Not so fast!

While Google states “search results, like warm cookies right out of the oven or cool refreshing fruit on a hot summer’s day, are best when they’re fresh”, that doesn’t directly correlate to “new” content being recognized as fresher than the rest.

ALL content has an expiration date, but whether that is today, tomorrow or last week depends on the value that content creates for its user;

1. Can it be found? Is it relevant? Well optimized content includes cues in the code (e.g. title tag, meta description) that better allow Google to index and present for a relevant query. Fresh means nothing if it’s served up as the incorrect answer to a search query.
2. Is the content unique or does it simply rehash other content without additional insight? We know from this year’s Panda updates that Google is harping on content quality. Although unique and original aren’t the only criteria, value is in a content’s ability to engage or educate or entertain or enlighten and freshness can contribute to whether it’s valuable enough to maintain a users interest once they arrive.
3. Is it worth sharing? Probably more important than any Google-created “value” assignment, is whether content is deemed worthy of sharing with friends, colleagues or the occasional Google+ passerby. Social is a real-time medium, providing valuable clues via data search engines can measure, that content has value (and is “fresh” – in the 70′s style of hip and happening).
4. Is there buzz, trending or other indicators that a topic is “hot“? Beyond social is Google’s massive data mining operation that monitors billions of individual “moments” online and is able to glean trends efficiently and at scale. For example, an article on a Royal Wedding might have little interest until a Royal Wedding is imminent, and then might warrant a ‘fresher’ tag or at least a little more prominence when Google sees relevance, a recent article post date, and some existing SEO authority.

The Google post ends: “Different searches have different freshness needs. This algorithmic improvement is designed to better understand how to differentiate between these kinds of searches and the level of freshness you need, and make sure you get the most up to the minute answers.”

Which essentially equates to “the more things change, the more they stay the same.”

Nothing much appears to have changed apart from Google continuing to focus on relevance.

Although Google’s “quality deserves freshness” mantra still rings in many SEO ears, my thought prefers the caveat of “quality deserves relevance = fresher“.

Just be sure to check the expiration date at the bottom of your pages

I watch for specials of things I need and quickly scoop up the necessities; money, budget and floor space permitting.

In the course of this bargain hunting, I’m always looking for “the better cart” or the “better shopping experience,” allowing me to highlight the best, as well as the ‘not so best’ ecommerce experiences.

One of my pet peeves is the displaying of out-of-stock items with tantalizing pricing.

Buy this brand new Mercedes for only 10 bucks – if it actually was ever in stock I probably would!

Although I’ve never actually seen a Mercedes offered for a 10 spot, just so people don’t think I’m making this stuff up (as if!), here’s an example I saw today from my favorite home store Home Depot.

My discovery…

What’s this? An overstocked special! Only $13.25 for this magnificent 15″ Camelia Pot Planter!!

OMG I have to have a few for my budding Camellia collection!

ONLY $13.25 REDUCED FROM $52.98 – O-M-G!

Read on a little and surprise, surprise, this little gem of a bargain is Out of Stock online, but wait… it’s an Online Only deal with a lovely green check mark.

Does that mean it’s available online and I should ignore the Out of Stock exclamation?

What are my Camellias to do? What am I, the potential customer to do?

Well…

Find another perfect pot at a perfect price, I guess. The green checkmark is just a tease to excite my inner shopper, only to disappoint the same with a grey exclamation of unavailability.

It’s hard to believe it’s that difficult to configure a cart so that it DOESN’T SHOW OUT-OF-STOCK ITEMS in search results or category pages.

There’s probably a checkbox just waiting to be checked on a platform with a million checkboxes to configure. So please check away!

Finally… Mr. Home Depot… you DO KNOW Camellia has two Ls, correct?

In fact, I surprised a few folks today when I recalled my first entrepreneurial foray into search with “VideoMetro”, a video community (pre YouTube) that some mates and I created for iMovie users to share their masterpieces – 1MB at a time. That was back in ’96, and I’ve been passionate about search & online ever since.

So what’s happened since then? Google was created and has grown into a dominant “intent interpretation engine”, Microsoft & Yahoo are joined at the hip, and former industry leaders like Excite, Lycos & Alta Vista… Alta Vista who?

So while a lot has changed some things have remained the same, namely change itself.

Nowhere is this more evident than with Google search results page layouts.

What started as “stark” is morphing into something more complex at each new iteration of their search results pages (SERP).

I’m not certain if this is a manifestation of Google A.D.D., or if there’s some master plan Google designers and engineers are working towards, but I do know that more often than not search result page layout updates threaten the very simplicity that Google was built upon.

Just this week Google added in brand sitelinks, an ugly and less-than-optimal implementation of an average idea. I mean I *get* it, but aren’t there much better opportunities to improve the SERP than this??

For me? Better snippets and more obvious filtering options.

What do *YOU* think could be the biggest improvement Google could make to their SERP?

(Google… You listening?)

It’s a filter that stops anyone but SEO pros from seeing certain SEO articles online.

It puts a score from 1/10 on every SEO article to show the level of trust & possible truth behind *any* SEO “secret,” “theory,” “opinion,” or “definitive fact.”

It states in big, bold, red letters that “WE DON’T ACTUALLY KNOW 100%” and every article should have a warning from the SEO General:

“SEO Articles can seriously harm your website and ability to rank well.”

At The Search Agency, we know that for every opinion – however much they may be based on testing, best practices & experience – there are 20 other opinions that may or not hold some modicum of merit.

Blindly following the “SEO article du jour” as a primary SEO strategy leads to wasted time, energy, and may negatively impact a site’s ability to rank. So we don’t!

With the plethora of SEO article authors and articles themselves freely available on the web, and fame as easy to come by as a catchy “hook”, recognition as an “SEO Expert” circa 2011 is a lot easier than writing a book, or presenting at an industry conference. When *anyone* can find and read an article that states an opinion as definitive fact, the SEO Professional’s recommendations get a little bit more difficult to both justify and / or defend.

“What do you mean page rank sculpting doesn’t work? This article from 2007 states that you have to maintain all link juice within a page for SEO.”

“I need to repeat my keyword at least 40 times in my page copy. That’s what this SEO expert says!”

“DoctorLinkJuice.com recommends I set up 20 Twitter accounts I can point them to my website to get more social links.”

Google’s algorithm is a moving target, so the better way to try and hit it isn’t to chase after and hope you catch it (i.e. reading every article and trying every tactic or strategy mentioned) – rather it’s better to plant your feet firmly in place, take aim and try a different arrow every now and then.

And how do you know which SEO articles and opinions to trust?

Here’s a great, industry-leading SEO resource that offers terrific insights and sound research.

On ABC7 News this morning, they were interviewing one of the stiff upper lip catering managers as they discussed how fastidious they were in planning and executing every detail of the most special of British days, to ensure “nothing was left to chance.”

Now far be it from me to introduce irony and doubt to such a blessed union’s event, but I must admit to being a little surprised at the comment.

Any service-driven company – including our very own agency – should seek to ensure *every* wedding engagement would leave nothing to chance.

In fact, at The Search Agency we have checks and balances on most of our planning and processes to try and make certain (at least as far as the Google gremlins allow), nothing is ever left to chance, or whims of search engine giants.

Our SEO teams frequently state that in the absence of certain tags, indicators or cues, search engines will make their own decisions (e.g. SERP snippets), so we attempt to anticipate and cover all bases to mitigate any surprises where possible.

Our SEM teams are constantly monitoring (leveraging our AdMax™ platform and good old human eyeballs) impression volume, spend, CPAs and a whole host of PPC factors to ensure as little is “left to chance” as is human and algorithmically possible.

So at risk of losing any possibility of a knighthood from Her Royal Highness <bowing>, I’d like to give the Royal planners a swift kick up their Royal bums for even suggesting that the “Katilliam” Royal Wedding would be anything less than perfectly executed. Because that’s exactly how every engagement should be.

In this update, Google wants to “reduce rankings for low-quality sites — sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites — sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis…”

What this means in a nutshell:

Rule #1: Create unique, valuable content. Period.
Rule #2: In case you haven’t in the past… Follow rule #1.

As a search practitioner, I’d like to add a couple more elements…

1. Ensure your content is accessible, logically organized, and shareable.
2. Promote your content effectively (including social channels)

Over the next few weeks, we expect to see fluctuations in rankings and associated traffic.  As Google notes, “some sites will go up and some will go down.” What shouldn’t happen is a panic to ‘correct course’ or make significant changes to current best practice tactics (see Rule #1).

TSA has always supported clients in strategic initiatives to create, maintain, enhance and promote the uniqueness and value of their web presence.

Although there’s a lot of clucking out on the Interweb today, the sky isn’t falling by any means. With change (and a bit of blue sky poking through) comes opportunity.

Since launch, Microsoft has built awareness of its “decision engine” through a massive television and radio advertising campaign, leading to an almost 10 percent “share of search” in the consumer search market. Although it may seem like a small slice of the pie in comparison to Google, Bing’s share represents over 1.5 billion US searches per month, a number that can’t (and shouldn’t) be ignored.

So how can a webmaster leverage this search volume for additional insight and opportunity?

At the recent SMX Advanced Conference in Seattle, Microsoft presented a preview of the next version of Bing Webmaster Tools (BWT) with a feature Microsoft dubs the “Index Explorer” which provides webmasters with a tree-like view of the crawling and index data for their website. Within the tree view, webmasters can access specific data management controls—URL blocking, cache blocking, and recrawl requests—at each level, something Google may want to emulate in their own Google Webmaster Tools interface.

For those less familiar with the Bing webmaster offering, now is a great time to revisit and recommend implementation and verification of sites under their control.

Bing’s current Webmaster Center Tools offers tools sectioned into seven parts:

• Summary tool: webmasters can check the status of their website, see data about the last crawl, check the domain score and page score, and the estimated number of indexed pages.
• Profile tool: webmasters can add information about their site profile and their contact information.
• Crawl Issues tool: provides an overview of issues identified by Bing during the crawling and indexing process.
• Backlinks tool: this tool generates a list of inbound links, which can be downloaded for offline viewing and editing.
• Outbound Links tool: similar to the Backlinks tool, the Outbound Links tool provides a list of URLs leading to other websites.
• Keywords tool: this tool allows webmasters to see how their website will perform against searches for a specific keyword or key phrase in the form of a webpage score.
• Sitemaps tool: enables webmasters to provide Bing with a comprehensive list of content to crawl.
• Robots.txt validation tool: this tool checks your robots.txt file for any incompatibilities with MSNBot that may affect how the site is indexed on Bing.

So why now?

Back in February, Microsoft and Yahoo won approval from U.S. antitrust regulators to embark on their search partnership, where Microsoft will be powering search results and paid search listings on Yahoo pages. Though Google remains the dominate global search with almost 72% percent, this Binghoo partnership will result in a worthy and “not to be ignored” competitor.

Now is the perfect time for webmasters to verify their (and their client’s) websites with Bing Webmaster Tools as well as make certain websites are optimized for Bing’s algorithm.

What are your thoughts on the Bing vs. Google competition?

What has your experience been with Bing Webmaster Tools?

What features of the next version of BWT are you most looking forward to?

You become more like Yahoo!

Today, Microsoft announced the addition of a very un-search-engine-like entertainment portal at http://www.bing.com/entertainment.

Rather than traditional Google simplicity, Bing’s entertainment page is much more reminiscent of the Yahoo! entertainment portal and is probably a good harbinger of what Microsoft is planning to launch to compete against Google’s market domination.

However, is this really what people want?

Bing said 76% of users polled “want one online destination for entertainment options to eliminate clutter,” and I concur. I’m just not certain that under the Bing brand is the best place for it to appear.

Microsoft appears to have a little schizophrenia about their offerings too.

Within the Bing Entertainment interface (and as the roll-in to the first video I watched), Bing is promoting “the new MSN” which, funny enough,  *also* has an entertainment section!

Microsoft’s own users “want one online destination” so why offer two?

MSN Entertainment

Bing Entertainment

I certainly believe Microsoft’s domination of the desktop and browser via their operating system offers them a chance to dominate valuable and profitable verticals online, unfortunately this Bing addition illustrates the strategic difference between Apple, with a singular focus, and Microsoft, whose strategy appears to be “throw a lot against the wall, and see what sticks.”

Although I’m a big believer in trying new initiatives, Microsoft needs to focus to avoid consumer confusion.

After spending a massive amount of marketing dollars on the Bing brand, it would be prudent (and just plain intelligent) to support those efforts with a singular brand strategy and singular online destination.

Because, Microsoft… that’s exactly what 76% of your prospective audience really wants.

In my 17+ years of marketing I’ve seen fads and trends and media and different mediums come and go.

And though I’ve personally adapted to change, moving from traditional instore display media to online marketing, it never ceases to amaze me how much my kids take the Internet and the almost limitless access to information, almost anywhere, for granted.

And now I feel the same for the seniors in my life.

My mother-in-law and I were going through my iPhone apps, I was explaining what each is for and does. We came across LinkedIn‘s application (which is pretty good BTW) and she asked me what it is / does exactly.

Rather than explain to this 70+ year old – she’d kill me if I gave away any more information about her age! – that Linkedin is (as they explain on their site) “an interconnected network of experienced professionals from around the world, where you can find, be introduced to, and collaborate with qualified professionals to accomplish your business goals.” I simply said…

“It’s like Facebook for business people”

Then it hit me.

I just explained a concept using another online community that I expected and knew my mother-in-law would understand. Facebook is mainstream enough that my mother-in-law not only knows what Facebook is (and goes on there a few times a week), but could use that experience as reference to another online community she knew nothing about.

A true senior moment. A true indicator that online communities are coming of age.

*Now* I feel old

Google Image SERP

As SEO practitioners, we’ve highlighted the importance of image optimization for our clients, Google’s insertion of revenue opportunities (for them) into the image search results, further underscores our belief that more users are looking to image search as a source for relevant results.

Interesting to note, that stock photo vendors have mentioned that image searches lead to a much lower conversion than ‘web search’ primarily due to image search as being a resource for ‘free’ (read illegal) use of assets.

Although that may be true to some degree, as relevance / selection has improved, more users are turning to image search as providing more of what they’re looking for – my search for a nice feng shui layout a case in point.

So is more frequent sponsored image results of major importance to online marketing?

No.

But it does stress the importance Google (and Bing) places on image search, and a further reason to plan for image optimization as part of your SEO strategy.