Search, Social, and Satisfaction: 2 Simple SEO Lessons
The way Google and other search engines are calculating SEO value is changing more often than ever before. Google reacts quickly with changes to its algorithm and as the online landscape rapidly shifts, especially to compensate for the rise of social media, search engines are forced to adapt quickly. A couple recent events have highlighted the importance of keeping an eye on how your site accomplishes good SEO. Here are 2 important things that have changed just within the last few months with how Google and Bing rank links and award SEO value.
- Keep customers happy! We talked about Clarabelle Rodriguez a little while back and mentioned that the extensive press coverage resulted in Google adjusting their ranking algorithm to punish online retailers that were actually using negative reviews to drive up their search results. Shady retailers were purposely creating a terrible experience so that customers would complain. Just a week after this story broke, Google adapted to lower the ranking of web sites that provide an ‘extremely poor user experience.’
- Influence has value: Google and Bing both came out this month and made public knowledge what many suspected; the social authority of a user influences the rank of a link. This means that any link shared in social media is analyzed on how influential the person sharing it is. (how many followers, and how many you follow) The more influential the person sharing the link the better SEO value that link gets. The lesson is this: Get important people to share your link, it makes Google and Bing view it as more important!
Google in particular is becoming known for quick reaction to SEO exploits and has adjusted its algorithm up to 10 times in a single week. If you want your site to be found, keep it credible, watch how SEO changes, and get social!
Look here for a list of awesome tools you can use to start measuring your social media influence now!