So, we need a quick history lesson on search, according to JD.
First they used meta tags, which people put at the start of each page, so search engines could list you in the right place. But sites starting to lie about their content.
So then search engines developed ways of analysing the content of your pages, so they could list you correctly. But as the numbers of sites increased, it became hard for the search engines to decide which should be number one.
So search engines started looking at links into a page. Taking the view that those ‘recommended’ by links must be the best pages. With the idea that everybody would use blogs and links, this was the latest thinking.
But the Internet is now perceived to be run by social media. We spend more time in Facebook than Google. More of our ‘recommendations’ are coming through Facebook, Facebook pages, tweets and other social media.
Google was starting to feel its dominance was threatened. Could people start using the Facebook search rather than a Google Search? Also, how could it tap into these social media recommendations? They were already paying Facebook for like data.
Well Google is taking more and more notice from links put on social media, but was not going to let all this social space be left without something from the big G. This is where Google Plus comes in. Google Plus is a new social media application. As far as search is concerned you are expected to ‘Plus’ a page, in the same way you can ‘like’ a page.
Google is then using the Google Plus, (and other social media) to influence their Google listings. However, there is one major change in the mindset of the Google listing from this.
In the past a website created ‘power’ from content, links and likes. The more power it had, the bigger its chance of being number one for a search term. Google created something called PageRank, which is still used today. You could also get more page rank when a site, also of high page rank gave you a recommendation.
However, when we start looking at social media, we are not talking about web sites, but people. So Google looks to start giving ‘author rank’ to people. Their contributions will then get better listings than lesser authors. We would therefore expect that over time a group of Authors or Gurus will start to dominate the listings for their particular area of expertise.
This does not mean that all the other methods of listing are dumped. They will still be part of the mix to get your number one google listing. But, the prominance to sites and pages that have ‘Google plus One’ likes, will have increasingly more inportance.
So, you need to rethink your strategy. Preferably you can have an expert or two in the company that will release all your ‘good information’. They will ned a Google Plus account, which is currently limited. Their followers will Google Plus the contributions and you get top listings for your sites. So now life is going to get harder. You need to create content, attribute it to your author and then have it liked.
Hackers and other people who try and subvert Google Listings will have much more trouble now. Just making lots of worthless links is not going to give you top spot.
Of course, companies, like Groupon, hope that you will just take a recommendation from a trusted source like them, which is why Google tried to buy this company recently for around eight billion dollars.
So much of web design is creating sub-concious messages. If you don't follow the rules, you can loose a visitor because your site just 'does not feel right' One of the biggest mistakes for self made or updated web sites is bad use of colour. I am not saying that people should not update their own sites. I encourage that they do, and regularly. Whenever you add content to a site you need to check that it will Look good. you may find this colour wheel a useful way of checking the colours on your site, or for choosing a new colour mix. Of course the colour rules work for all type of medium, web and print. The Colour Wheel