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Google the Great and Powerful

Guest post by: Lee Rostad

Article Overview: Google may not be up to its old standards of excellence, but it's still the most popular and powerful search engine in town, for both consumers and SEO.

Google the Great and Powerful

Lately, I've been reading more and more articles about how Google is on the decline, that their searches aren't as relevant as they used to/should be, etc. I'm not going to say that Google is and always will be the internet's finest search engine, or that it's the only thing you need to focus on for SEO. Those statements may or may not be true, but I don't have the time or energy to make those arguments right now.

My main point here is this: SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization*. And, whether Google's the best at it or not, it's still the default search engine for most people you're going to encounter on a given day. Bing/Yahoo may be improving by leaps and bounds, Blekko^† may be super rad, but for most folks-from your mom to your next door neighbor to the guy who sold you your car-Google is probably king. Few websites have had their names become a synonym for what they do, but I know I hear the term "I'll just Google it" quite frequently, when someone needs to look up some fact or figure.**

So, though I am by no means here to promote Google, it's important to note that, even if the quality of their service is declining and they're slowly, secretly selling out, they'll still be the first place most people look to find information on the web. Whether anyone wants to admit it or not, Google will be the most relevant/popular search site available for many, many years to come. This doesn't mean that all other search engines are useless for SEO, just that Google-good, bad or otherwise-will probably always be the most important and influential.

If you're in the market for new running shoes, you might be able to find better prices and a better selection at Dick's Sporting Goods^††, but most folks will probably still go to Foot Locker, because it's the most well-known shoe shop around. If you trying to optimize search engine results, it's best to focus on the most well-known, most-used search engine out there. Which, despite its recent decline (or not), is still Google.

* But you already knew that-why else would you be reading a blog from an SEO site?

^† Which sounds like a noise my cat makes after a long grooming session.

** I have even heard the phrase "Google it in the dictionary."

^†† Also not an endorsement, just an example.

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Article Tags: google, seo



Related Forum Posts
Re: Cool Video - How Google Updates it's Search Algorithm - Great Video Evan! As per the recent Google Algorithm update. Google also give more value to content and even shows rich snippet in Google SERP's.
Re: Can Google Alerts Increase Your Search Engine Rankings? - Yep, I agree, Google alerts can be great for keeping an eye on various things within your own business, or potential businesses, as well as your competition. Great example David!
Re: Search Engine Optimization - Great advice enlivener! Google takes time, it can sometimes even last for months till it starts sending a fair amount of traffic. Keep your fingers crossed.
How Do You Check Google Ranking? - Now that Google is so responsive to your own search history, how can you get a good idea of what your Google ranking really is for your web pages? Whenever I check my ranking for specific keywords on Google, my web pages appear on the front page, or suspiciously high. My way around this is to check Google ranking via other computer Internet links, i.e., whenever I'm working in a library I will use a library computer to check. I check Google ranking before logging into my Gmail or other Google-related accounts. Does anybody else have any other tips for discovering your Google ranking? Nowadays, I check Bing.com for my webpage ranking as it gives a much less favourable (and so, I guess, "truer") ranking for my webpages than Google does...
W3C Errors - My 2 cents on W3C - I never really paid attention to it and when I looked last week at how I was doing I had 260 errors - so don't feel bad about 40! Despite the errors, my page ranks well and drives a lot of traffic. I nonetheless had the errors fixed although I'm sure many of my inside pages are failing. Google works on link structure so as long as the navigation is easy for their bots to follow then your pages will get picked up. Great ideas TheAnonymousMan about putting text links on the homepage so Google can find them. It also helps pass your homepage Page Rank on to the interior pages so they can rank higher.


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