly demoted in the Google search results, primarily on the main commercial search terms for which they targeted their pages to be replaced by other sites who, in the main, referred to the search term obliquely. Several were the main shopping portals or business directories which gave listings for companies who may provide the services requested, many were not.

Very high-ranking "authority" sites seemed to be unfiltered.

The changes were starkly obvious on regional English language Googles where a regional filter was employed and there were less commercial sites with "authority"."


Bad news in the news. Change to Google Ranking System Irks Merchants

React. Toss in the Toolbar. "Perhaps if more people get rid of it and mention the quality of their results as the reason, they will take notice."

Under the hood. "Webby" is poking around and finding some neat stuff on Froogle, stemming and a new toolbar. ABAKUS SEO Blog

:: posted by Kim Krause Berg on 12/03/2003 12:49:42 PM

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