The field of journalism and publishing in general has never really enjoyed a cosy relationship with the Internet. The Web, with its enormous user base, free content and open-ended architecture, where people can comment on content, and in some cases even edit existing content or create their own, is seen as an enormous threat to their business model.

One of the most vocal opponents of this is media baron Rupert Murdoch. Last year Murdoch announced that he would charge people to access online content from his large portfolio of publications, such as the Wall Street Journal Online, and that he firmly believed that people would be happy to pay for quality content.

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Although Google Instant doesn’t have any direct impact on SEO and search results, one thing that did occur to me when I first used it was how much it would exacerbate any bad publicity a person or company might have. Particularly now, when search engines are constantly monitoring content from highly active, up-to-the-minute social sites like Twitter, changes in suggested searches can be quite swift and can seem to come out of nowhere.

How to become Google’s number one “drunken moron”.

One recent and topical example is that of Ireland’s current leader (though indicators suggest not for very long) Brian Cowen. Ireland, whilst having a large diaspora throughout the world, is a small island nation of 4.2 million with limited global influence when compared with Britain or the United States. Those living outside the Emerald Isle probably would never have heard of Brian Cowen until a couple of weeks ago. So, if you don’t know who he is already, all you need know for this example is that he recently became the centre of controversy over whether or not he was drunk whilst appearing, incoherent and slurring his speech, on a nationally broadcast radio interview to discuss the economy. The result was an already abysmal approval rating, 18% in July 2010 [source] dropping further to 11% by the end of September [source] following the scandal.
(To compare, George W Bush’s lowest, the lowest of any US President, was a comparatively-high 19%.)

In other words, this was a political and public relations meltdown and it would be hard to imagine how it could be made any worse. Enter Google Instant.

Let’s imagine, in the above example, that I was searching for “Brian Cowen DCU speech”, but by the time I type in “Brian Cowen” I can already see the autosuggestion field with “Brian Cowen Drunk” and related queries, and when I type in the D that seals the deal and I get dozens of results automatically for “Brian Cowen Drunk” appearing in the main Google search results.

Now, as far as the world’s most popular search engine is concerned, the name Brian Cowen is permanently affixed to the word drunk and worse still, the search term has gone viral. Suddenly a man who, lets be honest, most of the world didn’t even know existed the week previous, became a viral phenomenon appearing on sites like the hugely popular tongue-in-cheek news aggregator Fark (playing the drunken Irish stereotype angle) as well as countless Tweets, blog posts and YouTube videos.

Now I might sound like I’m contradicting some of the points I made in my last post about Instant, having already said that generally people, when they have their minds set on finding a specific piece of information, are unlikely to get distracted when Google suggests something else. Thing is, if ever there was something that just might distract the searcher it’s a funny video or nice juicy scandal. And as for both rolled into one, well…

So, getting back to the DCU speech example, whilst the end result will invariably be that I’ll continue my search and eventually find the speech I was looking for, there’s a also very high chance it will be after I watch the parody YouTube video.

This should serve as a dire warning for anyone who still doubts the power of social media. Firstly, companies should be acutely aware of how much influence social media has on search engines in general and Google results in particular. Secondly, that it is these very trends which now also dictate much of the content in the mainstream media. Television is prime example. When stuck for material or content researchers will often go online to find out what is popular and “trending”. The result? The man hardly anybody outside Ireland ever heard of is now famous throughout America as a “drunken moron” thanks to Jay Leno.

Thus begins a vicious circle as the Jay Leno video appears on YouTube (a Google-owned company) and also goes viral. With millions searching for the video “Brian Cowen Jay Leno” becomes a top Instant search term shortly after, and the wheels of Cowen’s PR nightmare keep on turning.

Brian Cowen’s name currently appears top of all results on Google.ie for the term “drunken moron”. He appears on all but the last result on page one and continues to appear throughout the results, right up to page 63 out of 66 result pages. He also tops results on Google.co.uk and elsewhere. Now, knowing what we now do about Google’s Instant/autocomplete technology, we can predict a strong possibility that Google Instant will autosuggest the term “drunken moron” every time someone searches for the name “Brian Cowen” and display those results in real time.

It’s part of the Irish character to find incidents like this hilarious, even when, in fact especially when, they have potentially-disasterous consequences. Right now it’s not only make-or-break time for Ireland, but for Europe as a whole, and the ECB and the IMF are watching developments closely. Ireland, with a crippled economy and a dysfunctional banking system, has already had several negative bond rating readjustments and is desperately trying to assuage jittery foreign investors. Having a leader who dominates Google search results for the term “Drunken Moron” isn’t going to help matters. In other words, Google, and the web in general, has become instrumental in destruction of Cowen’s political career.

Reputation management for Businesses

For companies, rather than individuals, the issue becomes even more dangerous. It can be bad enough with autocomplete, whereby someone typing in searches for “Joe Bloggs” or “Acme Airlines” might see autosuggested terms like “Joe Bloggs scam” or “Acme Airlines ripoff” but now imagine the person can also see the results of those search terms and read their content in real time – not good.

Very few companies will ever experience the sort of PRmageddon that BP or Toyota did this year, but that doesn’t mean companies should ignore their online reputation. Signing up to Google Alerts is strongly recommend, so as to be notified of new content containing your name or the name of your company so you can be ready to stamp out any dangerous sparks before they become wildfires.

Of course, Instant or not, whatever’s out there, both the positive and the negative, people are going to find it anyway. And to reiterate the point I made last time regarding Instant and SEO, the search engine hasn’t changed and the information on it hasn’t changed, just the interface is changed, making it easier, and faster, for people to find that information.

Therefore the methods used to counter negative press online haven’t changed either; that is to proactively deal with negative press whilst continuing to build your search engine and local search footprint. The game is speeded up now, however, so your company will need to speed up too, or risk being overwhelmed by the web’s ever-changing landscape.

Brionglóid Media can help your company overcome these sorts of issues, as part of an ongoing web maintenance contract. We can help monitor review sites (e.g. Trip Advisor), Local search sites (i.e. Google Places, Bing Local), social networks, blogs, forums and other online communities and, if necessary, engage with customers on your company’s behalf to help mediate disputes or counter libellous claims against your business. We can also help you to diminish the Google search result ranking of articles or pages which may have negative implications for your company and replace them with more desirable articles and press releases, working to positively promote your business online. For more information please contact us today and we can begin an online PR campaign tailored to your specific needs.

Google Instant & Search Results

In the previous post I gave an introduction to Google Instant and talked about the technology and how it works. This time I want to talk more about how Instant predicts people’s search habits and what effect it will have on those habits and on your business’s website traffic. Finally I want to mention a little bit on Google Instant SEO and debunk many of the myths and misrepresentations that surround Google’s novel search engine enhancement.

So I guess the first thing people will want to know is; what about all those bloggers who’ve been saying that Google Instant marks the end of SEO and online marketing? In a word – bull.

So why say it? Well, clearly these bloggers know the value of link-bait. In the same way scandals and controversy helps sell newspapers, saying something alarmist or controversial is always a sure-fire way to get people to read, comment on and link to your blog post.

Big Names – Big Brands
One of their most alarmist comments is that Google are now “suddenly” giving more weight to large corporations in search. This is complete and other BS. The fact of the matter is Google Instant doesn’t mark the end of SEO any more than the introduction of autocomplete did.

A is for:

B is for:

The above tables show examples of Google Instant/autocomplete information (September 2010). There you will see the big brands & big names based on the most popular searches. No real surprises there (well other than the revelation that so many of my fellow countrymen are still interested in Big Brother).

Yes, when you search you do see a predilection towards big brands and big names, primarily large Internet companies or large retailers and chain stores, as well as airlines, banks, telcos and so on, but that predilection originates with all of us. Google are merely reflecting our own search trends back at us. In other words they’re giving the people what they want. And what they want, clearly, is to buy things, bank online, book flights online, play games online, talk to friends online or check the news, sport and weather. Go to any internet café on the planet and this is exactly what you will see people doing.

In fact, back when I used to own an internet cafe I used to check which were the most popular sites with customers as logged by my Smoothwall firewall/proxy server. When I compared them with those of a friend of mine who ran another cafe the results were virtually identical. Google released their autocomplete functions just I was exiting the net cafe business, however I did have the time to check the logs of both cafes against the Google suggestions and, once again, they were virtually identical. Since Instant and autocomplete are one and the same this is basically solid proof, if ever any was needed, that the results that are generated by Instant are based solely on which sites are the most popular with searchers and not, as some have hinted, motivated by any covert agreement between Google and its advertisers to gain a higher ranking.

Still don’t believe me? Ok, try it for yourself, open two tabs and search for the same thing, one tab with Instant enabled and the other disabled. Because Amazon’s dominating the A’s let’s see if they perform any different on Instant than they would normally. “Books” (I used Google.com US for this) bring up as the top two, books.google.com and Amazon. “Bookshop” brings up a company called “Bookshop Santa Cruz.” However as I honed in on the location, “bookshop [name of town/city - wherever you live]” the results began to change and update themselves according to my searches. When I had my my full search term typed in the bar I then compared my search with that of “regular” Google and – hey whadya know! – they were the exact same. The same companies dominated the top results for the same search term in both regular and Instant.

So whilst Instant uses autocomplete information to help facilitate the search and changes the look and feel of the search engine functionality, the final results for any given search term remain unchanged. Therefore if you’ve already conducted a comprehensive online marketing campaign, with the emphasis on SEO and local search/maps, then you have absolutely nothing to fear from Google Instant.

How will Google Instant change how people search?
Another common anti-Instant argument I’ve heard is that, by providing people with ready-made search terms people will be more likely to go with those search terms than use their own. This simple isn’t true. If the suggested search term is identical to what the person was searching for in the first place – which is all a case of predicting probabilities as far as the search engine is concerned – then that person will, of course, go for the suggested search term. But if Instant throws up suggestions that are contrary to what the user is looking for, they will naturally be ignored.

Think about it; if I’m looking for “Paris Hotels”, and I’ve just typed in “Paris H” the odds are very high that I’m going to continue typing my search term and I’m not going to be swayed by recommended links to sites about Paris Hilton. But let’s say, for argument’s sake, that I start searching for Paris Hotels and do click on the link to Paris Hilton, one has to wonder how committed I was to booking a hotel in Paris in the first place. It begins to look very much like I’m surfing, rather than searching.

It works the other way too. Say I’m a zoology student researching “Amazonian tapir population decline”. How likely am I, when Google Instant suggests it, to forget about my research paper and buy Dan Browne and Harry Potter books on Amazon instead? Not very.

So, whilst Google Instant does make it easier for people to access the most popular sites and content online it does not mean people are suddenly going to forget what they’re looking for. What it will do, however, is help prevent people from accessing sites they didn’t mean to, therefore improving bounce and conversion rates.

Whilst there have been massive improvements in search over the years, they’re still not all that good at understanding exactly what information we want. Google still doesn’t really know what we want so it guesses based upon what other people have wanted in the past. This helps anyone trying to conduct a search because, whilst they know the answer they want, they may not necessarily know how to best phrase the search query in order to find it. Instant now not only shows suggestions of what people have searched for in the past, it also shows the results in real time. So the user can see whether the search was successful or not. The result is that people find exactly what they want faster and easier and the likelihood of people accidentally accessing sites unrelated to their search term is greatly reduced.

Of course it’s not going to stop false landings completely, as anyone who’s accidentally landed on this page searching for Amazonian tapir population numbers can probably attest. (I aim to please, try here)

How to increase traffic with Google Instant.
Contrary to what the doomsayers say, Instant exposes even greater scope with which to connect directly with search engine users. Most people still don’t understand what a search engine actually does and fewer still understand how search engines actually work. They just know that if they type the name of the company they’re looking for it brings up the company automatically so they don’t have to mess around with all that fiddly www-dot stuff. They also tend to view Google as the oracle of the web, rather than understanding how it crawls sites and indexes content and keywords, they tend to ask it questions; “How do I do this?”, “where can I buy X in region Y?” and so forth. Google has only the most limited understanding of what words and search terms mean, so although it has a better track record than most search engines, it will none the less frequently show results that are irrelevant to what the person was looking for.

There are two reasons why this happens. The first is because the person used a bad or vague search term. This problem will be greatly reduced by Google Instant’s improved autosuggest feature, thus greatly increasing the chances that they will eventually find that which they seek. The second reason the user cannot find a relevant page is because a page relevant to their chosen search term simply doesn’t exist. This problem has also been reduced a lot due to specific question and answer sites like eHow and Yahoo Answers filling in many pre-existing gaps, but it still happens quite often.

Now imagine there’s a Google Instant search term that’s already out there, that’s related to your business or niche, but that there’s no answer or content to satisfy it? There are obviously a lot of people searching for that term, but that demand is going unsatisfied and all the potential is lost. So, rather than trying to go after saturated search terms that your competitors are already ranking high for, why not go all-out to secure this specific search term? Google’s Zeitgiest and Insights pages are a good place to start looking for those terms. Bear in mind, though, there are many words and phrases which Google automatically censor from Instant results.

So, whilst there’s still a long, long way to go before we reach the Star Trek level when we can just say, “computer, how do we do this?” or “show me all the files related to that” and the computer responds appropriately, Instant does serve as a good stop-gap solution by making it easier to match the queries made by users with the content they desire. You won’t have to wait long for other search engines, most noteably Bing, to follow Google’s lead, and for suggestive search to become the new standard.

Google Instant search optimization.
So how do you optimize your business website for Instant-type search? Well, getting back to the “bookshop [town]” example I reccommend, firstly, that your business concentrates heavily on local search, particularly Google Places, Facebook Places, Bing Local and the emerging trends in geo-tagging social networks like Foursquare.

Local search is becoming ever more important these days and geotagging is another rising trend. Search for any busines + location combination on Google, e.g. “Hotel London” or “Restaurant Paris” and the first thing you will notice is that, top of the results are lists of businesses on Google Places complete with maps of their location. Naturally you’ll want to be right at the top and marked on those maps. You’ll also want to ensure that your organisation keeps a very close eye on your listings and deals proactively with any negative comments so as to resolve disputes before they escalate. That way you can rank high on Google and also enjoy high customer feedback.

Other than that the rules of good SEO still apply and have not changed not even slightly. As discussed in the bookshop example the end results of a search for a given term or keyword are identical whether Instant is enabled or not. So you will need to ensure that your site exibits the charactaristics of quality web design, that it is properly designed, coded and easy to navigate. This way not only is it easy for people to find what they’re looking for, it makes it easier for search engine spiders to crawl and index your site also. You should also provide a sitemap for your users and an XML sitemap of your site to help search engines, like Google, index your site’s content more easily. Finally be sure, also, that your site does not have any flash-based navigation or contains frames.

If you are not sure you can always contact us for a consultation. You may also be interested in our link-building services.

I’ve read a lot of articles over the past week or so on the new Google Instant engine, some people liked it, some hated it and some, actually quite a few, quickly panicked, foreseeing the end of SEO and Internet marketing as we know it. I have decided, therefore, to hold off on commenting on it, to digest the various pros and cons, as well as the portentous prognostications of numerous SEO blog Nostradami and deliberate for a while whilst conducting a few tests of my own. In this, the first of a three part series, I’ll be discussing Google Instant and what advantages it has over regular Google.

For those who don’t know, Google Instant is a new service that’s currently being rolled out worldwide. The idea behind it is that it speeds up searches by suggesting search terms to you as you type. Essentially it’s the same principal as the autocomplete function which has been a familiar part of the Google search experience for some time now, but extended throughout the page.

So, for example, when you type in A the familiar dropdown menu appears showing a number of possibilities for A based on popularity. Usually when teaching the alphabet we say “A is for Apple” but in Google.com (USA), no doubt much to Steve Jobbs’ chagrin, the top of the A autocomplete list is Amazon, based on the site’s enormous popularity. All that Google Instant does (though Google make a huge deal of it) is automatically serve results based on the autocomplete data. So, when you type in “A”, it not only shows the main A-results with Amazon at the top, it also shows results for Amazon at the bottom of the page.

Instant really isn’t anything new or revolutionary, it’s basically the same basic Google search engine with a new front-end tweak that helps speed up searching. At the end of the day Google want to retain their number one position. They want to ensure that as many people as possible use Google and that they all find what they want as quickly as possible. As long as they manage to stay ahead of the posse in terms of the quality of search results and ease of use, they’ll retain it. And from that point of view, Instant delivers.

At this point I should mention that, personally speaking, I don’t really like Instant. I’m an incurable geek, of course, a web-veteran who’s been a Google user for over a decade.  I’m used to performing my own searches, using functions where necessary and I’ve picked up a lot of tips and tricks over the years to make information retrieval as swift as possible. So for me Instant serves as an unnecessary and somewhat irritating distraction whereas original Google, with its familiar minimalism, reassures me that I’m the one telling the search engine what to search for, not the other way around.

Website redesigns almost always provoke negative reactions from a significant proportion of users, we don’t like when something we’ve gotten used to using gets changed. That’s why I’m sure the new Twitter is going to provoke a similar reaction and it’s also why I decided to reserve judgement and give myself more time to test Google Instant before weighing in.

Whilst I’m sure I’m not the only one who has had this reaction I am no longer in the “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” camp regarding Instant nor do I regard this as Google’s New Coke moment. First of all, if you don’t like using Instant, you have the option to disable it by clicking on a clearly marked link on the right-hand side of the search bar. Secondly, though it may not be for everyone, for most people Google Instant does offer many advantages over regular Google search and the more I used it the more I began to appreciate just how ingenious it really is.

My first business, way back when, was an internet café. I dare say operating such a business has given me an enormous advantage over other web designers and developers. Why? Because it firstly gave me the chance to view (and often times assist) a diverse range of users, of all ages and skillsets, and secondly – and this is the clincher – it allowed me to see how they performed on various websites. When I started thinking in these terms I suddenly I saw how much of a game-changer Google Instant is really going to be.

I’m going to introduce you to a character called Joe, who is the ultimate benchmarker.
Joe is a composite character of various people I came across working whilst running my internet cafe. My café was based in Ireland, but I’d say everyone who has ever worked in an internet café before has had a Joe of their own and when I describe Joe, I’m sure you’ll probably know somebody just like him.

Joe doesn’t believe in calling repairmen and never took his car to a mechanic. The doctor keeps telling him he should slow down a bit but then what does he know? Joe comes from that that hard-working, hard-as-nails generation; fiercly frugal, doggedly determined and self reliant. And he certainly isn’t going to let a thing like mild myopia (it’s not as mild as he’d care to admit) or not having the first clue how to use a computer stand between him and a good bargain. For seven decades of his life computers were non-existent, then he heard about eBay, found some great deals on tools and hardware, and since then got hopelessly hooked.
Getting to the eBay website, however, is a constant battle.

Joe represents all those squinting, one-finger typists out there who can’t see the screen as well as they’d like to and to whom the QWERTY keyboard may as well be the bridge of the Starship Enterprise. Now, Joe just clicks on the big blue E which he associates with being “The Internet”. (We’d like Joe to use Chrome or Firefox instead but one step at a time). Internet Explorer opens up with the homepage set to Google. Joe now only has to press one single, solitary key – E – before eBay appears automatically top of the search results. One key press and two mouse clicks is all it takes to bring Joe to his destination.

Both Ebay and Amazon already have an autocomplete function on their site and I’m sure they can see the potential of Instant-like technology and how they might adapt it for their site so people, regardless of their level of computer literacy, can find, and purchase, the items they’re interested in as quickly and easily as possible.

This is the thing that I’ve been telling people since day one and it especially applies to ecommerce sites of all sizes; the easier you make your site to use, the easier it will be for you to sell. If you’re not sure how, Google Instant can help show you the way.

When in doubt, try to think of a Joe-like character you might know and try to envision how that person might perform on your site. How easy, or difficult, would it be for them to locate key information or perform a transaction? Now imagine that, unlike Joe, the person doesn’t have that same determination, and will give up very easily if they can’t find what they’re looking for and go to one of your competitors instead. Now think about Google Instant again, think about how long it took Joe to find what he was looking for. Under one second to find it, under two seconds to get there. There it is, that’s your time to match.

Google already offer a Custom Search Engine service so that you can use Google technology to allow people to search through your site’s content. Although Google haven’t released official Custom/Instant search code yet I did come across this Instant Google Custom Search Engine with information on how it was done here. I’ll be looking into that myself to see how I can adapt it for clients.

So, that’s it for now. In part two I’ll be talking more about Google Instant and what it means for your business. I’ll be going into detail about Instant search results and how to position yourself on them. I’ll also be debunking many of the myths and misrepresentations which have rapidly propigated throughout the blogosphere in the last couple of weeks.

Here are three great Firefox add-ons which I use quite regularly, one for assistance in design and development of web pages, one for for checking search engine rankings and other SEO-related information and finally one for helping to keep my browsing more secure.

Web Developer
The Firefox Web Developer Toolbar is an indespensible tool for web designers or developers.
It boasts a broad range of options such as enabling or disabling Cookies, Java or Javascript, CSS elements, forms, images and various other page elements. You can also view and highlight various HTML and CSS elements, edit them or validate them, as well as your site’s feed and check whether your site meets W3C accessability standards. Other features include a small screen rendering function to help get an idea how your site might look on a mobile device. With a huge amount of tools and information at your fingertips its the ideal tool for studying pages, tweaking CMS or blog templates, checking for errors or indeed any other web design/development task one can concieve of.

The Web Developer toolbar runs on Windows, Mac and Linux versions of Firefox, in addition to other Gecko-based browsers such as Seamonkey and Flock. A version of the Web Developer Toolbar for Chrome is now also available.

Search Status
The Search Status toolbar is ideal for SEOs or indeed anyone with an interest in their website’s search engine ranking. Available for both Firefox and Seamonkey it shows both the Google page rank of each visited page and can also display the rankings of Alexa, Complete and mozRank. There are also options to view backlinks from Google and Yahoo site explorer, indexed pages on Google and Yahoo/Bing, check the site on Archive.org, view WhoIs information, meta tag information and more.

Noscript
Installing the Noscript add-on for Firefox (or Gecko-compatible browsers) is a great way to keep your browsing safe, secure and private. Noscript blocks various scripts which may be dangerous such as Java, Javascript and Flash and the security vunerabilities which might result from them. You can then easily disable the protection for trusted sites such as your email account or other regular sites.

It’s official, Yahoo are out of the search engine business.

Anyone now searching on Yahoo won’t really know the difference, but essentially all they’re using is a rebranded version of Bing.

As many of you may recall, Microsoft have been trying to get their mits on the web portal giant for years, five, by my count, with Microsoft once offering a whopping $46.6 billion US for the company, only to be rebuffed.

Then, last summer, Yahoo announced that it was getting out of search completely and turning over control of the search engine side of their business to Microsofts then-new Bing search engine. The deal would leave Yahoo as a completely independent entity albiet one which essentially oursources its search engine operation to Microsoft.

Yesterday it went live.

This is nothing new for Yahoo, who’ve had similar deals in the past, including a search alliance with Google. Traditionally Yahoo were always more interested in web directories and didn’t understand all the fuss about search engines. When one recalls the early days of search engines it’s easy to understand why. They were still a relatively new phenomenon and, until Google came on the scene, nobody had really cracked it.

Unlike so many others, Yahoo emerged from the Dotcom Crash intact, its market share bolstered by several aquisitions including search provider Inktomi, but by that time it was too late, Google were already leaps and bounds ahead of Yahoo in terms of search engine technology. Yahoo instead began to concentrate more on pay per click advertising and emerging social technologies, once again through aquisitions, such as photo sharing site Flickr and the social bookmarking site Delicious.

The Microsoft deal marks the end of an era for one of the search engine industry’s biggest players and leaves Microsoft now the second largest search engine though still far behind Google which presently enjoys over 70% market share. [source: search engine market share statistics]

Whether or not Bing can ever catch up with Google is unlikely. Though with new social rivals such as Facebook stealing Google’s thunder both in terms of traffic and ppc revenue they may want to rethink all those millions of little side projects they keep announcing and start to concentrating more on their bread and butter; pay per click advertising and search.