How to Make Google Like You

by Carl Weiss

Image via CrunchBase

What do you feed an 800-lb gorilla?  Anything he wants.  And if that 800-lb gorilla happens to be the world’s most popular search engine named Google, then boy are you going to need a ton of bananas.  Having worked the web since 1995, I can tell you that I have seen a lot of search engines come and go. (The recent closing of AltaVista being one highly publicized case in point.)  But to date none of them has been big and bad enough to more or less own the Internet.  Then along came Google.  Started in 1998 by Sergey Bryn and Larry Page, the search engine quickly gobbled up market share, particularly after going public in 2004.  Today, Google controls more than 81% of search worldwide.  So if you hope to make a splash online then you are going to have to come to terms with the King Kong of search engines.

He's BIG 

Back in the early days, many SEO experts routinely used to amass position by gaming the search engines.  By that, I mean that they used to routinely try to trick the search engine spiders into rating them highly by the use of underhanded tactics such as keyword stuffing and link farms and all other sorts of nefarious deeds.  However, over time, the spiders have gotten wise to such tactics and today the bots are sophisticated enough to detect most forms of cheating.  Sure, you might get away with gaming the system for a few days, weeks or even months, but catch up with you they will and then there will be hell to pay.  The same goes for any clients of firms who still try to cheat the system.  Those tarred with the same brush can not only expect to lose ranking, but they can wind up being blackballed or even delisted, which means that they will have to start from scratch.

He's Hungry

My advice to those who wish to thrive online is simply this: Give the gorilla what he wants.  Today that 

English: a chart to describe the search engine market (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

means content and lots of it.  Gone are the days when you could create a website once every few years and then walk away.  The face of Search Engine Optimization has changed as well.  Before the turn of the century, everything the spiders needed to rank a site was contained on the homepage.  That is no longer the case.  In fact, only 25% of the criteria used to rank a site today is on-site.  The other 75% is off-site.  It is composed of such things as blog posts and social posts, podcasts and videos.  Ranking today is determined by how well the content is crafted and how often it is posted.  That’s right, sports fans; the spiders have learned how to read.  They can tell the difference between an article-length blog and a tweet.  While they can’t comprehend video yet, they can judge such things as length, number of videos on a channel, how often they have been viewed, keywords and comments. 

Another thing about the big guy…He prefers his own brands.  That means if you are going to blog, you want to use Blogger, because Google owns Blogger.  If you want to post videos, then you want to post them on YouTube, because, you got it, Google owns YouTube.  And if you are into social networking, which is an SEO must these days, then you better not leave Google+ out of the mix.  Need I tell you why? 

He's Smart

More importantly, not only do the search engine spiders respect content, so do your prospects and customers.  While many businesspeople lament the fact that crafting weekly blogs, daily social posts and a couple of videos per month take a not insignificant amount of time in an otherwise busy schedule, all I can tell you is that from your audience’s perspective, this is time well spent.  Consumers today are information 

In ur flickr (Photo credit: TaranRampersad)

junkies.  They prefer being shown as to being told.   They will spend more time checking you and your product line out online than ever before. Why not, since it has become so easy.  Reputation management has become big business do to the simple fact that companies can no longer hide slipshod practices, bloated prices and poor customer service.  Business review sites have sprung up like weeds touting scammers, spammers and take-it-on-the-lammers to anyone who cares to read.  The search engine spiders can also pick up on less than stellar reputations and will not only take appropriate action, they have also been known to hold a grudge.  This means that not only do you have to protect your reputation; in the digital age you are also forced to police your reputation as well.

So if you truly want to make the grade online, you need to take the time to provide quality content on a consistent basis that engages your audience and satisfies both the search engines and your audience.  This means providing multimedia offerings in the form of video and audio as well as the written word.  You also need to make sure your online reputation shines.  Last but not least you need to make the care and feeding of the 800-lb gorilla in the room a priority.  Because if you don’t provide the gorilla with bananas, then all you are likely to see online is goose eggs.  And they won’t help you fill the coffers.

Carl Weiss is president of W Squared Media Group a Jacksonville, Florida firm that specializes in online marketing.  He also owns and operates Jacksonville Video Production.  You can also interface with Carl every Tuesday at 2pm on his Working the Web to Win radio show.