Google has announced that they have introduced a new search algorithm within the past week.  That's not news; but what is news is that they estimate that his algorithm changes impacts nearly 12% of the sites they index!  If your site is in that 12% and you move down a page or two in their rankings, the consequences could be dire for your business.  What's the best way to deal with this and other changes that we might see from Google in the future?

The Change

Google says that this change is intended to respond to complaints that they receive about the quantity of "webspam" that's included in Google search results.  "Webspam" refers to low-quality sites that are designed to appear important to search engines by incorporating large amounts of low-quality content.  Examples of such sites are the sites that are used for articles that are used only for Web site promotion, and other sites that might link to them or receive links from them.

Google's goal is to satisfy their customers so that they'll continue to use the search engine, increasing the value of the various kinds of advertising that Google conveys to make its money.  They satisfy their customers by presenting them with search results that don't duplicate each other, that contain relevant content that's of value to Google's customers.  An earlier newsletter in this series talks about this at greater length.

The best way to deal with this change, and with other changes that Google can be expected to make as they seek to satisfy their customers, is to help Google help their customers by insuring that your site has a significant quantity of relevant information about your company, its services and products.  Yes, it does make sense to understand how Google determines what is relevant so that you can give them just what they're looking for; but the point is to work with them, not try to fool them.  If you deliver relevant content that's of high quality, then as Google gets better and better at separating good content from spam, you'll do better and better in search engine position.

The Bottom Line 

Understand that Google wants to deliver a high-quality experience to searchers, who are their customers.  With your own site, help them do their job, by providing lots of content of high quality, well tagged and organized.  If you work with Google instead of against them, you will have little to fear from future algorithm changes.