Google: Ally or Enemy?
Tuesday, April 21st, 2009Is Google "the Man?"
I grew up in the 60's where you weren't supposed to trust anyone over 30 and certainly not big, greedy corporations. Big corporations and big government represented "the Man," the enemy. And "the Man" was always trying to keep you down while taking all the advantages and profits for himself (well, I guess with respect to some corporations, things haven't changed at all).
I realize that Google is gigantic and that's a scary thing. Because we can't control something that large (AIG), we're at it's mercy (to a point) and we can only hope that it's kind and benevolent. Google's stated mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful, but does that make Google "the Man?"
Perhaps it does in some contexts, or even in a lot of them. But, because the focus of this blog and the purpose of my company, IncreaseOnlineProfits.com, is about helping online businesses attract more visitors and create more customers, let's just focus on Google's search function and whether or not it's an ally or an enemy to our businesses.
Gaming the system
Many people try to cheat the search engines. They find ways to artificially get their website ranked higher for a short period of time. They load their pages with invisible keywords, where the font color and the background color are the same. Or they purchase multiple domains and post the same content on each and link to each other, or a whole host of other blackhat (as opposed to whitehat) SEO tricks.
The problem with trying to cheat the search engines is that you will be found out. Don't even begin to think that you can outsmart Google or the others. You can't. You might get by for a little while, but once they catch on, you just might see your website completely deleted from their databases and/or be blacklisted without any chance of returning.
You say to yourself, "So what? I'll just get a new domain name and do it again." But what about your customers? What about your personal sense of integrity? If that's how you want to operate, always looking for a new angle because you got caught using the last one, that's up to you. Personally, I like to go to sleep at night not having to look over my shoulder, knowing that I'm right with the world, that I've treated everyone the way I'd like to be treated.
Is it possible that you and Google want the same things for your website?
Google is a business. It only remains in business for as long as it returns search results that you and I find relevant to our search. If we search for information or pricing for a Flip camera and Google's search page results just returns a listing of electronic stores, is that relevant? Does that help us out?
No, it doesn't. If we continued to received results that didn't save us time and didn't match our query, would we continue to use Google? No, we wouldn't. So, it's in Google's best interest to give it's searchers the most relevant information it can based on the search terms used.
How does this relate to your website?
Google has created a Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide as well as Webmaster guidelines to help improve your site's interaction with users and search engines. Within those guides are suggestions such as:
- Offer quality content and services- write easy-to-read text, stay organized around the topic, use relevant language, create fresh, unique content and create content primarily for your users, not search engines
- Make your site easier to navigate- create a naturally flowing hierarchy, use mostly text for navigation and use "breadcrumb" navigation
- Think about the words users would type to find your pages, and make sure that your site actually includes those words within it
- Offer a site map that points to important parts of your site
- Write better anchor text- that's the clickable text that tells users and Google something about the page it's linked to
- Optimize your use of images- use brief, but descriptive filenames and alt text, supply alt text when using images as links, store images in a directory of their own
- Try to use text instead of images to display important names, content or links. The Google crawler doesn't recognize text contained in images
- Check for broken links and correct HTML
While these suggestions (and there are many more) not only help your website to be found in the search engines, they also help those users who actually click through to your site.
Don't you want to attract more visitors by being more easily found in the search engine result pages? Don't you want to create more customers by having better quality and content, a site that's easy to navigate, easy-to-read text, etc. Aren't these all things that make for a website that people want to visit, stay on, link to?
Is it possible that you and Google are on the same page in this respect? Doesn't it benefit them if you have a quality website with valuable content? Isn't that what they need for their search results? Remember, if Google can't return relevant search results, they lose customers.
Perhaps, they are an ally or can at least be seen as an ally and not the enemy.
Comments...
Have a comment about Google, a different point of view? Please, let me know.
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Rick
