Today we’re helping people get better search results by extending Personalized Search to signed-out users worldwide, and in more than forty languages. Now when you search using Google, we will be able to better provide you with the most relevant results possible. For example, since I always search for [recipes] and often click on results from epicurious.com, Google might rank epicurious.com higher on the results page the next time I look for recipes. Other times, when I’m looking for news about Cornell University’s sports teams, I search for [big red]. Because I frequently click on www.cornellbigred.com, Google might show me this result first, instead of the Big Red soda company or others.

Well I do like the suggestions in the search, but ask myself if I want the links that I click in the Google are good and updated ones? It is better to let the users choose what they want, or is it better to present them with the latest and best options? Considering the number of people who search web, and considering the number of people among them who are end users who don’t know what is going behind under the hood, personalized search sometimes seems to be a sneaky option. Lots of user data is being transferred without a people knowing about it.

What is still interesting is that Google doesn’t tell us “how much personal” is the personalized search in reality. God knows if my atheist instincts will be further cemented into my mind because I will start seeing quotes about rationality and ‘how atheists are more utilitarian’ articles all around my search results!!

Btw, for people reading this article, personalized search can be turned off.

So what are the implications that SEO industry might have to battle with? Well to start with, geo targeting will become a difficult job. Lots of times, it will be difficult for small SEO companies to display their results to their clients just because clients will see different results based on their search history. It might mean lots of nightmares for the SEO analysts.

..to be continued

Prediction 4:

• More and more Videos will be used to market the websites and products. As a result more Videos will become part of the search results, which online marketers would want to leverage. In 2009, a result with accompanying video will have about 50 times more chance of appearing in the results than the traditional webpage.

Convert or not? If companies asking for Social media optimizations services (youtube etc.) is any proof that video optimizations is continuing to be an important part of online marketing/SEO strategies.

Holds for 2010? Sure as heaven.

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Prediction 5:

• Blogs will become important part of your website. Interestingly there are still many major companies/businesses/people who still don’t endorse blog as a potential tool for interacting with the world on web. It is accepted by almost the entire major companies that without a blog a website and hence the activity surrounding your brand is pretty much dead. Blogging reflects the efforts of the companies to share and learn information (which is power). TG encourages all the top businesses to blog and become part of larger information sharing communities.

Convert or not? The required shift certainly seems to have started, but it seems that most of the small businesses are very reluctant towards blog. A blog is a small investment which leads to long time benefits. People visiting the website these days make sure to have a look at the blog. I guess the prediction was true, but blogging will pick up even more in coming year.

Holds for 2010? Already said that.

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Prediction 6:

• ROI tracking and analysis will gain momentum. As the economy is taking a fall, more and more metrics will be analyzed for making decisions and checking the ROI. What works and what don’t work online has to be backed up by facts, and tools that define and measure such metrics will play an important role.

Convert or not? Definitely a yes, Google and Yahoo have done lots of investment in making and upgrading the analytics too. The user generated content is now more than ever, and every savvy online marketer is using these tools to their advantage.

Holds for 2010? Not sure where the research is heading in this direction, but we will touch base with this in the predictions for 2010.

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These predictions were not facts, but they are way to measure our direction of thought. We will continue to update ourselves by keeping an eye on the latest in the online marketing world, but to predict and act is to be proactive in approach, and lots of businesses rather take action instead of waiting for reaction. We will continue our year in review series by writing down some predictions for the year 2010. Stay tuned!!

Ok, so as search engine marketers, there were few predictions that are mostly evident by the content of our blogs:

Prediction 1:

• Google will take a step closer to ruling this world: kidding, no bet I am not, we at TG realize the importance of knowing how Google is changing, and that is why we watch the search engine behavior closely, some examples are here, here, and here. Point being, we all use Google for search, so more and more of SEO world will try to learn the Google insides more than ever.

Convert or not? Definitely yes, for the reasons just mentioned above.

Holds for 2010? Definitely go. Let’s hold this till next year.

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Prediction 2:

• Lots of small businesses will try to enter SEO business. Lots of them will try to enter the business just to make money, and because they are expecting losses in other departments. But as they say, big fish will always eat the small fish.

Convert or not? Yes, the acquisitions in the industry have been astounding in number.

Holds for 2010? There are so many new companies coming up with technology in the s            same areas (e.g. PPC), that they are bound to be merges to create more space in the market.

Prediction 3:

• More money will be spent on SEO and SMO. Lots of people will realize the importance of organic SEO in their campaigns, and they will continue to invest more in this area.

Convert or not? Yes, there is lots of data about the same on the web. Fact remains that tried and tested methodologies like link building, good content, small codes, smart design will always remain the basic priority of any SEO optimizer.

Holds for 2010? Kudos (More data and analysis on this later).

to be continued

E.g. the people who want SEM of their websites do not know that 80% of the clicks happen through organic results. Yet, 80% of the money that is spent on SEM goes to PPC and other advertising. In-exposure to facts can be costly to those who know it too, because that is exactly what happened in 2009, where a multitude of companies came into SEO field and promised things that lured lots of businesses.

What’s my point?

I am not saying that PPC is not worth it, it just means that the better companies always know how to balance the budget that is dedicated to SEO and the amount that is spend on PPC and other paid advertisements.

Many had predicted that SEO would be dead by the end of 2009, but isn’t, the traditional SEO is here to stay, and I admit my foolhardy predictions a year ago. In some ways, I would have been correct if I had said that SEO would be dead but for organic search engine results marketing—would you agree that the search engine business is going in that direction?

Web remains the most effective way to market business these days because that is where the people are: our moms and dads are on the Internet, the college guys are on the Facebook, and people like us are always on there!!

So many of the things happen, and we tend to discuss lots of things in the hindsight, and so let us see what are the things we would have easily predicted in the beginning of the year from the search engine marketers perspective.

….to be continued

Google is already making sweeping changes to its algorithm in an effort to make the user search experience better. Now, they have introduced a new search parameter that will be taken into account when it decides which site is better one to be promoted up the order—the page load speed.

It makes perfect sense that Google acknowledges the fact that user experience is time and again hampered by sites that have many features and takes ample time to load at the first place. I personally don’t like sites which take forever to load, I want my information and I want it quickly. Many webmasters  wondering why the their sites bounce rates are so high might want to rethink their site structures and take care of the site loading time in the future (now they have another incentive for doing so!!)

If you’re wondering how you can quantify the “magic-speed” factor, then here is the link to the tool that Google has put up for install:

The Page speed Tool

The tool clearly tells us about how well our site is performing when compared to other sites.

Another important factor that will play important role in your SEO campaign is ‘Personalized search’. It necessarily means that all the user generated content that Google is collecting all this while will now be used to rank the pages that show up in the search engine.

It will be interesting to see how much change they make to the site rank depending on these factors. Also, it is important to note that very big sites have got lot of data to load, e.g. Amazon, do you think Google will lower the page rank for Amazon user by user?

It used to be different earlier, I would say for the good. Link building a.k.a link acquisition used to be a mechanical labor process, in which we would start the process by searching for directories, get the relevant links, start emailing the relevant sites, and then start begging or buying the links. As I got more experienced, I found that many Blogs/sites have got a wide area network which link to each other not because they think it will better the SEO of their websites, but because they had genuine reasons for doing so.

Moreover, with the Google search algorithms (yes, there isn’t really a reason to believe the other ones!) getting intelligent day by day, it makes sense to buy/get “white hat” kind of links for the site for achieving greater legitimate and relevant traffic for one’s site. And with Web social media changing and now back-links being available for just about anyone who has got a point—Yeah, I am talking about the power of Digg, Reddit, and Stumble, which give powerful back-links to just about anybody with good content.

The Viral marketing has already “shifted” in many ways. Now it gives a greater platform for naïve bloggers to market the blogs without any external effort, and gives companies like us a chance to analyze and take advantage of the Social media marketing. We sometimes even suggest the clients not to buy links and instead rely on deeper tactics such as content embedding and long tailing for “longer” results.

With more and more user data available to search engines like Google, one wonders how the algorithms are going to adopt to give the users some “real time” links and suggestions instead of just relying on some calculations based on back-links. The algorithms are definitely accounting for the potential “misses”, which will be improved as the days go by.

Few more things that are changing the way link building is viewed are:

• The power of twitter, it is amazing how Google is philotweeting
• Freshness of the links gaining more importance
• User generated data
• The unimportance of paid linking

As the market evolves, we have to hope that we still are able to bear the fruit in a forest where every tree is fighting for resources.

We should not try to be smart, smartness will only last to get the project—the results one will deliver will speak volumes, and then clients can decide about whether to continue with the services or not. So client always has a choice. But it happens many times that clients do not seem to be all that willing to give a chance to the service provider. Most of the times, it is because the clients are misinformed about what is SEO or what can be done with SEO. They forget to realize that there are only 10 top results displayed on the Google search results page, and not everybody can fit in there.

But isn’t that what SEO is all about? Why should I even go for SEO?

At present, the kind of algorithm Google search uses is based on calculations, and calculations are always taken advantage of. That is why Google clearly says that one should not worry about search optimization techniques, and instead worry about quality content and site structure. But there are companies who have already made it big in the market and they promote other sites solely based on their reputation (not the clients product). And if you are ready to spend lot of money, you too would get such ranks, but how many of the “traffic” will convert into customers? You never really can get such answers, can you?

So what is my point?

Instead of deciding your online marketing strategy based on a single factor called as page rank, it makes sense that the clients should instead define their goals, their needs for the business and sit with the service providers and talk about achieving those goals instead of demanding and then not benefitting.

But clients come first, isn’t it?

I never disagreed with that, I am just saying that we can create a better playing field for the clients and the SEO services by understanding the “catches” in each other’s fields and then do make the most of what is available.

So what exactly should the client ask from the SEO services company? To be continued…

What exactly are things that make us believe that SEO and married life are similar? Here are few that we may find quite logical (Please don’t think of your wife or your husband as Google here):

• SEO is a process not an end result. It is true for marriage. Both need commitment.
• Lot of times there is a tendency to overlook lot of things. We know that lot of marriage fights occur over pity reasons. Similarly, it is common to overlook few things in SEO project, for e.g., “even Google’s home page has validation errors”, “It doesn’t matter?” But fact remains that everything counts.
• Doing the basics right—possibly applies to everything in life, and is true for SEO and marriage also.
• Marriage can have its ups and downs, so realizing that there won’t be huge traffics all the time is important. Adding quality content to the websites, and not stopping the marketing websites are ways to show commitment during the downtimes.
• Knowing things during the both the processes can be both funny and frustrating at times. But remember, perseverance will pay, and nothing can beat you when you are past that stage.
• No cheating allowed please! Google doesn’t like it, and the partners in the marriage won’t like it. So if you are looking for quick ways to find satisfaction, look at the screenshots (photo albums) of your website ranking in the first page.
• Nothing works like hard work, so keep at it.

Everybody knows that maintaining the positions in the search engines is far, far more difficult than getting the rank. Not ranking well in no way should lead to lack of enthusiasm to scale up the marketing activities. In fact, that is the time when search engine marketing activities should be beefed up. In contrast, what we get to see is clients backing out, wanting to spend less time and less money on marketing.

As a SEO company or provider of SEO services, it is important that we make client aware of all the possible scenarios that lead up to a successful search engine marketing campaign. Clients should be taken into confidence, should be made to believe that as service providers, we are not here only to take their money. After all, clients getting profits automatically means our profits.

So it is your call—do you want to be divorced?

With this new search engine the company has replaced Live Search. Microsoft would aim to match the “perceived satisfaction” of search engine with the real experience by helping the user get exactly what he was looking.

Rather than working like any other search engine bing promises to be different. The major difference would be in approach. Bing would list all the relevant results and reviews taken for various sites in the same page along with related results in the left hand column. The categorization is done based on various features of the product or the subject that you are searching about.

In case you are searching for “great white shark” apart from a listing of relevant websites you will also get a list of other links in the left hand side of the webpage that focus on topics like great white shark attacks, largest great white shark, sharks, great white shark UK, and great whiter shark attack pictures.

If it is hotels that you are looking for then again this “decision engine” will give a list of various variations. The main purpose behind this is to narrow down your search and make it as specific as possible. Thanks to all these specifications and sub-categorizations it is hoped that you will find what you are looking for pretty quickly.

While looking for a particular shop or hotel bing does not ignore the local sites at all but includes them in its search. This makes your search results more specific. The site also has a very attractive look. It is also quite user friendly.

Now, all this site has to do is to keep up the good work. Let us not forget that the cyber world is evolving every minute. In short once this site gets launched we would definitely hope to see some more advancements and where it goes here after. We are really lucky that we are born in an age where change comes everyday.

I doubt if all the seo companies will start creating seperate strategies to rank well in Bing.

[Sources: www.bing.com and

http://www.decisionengine.com]

The major clients who offshore their projects to India are USA, UK, Spain, some South East Asian nations, and many countries of the Middle East. This is one industry that still provides India a steady business. The reasons behind this success rate are; English literacy, number of graduates, exposure to Internet service, and a clear idea about the required job.

The percentage of search engine users globally was 7 percent in the year 2007. This has increased and that can be seen from the growing popularity of search engine Google that has recently become the number one brand in the world. Moreover, on the international front the 10 million dollars investment received by Conductor, a company providing SEO solutions, proves that SEO and SEM are really recession proof.

Right now 85% of searches are dependent on SEO and that is why Indian companies who excel in this field will definitely get benefited. That is why many new graduates are trying to enter the industry as SEO professionals. This also justifies the claim that by the year 2013 the SEM industry will see a rise of 13 percent.

In the year 2007 the total number of Internet users was 29 million and last year this figure rose to 40 million. This shows a substantial increase of 19%. That is why various Indian companies are so encouraged to make their online product marketing process more aggressive. The companies falling in this league include big names like; ICICI Bank, HDFC, Taj Hotels, and Godrej that can prosper due to SEM.

Moreover, among the 29 million only 35% went for Internet searches in 2004 but in 2007 this percentage increased to almost 75%. In 2007, only eight percent people used the Internet to check travel status and make reservations but this percentage climbed to almost 80 in 2008. This makes the future of SEO look really bright. Better SEO will mean more growth in SEM industry.

*Survey conducted on 29 million people.

**Source: Internet and Mobile Association of India

It is also believed that by this year India will see an investment of about US$175 Million. All these figures can only mean one thing that the SEO as well as the SEM is bound to grow further with time.