What These New Google Updates Mean For Planning Website Content

Internet marketing copy used to have to basically read something like this for folks who hoped to have their websites rank well in the SERPS (search engine results pages):

Search engine online

SEO – ah! Blossoms of

Bad haiku dot.com

Ah, we were young SEO grasshoppers back in those days. (And, as you might surmise, never, ever professional haiku-ers in any way, shape or form.)

Fortunately, the ranking and indexing algorithms for Google, as well as the other search engines, are being constantly tweaked to ensure that nobody can “game” the system (or ever feel entirely comfortable or relaxed in knowing that “search engine optimization” can be scratched off the “to-do” list).

Google, most recently, has issued this update to its official blog.

 

To Clarify (Not Really – But It’s What Google Said)

In case the update leaves you feeling a tad perplexed, one of Google's esteemed blogsters explains it all further here:

“When we say this algorithm impacted 35% of searches, we mean at least one result on the page was affected, as opposed to when we've said noticeably impacted in the past, which means changes that are significant enough that an average user would notice. Using that same scale, this change noticeably impacts 6 - 10% of searches, depending on the language and domain you're searching on.”

Essentially, the new algorithm automatically ranks fresh content higher when it’s related to recurring events, “hot” topics or topics that are frequently updated with new information.

The latter is where it gets interesting/competitive, viewed through the lens of online marketing. You can’t just sit back and hope your business’s optimization efforts will keep it at the top of the heap in the SERP results. Be mindful of your keywords. Be proactive.

Constantly stay on top of  the hot topics surrounding you industry, and then write about them, comment on them, link to stories about them on your blog, social media, or wherever else online you are promoting your brand, products and/or services.

Fresh content is key. SEM Zen can help you with that. Just give us a call or drop us an email.