Content Trends

Content Marketing, SEO and Digital Marketing

There’s More to SEO in 2013 Than Google

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In my last post for Web Content Blog, I discussed changes in SEO for 2013 focused on Google. That’s for two very good reasons. First, Google is dominant in search with over 66% of core searches. Second, Google talks about its changes while other search engines generally don’t. However, Bing broke through the 17% core search threshold for the first time this year – Search Engine Land, May 15, 2013.

The Search Industry

Because Google is dominant in search, it leads the rest of the pack in maintaining the technology. The others follow suit or make changes that help them market against Google. But occasionally, the others change their algorithms to suit their own business aims, and without alerting webmasters, it can send the industry into a tizzy. Bing, for instance, made three algorithm updates in 2012 and their forums lit up trying to figure out what was happening. To date in 2013, Bing has made only one algorithm update. Yahoo uses the Bing algorithm and so a change to the latter is a change to the former, although each tweaks its results to suit its needs.

There has always been a tension between search engines, which are naturally loyal to their search users, and webmasters on whom search engines rely for the sources of those searches. Search engines set the rules for how webmasters may run the gauntlet of a search engine indexing but have been little helpful in the navigation of the gauntlet.

Google is secretive with details about its updates, but it has communicated upcoming changes and it has answered questions, without giving away details that might negate the changes. Contrast that with Bing, which simply makes updates.

While you can generalize that a broad rule change in Google won’t hurt you with other search engines, it’s to the specifics that you need to pay attention (Bing Webmaster Guidelines, for instance). While some rules apply universally to all search engines, some don’t, so it’s important to know your search engines. If you see in your analytics that a large or growing share of your traffic is coming from Bing, for instance, you need to make sure you don’t set up roadblocks to being found there. A “roadblock” is something that interferes with indexing, including not meeting their guidelines and blocking access to your site.

Both Google and Bing recommend unique title tags and description tags for each Web page. However, Google only says to keep them brief. Bing gives specific limits in its guidelines. If you’re targeting Bing, the limit is 65 characters for titles and 160 characters for descriptions.

General Changes to Search

Some general changes in 2013 that apply to all search engines might be:

  • Links for the sake of links can be a bad thing. Focus on links that apply to your content.
  • Using too many keywords looks even more like keyword stuffing.

Technorati suggested no more than three uses of a keyword on a page. However, search engines would counsel, write naturally.

I said “might be” above. That’s because these rules have always been under close scrutiny by search engines. They are just getting more enforcement among more search engines now.

A forum earlier in the year noticed that Bing and Yahoo were updating their algorithm for links to give an edge to branded domain names. That gives the brand owner the authority of the link, not you the website linking to it.

A contributor on Search Engine Land focusing on maintaining links noted more relevance was being given to links to interior pages instead of home pages. In fact, if you check the links to your site and there is a higher percentage going to your home page than to interior pages, it suggests your content is of less quality. It pays to maintain your links!

Making the Differences Between Search Engines Work for You

Most businesses – and some SEO practitioners – have decided that since Google is the dominant search engine, they should just optimize for Google. But that’s ignoring huge swaths of the marketplace. Bing is working hard at being competitive and its share of search is steadily growing at Google’s expense. Their recent advertising blitz comparing their search results against Google’s is making a difference.
Here’s how you can make the differences between search engines work for you.

  • Roost on your site analytics and watch where your traffic originates. There are dozens of search engines, some of them focusing on unique markets, which may be searching for your site. Don’t lose traffic because “Google is dominant in search.” Here are the current 15 most popular search engines. If you have a specialty site, some of these smaller search engines may help you increase traffic.
  • Register with Webmaster Tools on Bing as well as Google and watch for things like Link Alerts (Google) and Crawl Error Alerts (Bing) for opportunities to improve site performance. (Yahoo uses Bing Webmaster Tools and Ask uses Google Webmaster Tools.) Follow their guidelines – note the similarities, and if traffic flows from a particular search engine, note and make use of the discrepancies.
  • With recent revelations of search engine compliance with NSA snooping into citizen Internet use, there has been noticeable growth in smaller, more secure search engines like StartPage and Ixquick. Remember to consider their effect in your traffic increases or decreases. Note: StartPage gets search results from Google; Ixquick sources its results from multiple search engines.

The truth remains: If you write quality content for the reader, you are unlikely to run into problems with any search engine. Optimization remains the art and science of showing up in a search on any search engine.

Nothing Much in SEO Has Changed in 2013 – and Here’s Why

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Some SEO practitioners look on search engine updates like Google Panda and Google Penguin introduced in 2011 and 2012 respectively, as nuclear option penalty devices. An SEO guy is just doing his job, after all, trying to get his clients noticed in a competitive field. A nip here, a tuck there, ignore some rules over here, wink at a search engine tut-tut back there, and who gets hurt? Search engines don’t see it that way: All the nips and tucks break their rules.

Search Engines are hardly proactive, at least until recently. All their algorithm changes have been reactionary – reacting to SEO practitioners bending the rules or ignoring them altogether to rank ahead of the field in searches. Google Panda (meant to fight thin or low-quality content) and Google Penguin (meant to fight spam) were major adjustments to rein in SEO game playing. And it seems to have worked, because Google has made few other major changes in 2013. Here is a list of Google’s other reactions to-date in 2013.

Google’s 2013 Effort to Tame SEO

#1. Continued minor updates of Google Penguin (to reduce spam) and Google Panda (to reduce thin content).

Panda most recently was a much milder update than in the past and some sites have reported recovering ranking recently.

#2.Loss of relevance of keyword links (anchor text).

The practice once was to make sure you used keywords in anchor text, but Google says that’s no longer as important. They are attaching more relevance to more natural language – write the content naturally and add then add the links. It’s OK to use referral language or even as simple as “click here.” Google is also connecting sites through brand names that aren’t even linked, so keyword linking between brands isn’t always necessary.

#3. Fewer SERPS results per domain name per keyword phrase.

Fewer SERPS per domain name means a business that was used to their website ranking multiple times under the same keyword or keyword phrase will now only rank up to four times. For example, let’s say your domain name is pencils.com and your keyword phrase is 2 lead (as in #2 lead pencil) and before the change, you had SERPS six times for different colored lead or different pack sizes. Now you will only get SERPS for four times for those same colors or packs. Thus, the domain name remains just as relevant, but the number of rankings is lower. Google is trying to reduce the dominance of some players in rankings while making room for others who because of those dominant players were crowding the field.
Thinning out some of the same-domain-name results may help bring up some of the deeper rankings. It’s both a benefit and a bane, depending on how your website ranks.

#4.Refined Google authority algorithm to boost site authority on topics.

Topic or industry authority figures high in ranking and refining this algorithm should aid those with higher quality content and further penalize those with lower quality content. Again, the goal is to benefit the reader, and it also benefits the higher quality content producers.

#5.Less rhetoric on link building, but continued emphasis on link quality.

To reduce the effect of specious or unnatural links, Google is downplaying the number of links in favor of ensuring the links you do include have meaning. Links are still important, but you are rewarded for high quality links and not rewarded simply for having links.

Google 2013 Proactive Steps to Help Webmasters Maintain Links

Surprising SEO practitioners, Google did take two proactive steps that help webmasters manage optimization. They can help you maintain quality content, too.

#1. New “Disavow Links” feature to disavow inbound links.

Acknowledging that competitors and spammers may create links to your site that detract from your ranking, Google now allows you to “disavow” links. Make use of this feature among others in Google’s Webmaster Tools.

#2. New “Link Alerts” feature to help for maintenance of bad links.

Another new feature Google has added to work with websites is “Link Alerts.” When Google discovers problem links, they now alert you through Webmaster Tools and provide example URLs. Another feature on Webmaster Tools is the ability to track all the links to and on your site, which makes following up on Link Alerts easier.

Pleasing the Reader Pleases the Search Engines – Still in 2013

What I have found is that it’s best to ignore all the hype surrounding SEO (Search Engine Optimization, or, optimizing for search engines) and personally work on Website Optimization (optimizing a website for search, or, removing roadblocks and optimizing reader opportunities within my pages). I try to write quality content that – from the beginning – makes the content clear to the reader. When it’s clear to the reader, it will also be clear to the search engines In that respect, nothing much has really changed in 2013.