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Google Confirm Tweet Status Can Effect Natural Ranking Position

Way back at the end of 2009, we heard through the grapevine that there were to be some major changes to the Google Algorithm, and how it would decide which websites would be listed on the first page.

We had heard there would be 6 major changes:

• Site Speed
• Bounce Rate
• Time Spent On Site
• Duplicate Content
• Poor Links
• Social Media

We saw massive changes to some of the ranking positions websites with the May Day update, and there have been other updates that have had the online (SEO) community chatting about since then.

An interview with Dan Sullivan from Google confirmed that the status of your tweets can also feed back to the ranking of your website. What this means is that when you tweet, you are hoping for this to get retweeted by people who have found it interesting. And then some of their followers do the same. This gives your tweet great exposure, however it also gives your tweet some “credibility”.

What Google appear to be looking at is not only how many times your tweet gets retweeted, but also by whom. If you get a tweet retweeted by someone with 1000′s of followers (and add to that the number of followers THEIR followers have) then Google is likely to see your tweet as a valuable piece of information (and give your website some credit back as a result).

Which means two things for businesses and website owners.

1. Get on Twitter – engage, socialise, tell us about your stuff and tell us interesting things about your industry. Be the expert (or at least display a good level of knowledge) about the area you are supposed to be respresenting.

2. Ensure your blog and tweets (that you want retweeting) are about the subject matter on your website. My guess would be that tweets that people find funny (and retweet) will have no bearing on your website (unless you are a comedian).

Another good use of Google Instant?

One of the techniques we use as search engine optimisation consultants is the allintitle: search in Google.

An all in title search will show you the number of websites that have the keyword or keyphrase as part of their page title. This can be a good indicator as to how much competition you are going to face optimising for that keyword – don’t get me wrong, there are many other factors, but this technique can be a good guide. It can also find some great niche search phrases with reasonable search numbers and little competition.

Not sure what I mean? Let me show you a couple of examples for the client I was doing the research for today:

Wireless CCTV camera has 720 exact match searches per month, but 15,800 web pages with this phrase in their page title.

Wireless CCTV cameras (plural) has 480 exact match searches per month, but only 822 web pages with this phrase. For the little difference in monthly search numbers, in this instance, it is worth investigating all the other SEO stuff for the client to see if we can optimise their web page for Wireless CCTV cameras.

The problem has always been (for me anyway) that when you start to do these searches (and usually you have a great long list of keywords to work through), Google will kick you out, saying that it feels you are generating automated requests. You can swap your browser (I usually go Firefox, IE, Safari and Google Chrome), but eventually they all get blocked (and the final few seem to get blocked quicker). This often leaves you half way through your keyword research, waiting for Google to “trust” you again. You can clear your cookies etc, but it can be a pain.

Today I thought I would test the allintitle search using Google Instant search results. I signed in, set the web results to the UK and ploughed on with my research. I didn’t get ditched ONCE by Google AND it was a much quicker way to see the results. I have used a couple of automated programmes in the past however these have also faced the same problem, after a few requests Google closes the search facility – so maybe Google Instant search will prove to be a great tool for SEO after all!!

Advertiser Ratings Showing In Google.com UK Searches

I came across a blog post yesterday from Patrick at Blogstorm talking about the advertiser ratings finally hitting these shores.

At the moment it still only appears to be working on Google.com (albeit showing UK based searches) – however when you try to same search on Google.co.uk there doesn’t appear to be anything listed.

What will be interesting to monitor is the difference on click through rate these ratings have. It will also be interesting to monitor how less than impressive feedback ratings will effect click through rates.

What is clear is that all Google AdWords advertising selling their products via the Google Shopping search really need to be encouraging more feedback from their clients as soon as possible.

Promoted Who To Follow Now Live In Twitter

At the end of September, Twitter announced they would be offering a new service (for a fee), allowing people to promote themselves into the “Who To Follow” suggestion list of Twitter users. The same algorithm used for the existing “who to follow” interface is used – therefore if you are talking alot about “Internet Marketing” then don’t be surprised to see people in your “Who to Follow” list who are internet marketers.

Anyway – I have just seen the first one appear in my list – see the screen shot below (and thought I may as well raise the awareness about it!). This could be a great idea to gain followers genuinely interested in your services or products.

John Lennon Google Doodle – Now with working video

My previous post talked about the awesome Google Doodle produced by Google to celebrate what would have been John Lennon’s 70th Birthday – so here is the video that runs when you click the doodle – enjoy!