19/02/2007 - Google - Is there a sea change coming?

I wonder how many people attending the 2007 Search Engine Strategies conference, London were there hunting for ‘The Nugget’. That golden piece of information that will illuminate the path all the way to the top of Googles results page. So it was with much anticipation the audience fell so quite you could hear chins bumping to the floor when during Matt Cutts (Google Engineer – the algorithms guy) keynote address, the moderator asked him, ‘so if there was one nugget of information you would like to send people away with, what would it be?’ Was he about to bare all?

Happily for all those companies sitting pretty at the top of their chosen results page, their secrets are safe. The answer was a pitch for Web Master Console, a free and admittedly quite neat tool set.  His comments that SEOs should focus on the future and preparing for the changes coming had an ominous sound, though. Is there really a sea change coming? And if so, what should we be looking at?

Well personalisation seems high on the agenda. Matt Cutts suggested they are planning to move away from the winner takes all scenario that they feel currently exists. For example if you rank in the top 5 for the big term in your industry, you are going to be enjoying the results. However, the suggestion was that by taking into account user preferences, different results could be served to different users, thus giving more websites exposure to the top positions in Google. Googles view would be serving better results.

But this seems to raise more questions than it answers. As you might expect I suppose. For example if I use the search term ‘digital camera’ am I really looking for something different to the next surfer? Will they personalise my results based on my selection of preferences, or will they determine for themselves my preferences based on my own historic search activity?

Well, either way the end result could be the devaluation of the top positions in Search Engines, and a shift in value even more onto ‘the long tail’. For a long time the key part of paid search activity, the long tail could be moving up the agenda for organic listings.

Localisation looks like it will also become more important. Trouble is that whilst this is useful in some areas, is it really relevant for consumer goods (IRTs favourite topic)? Does the consumer want to be presented with local suppliers of a product rather than suppliers from other areas? National delivery is not the problem for consumers. Finding the right product at the right price, from a company offering good service is the key. Lets face it, whether you live 5 miles or 250 miles from the warehouse the order is being shipped from isn’t likely to effect the customers buying decision. So it will be interesting to see how this is applied.

So what’s round the corner? Of course we’re not really any the wiser, but perhaps those lucky companies sitting pretty at the top of their chosen results page will have to start looking down the length of the ‘tail’ as the value of their positions drop.

(Aside from Mr Cutts though, take a look at Trexy beta. Search trails. Blazing your own and sharing others. So if you can identify through search trail analysis the most appropriate search result for a term… well that sounds like a potential ranking algorithm based on user behaviour rather than algorithms restraining SEO behaviour. Interesting.)

About Us

Internet Retail Technologies Ltd ( IRT ) works with manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers to help them enjoy greater advantage from internet distribution. Through offering consulting services, and web distribution services and channels, IRT helps is network of partners start or further develop their online sales and marketing strategies.

IRT also operates its own consumer facing web site in the form of yourblueworld.co.uk