Google have rolled out their monthly update of Panda, with the search giant’s war on low quality websites raging on.
Google have been championing the use of quality, highly relevant content on websites to improve the user experience on a whole. Any sites that have been set up to appeal to search engines rather than its users may be targeted by Google.
Although the presence of Bing (in UK search at least) is dwarfed by Google (which has around 90% of the search market), the Bing team are providing some valuable information to webmasters.
In recent months there have been two useful updates from Bing. Firstly, there have been new features added to the Bing Webmaster Tools interface – including the launch of a new keyword research tool. Bing has also launched an API for its Webmaster Tools, making its data accessible anywhere.
Along with these updates to its Webmaster Tools, Bing has also launched a ‘Search Quality Insights’ series, which it intends to give “deeper insight into the algorithms, trends and people behind Bing”.
With Google making a number of changes in the past few months – and the prospect of EU anti-trust legislation coming to a point on the horizon – there is a possibility that Bing usage may begin to grow in the medium to long term. These tools are therefore very helpful in helping gain insights into how Bing ranks websites.
Improved data sampling was a noticeable upgrade when a new version of Google Analytics was rolled out a few months ago. So why is data sampling used, and how can it benefit reporting on marketing campaigns?
What is the Venice update?
The Venice update was a small part of Google’s largest ever algorithm update, which took place in February 2012 and included a total of 40 algorithmic changes to their search engines Google, Youtube and more.
Although Venice was not generally flagged as the most important aspect of this update, it is amongst the most visible and has changed the dynamics of search results in many industries.
Just over a year ago, Google launched its much-talked-about Panda algorithm update. Panda was initially designed to filter out websites with ‘thin’ content that added little to the search experience. Over the course of the last year, there have been various tweaks to the Panda system, culminating in late February with the roll out of version 3.3. In a post on its Inside Search blog, Google announced that over 40 changes to search quality have now been implemented.
Many observers of the SEO industry had expected the further penetration of the Google+ network to happen at some point in 2012. However, for it to happen in the second week of the year came as a bit of a surprise. This is what transpired with the launch of ‘Google Search, plus Your World’ on January 10th.
Search, plus Your World introduces enhancements to your personalised search results (if you’re signed into Google). Now, if you’re signed in you’ll see listings from a number of sources within your private network of connections including:
These personalised results are indicated with a blue figure to the left of the search listing:
There are a few rather notable absentees from these sources; namely Facebook, Twitter and Flickr and in fact visits from any social network that isn’t related to Google won’t appear, which has sparked more anti-trust controversy. Will they be able to hold off from providing Google with access to at least a portion of their data for much longer?
Whilst these personalisation enhancements are interesting in themselves, it is the further push of Google+ results into the main Google serps (search engine results pages) that has pricked the ears of many in the SEO field.
For example, when searching the name of a person or a company, Google will now suggest their Google+ page as a result within the search toolbar.
Another change is suggested Google+ profile pages. Although these search queries are limited at the moment, there are signs as to where Google is going with its Google+ network. If you search for ‘SEO’ the results return the listings for some well known SEO experts Google+ pages – the key point here is that you don’t need to be signed in to trigger these results:
Will Google push further with these results appearing in more and more queries in the future? We would guess that it was highly likely. Indeed, the advent of Search, plus Your World and the continued penetration of Google+ results into the serps should make businesses and brands seriously consider how they’re going to manage their presence on Google+.
From these indications this is unlikely to be the last aggressive move that we see from Google as it continues to integrate its social network further into its search results.
Figures from Comscore report that Microsoft’s Bing search finally managed to overhaul Yahoo! in the US during December 2011, taking a 15.1% market share as opposed to 14.5% from Yahoo! Google remains dominant with a 65% share of the market in the US. Whilst this is not perhaps significant to UK searchers (where Google dominates with 90% of market share), what is impressive is the raw numbers from these statistics which illustrate the continued popularity of search engine usage. In total, over 18.2 billion searches were run in December – a 2% increase from November, with Google taking 12 billion of these, Microsoft 2.7 billion and Yahoo! 2.5 billion.
In the eyes of many SEO industry observers, the start of 2012 has not been great from a PR point of view for Google,
SEO practitioners (particularly in competitive niches) are well used to seeing the use of underhand tactics in order to gain an edge in the Google serps – however, it comes as a bit of a shock when we see the use of similar practices from Google themselves.
Firstly, Google was embroiled in a rather messy episode regarding a campaign to promote its Chrome browser, where the line as to what constitutes a ‘paid’ link was blurred by a media campaign that appeared to contradict its own rules. After an investigation, a surprised (they thought they were buying advertisements) Google took the action to demote the Chrome webpage and lower the PageRank of the site for at least 60 days.
Then, just over a week later, another story emerged that didn’t paint Google in the best light. Google was caught ‘scraping’ Mocality (a Kenyan business directory) in order to sell its own services to Kenyan businesses. The story takes a few rather unpleasant turns, and, after an investigation (there’s a pattern emerging here) Google was forced to admit that there had been wrongdoing from its end, releasing a statement that it was ‘mortified’ to learn that this was happening in its name.
Whilst it is disappointing to see Google using these tactics, there are wider implications of this behaviour to be considered. Many webmasters are (rightly) pointing out that if they were caught in a similar position, their websites would be banned from Google, possibly losing their businesses and livelihoods in the process. Also, the fact that Google has been caught contravening its own guidelines essentially gives licence to unscrupulous SEOs that it is ok to utilise these manipulative tactics ‘because Google did it and got away with it’.
If these tactics reach as far as Kenya (via India), then is it not possible that there are other cases where Google has behaved ‘inappropriately’ and pushed the envelope of what it considers to be acceptable? What’s certain is that many in the search industry will be watching any Google campaigns very closely in the coming months.
Google has recently launched Trusted Stores. Trusted Stores is an e-commerce certificate where e-commerce stores can apply to Google for the certificate – if accepted websites can display the certificate on their site, showing consumers the website has Google’s seal of approval.
Why would a webmaster want to apply for the certificate?
Google is trying to build more consumer trust in the online retail market. Having the trusted stores certificate badge displayed will let users know the site meets stringent requirements.
What kind of requirements do sites have to meet?
To qualify for a trusted stores certificate the webmaster must apply and agree to share information with Google. Google will use the websites internal data to determine if the website qualifies for the Trusted Stores certificate.
Criteria states participating websites must have a good reliable customer service team who quickly resolve consumer problems and issues. A good time keeping record on shipping products to customers is also required.
Google will grade each participating store based on customer service and shipping and display grades live on the retailer’s website.
For Google’s part, they will offer free purchase protection to consumers worth $1000. Google claim they have no plans to integrate other products like AdWords, Google Wallet, Check Out, etc, however if the scheme is successful, we would expect Google to try and take advantage of this at some point.
Early October saw another Panda update from Google – the 7th update to date. The big news in this update is that video content is the big winner. Big brand video sites such as CBS, NBC, Hulu, HBO, MTV and of course YouTube are the biggest winners according Searchmetrics – basically, all these sites have huge amounts of video content on them.
Out with international websites like the ones mentioned above, the new update also looks to favour smaller websites who use video content, although it is still early days and more testing will need to be completed and analysed before this can be confirmed with conviction.
So why has Google decided to put more weight on videos?
Google are constantly testing search trends, click through rates, etc, looking for better ways to improve the overall search experience for users. Not that Google shows these results to anyone however; there are other clever folk out there trying to replicate the kind of tests Google does.
Mirametrix is one of those companies and specialise in eye tracking software. Recently they decided to test and share some insights through SEOMOZ. In a nutshell the eye tracker shows Google searchers are attracted to video results in the search engine results pages.
We’re also assuming Google has click through rate data to back this up hence the reason video content is the big winner in this Panda update.
Other ranking metrics to be given more weight in this update are Google’s +1s. This comes as no surprise, and we expect more of the same in future updates. Google plus for businesses will be available later this year but in the meantime make sure your company website has the +1 button on all priority pages.