This thinking brings me back to a post I read in December on Google’s blog. I have had it on my mind since then and want to share it. In the post, Google talks about a business owner who treated his customers badly. The twist in this is that the business owner treated his customers poorly on purpose so that he would rank higher in the search engines. Most negative comments he received online had a link back to his website. Inbound links (or links pointing to your website) are considered to be the same as a recommendation for your website. Those recommendations translate into higher listing results. For a while, all of these negative comments were boosting his business.

After finding out about this, Google adjusted their algorithm to fix this problem and will continue to work to punish people who try similar methods.

Quite simply, this tactic comes down to manipulation. Manipulation methods like these may have short-term success, but they tend to eventually backfire and hurt your search results over time. So, be careful about trying to trick the search engines and focus on how you can help your clients and potential customers.

Here is the blog post: Being bad to your customers is bad for business

predicts Internet search queries and shows results as soon as someone begins to type, adjusting the results as each successive letter is typed.

Source: NY Times

After reading the NY Times article I tested out Google Instant and I have to admit that this new search feature is fast, incredibly fast. I did feel it was a little distracting as I typed, though. Distractions aside, GI might also create potential problems for website owners trying to find their place in the search engine rankings.

Possible Paid Problems
According to the article, a lot of Adwords advertisers are concerned about Google Instant because it might drastically change the way people search. This is because with each letter a person types they see instantaneously-updated results. As they see these instant results, people are more likely to stop typing without having to dig deeper using a very specific search term. As a lot of people begin using only broad search engine terms, highly targeted keyword terms in Adsense will not be as effective. Adsense advertisers will then be forced to use broader keywords, which are also more expensive.

Possible Organic Search Problems
The other potential problem is related to the Google advertiser problem above. Google Instant might also change how search engine optimization is handled. As an example, in the past our company might have had to only really compete for the search term “triune designs, Matthews, NC” because that is how people would search for us. Today, though, we have to make sure we also compete with “triune designs” or just “triune” because people would have already seen their search results change six times. With each additional keystroke they might see our possible triune competitors that much sooner.

The potential concerns over Google’s changes help to provide a reminder that no one can simply promise exact search engine results for your website. The only people who have complete control over the results are the search engines themselves. The best place to start for getting your website listed higher in search engines is to create good-quality content on your site that people will want to link to (a.k.a. recommend).

As you begin trying Google Instant I would love to hear if it affects your business and how so. Throw your thoughts in the comments below.

Google Says: “Get More Links”

In general, webmasters can improve the rank of their sites by increasing the number of high-quality sites that link to their pages.

Google’s Ranking Webmasters/Site Owners Help

How? Participate In Community
For many, a website is just an online business card. They just put some information on the site and then tell people to check it out for contact information and a quick egocentric bio. Unfortunately for those businesses they are missing out on the true power of the web: the community.

Here are a few suggestions on how to increase the number of incoming links. What you should notice is that most of the suggestions center around participating in the online community and building an online presence through active interaction.

• Create good content – Make the information on your website helpful, useful, and informative; entertaining; newsworthy; or funny. In other words, make the content on your website worth talking about.
• Read and comment – Read other people’s blogs and participate in their discussions. The web communities are not one-way streets and it is vital for you to be an active participant. The more you get involved, the more you will find people linking to your site/blog.
• Link to others – Again, the web is a two-way street. Link to other people’s or business’ web pages when you find something worth noting. Does someone have a particularly good blog post? Do they excel at a particular service or have a great product? Link to them. You will find that giving other people links becomes reciprocal over the long term.
• Give something away – People like free stuff… and people like to talk about getting cool, free stuff. Therefore, give something away. Whether it is an e-book or one of your products or services, give a little something away for free and people will want to talk about you and link to your website.
• Use Twitter – Have a good blog post on a particular day? Let the Twitter world know and throw it up on your Twitter feed.
• Add your post’s link on Facebook – This should be done a little more sparingly than Twitter. However, if you have a special article that is worth noting, post it on Facebook for all of your friends to see. Perhaps your friends will also find the post special and add a link themselves.

Remember, for small businesses like us, building links to your site is not about quick-fixes or schemes. It is about participating with those around you.

As a final thought before closing, here is Google’s own recommendation on how to build incoming links:

The best way to get other sites to create relevant links to yours is to create unique, relevant content that can quickly gain popularity in the Internet community. The more useful content you have, the greater the chances someone else will find that content valuable to their readers and link to it. Before making any single decision, you should ask yourself the question: Is this going to be beneficial for my page’s visitors?

Google webmaster recommendations, emphasis added

Now, what are you waiting for? Go out there and get involved…

The Lucerne, Switzerland bridge photo is courtesy of Olivier Bruchez on Flickr.

Since it is always such a big question for small business owners I thought I might use a few blog posts to give you Google’s own advice for improving your own search engine rankings.

First, the what not to do. This will help you know where Google draws the line so you know what is recommended and what is not.

Your Own Litmus Test

Google provides a few rules of thumb to help you if you are ever left wondering what is right and what is wrong. Ask yourself these three guiding questions:

1. [Do you] feel comfortable explaining what you’ve done to a website that competes with you?
2. Does this help [your] users?
3. Would [you] do this if search engines didn’t exist?

The Recommendations

Here are some suggestions on what to avoid:

Google’s General Guidelines

• Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines. Don’t deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users, which is commonly referred to as “cloaking.”
• Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings.
• Don’t participate in link schemes designed to increase your site’s ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers or “bad neighborhoods” on the web, as your own ranking may be affected adversely by those links.
• Don’t use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate our Terms of Service. Google does not recommend the use of products such as WebPosition Gold?Ñ¢ that send automatic or programmatic queries to Google.

From Google’s webmaster guidelines

Google’s Specific Guidelines

• Avoid hidden text or hidden links.
• Don’t use cloaking or sneaky redirects.
• Don’t load pages with irrelevant keywords.
• Don’t create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.
• Avoid “doorway” pages created just for search engines, or other “cookie cutter” approaches such as affiliate programs with little or no original content.

From Google’s webmaster guidelines

Check back later to read about Google’s recommendations for what you can do to help improve your rankings.

The “do not cross the line” photo is courtesy of Rob Gallop on Flickr

One way these web-savvy people do this is by using Google Alerts. Google Alerts is one of the most valuable tools in your web marketing arsenal and it is also one of the easiest to use. You just sign up for the service and let Google do all of the work for you.

What Are Google Alerts?
According to Googe, alerts are

email updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic.

You can use Alerts for

• monitoring a developing news story related to your industry
• keeping current on a competitor or industry
• reputation management for your company
• reputation management for yourself

How Do You Use Alerts?
Like I said before, using Google Alerts is very easy. You will first need to sign up for a Google account. Once you have it you can go to Google’s home page and look for My Account.

Next you want to find the Google Alerts link.

(You can also go straight to the Google Alerts page.)

You will now be on the main Google Alerts page. Simply enter the search term, criteria, frequency, and what email address you want to use. Once completed, you will begin receiving the alerts from Google as those search terms are found. Here is a little more information about each option:

Search Term – Enter your search term here. If you are using multiple words in your search I suggest using quotation marks around them. As an example I used the search term “web marketing” abominable snowman. This means I will receive alerts when Google finds information for “web marketing”, abominable, or snowman. I can simply move the quotation marks and it changes the alert completely. If I had used “web marketing abominable snowman” then I would only receive alerts when all four words are found. Using quotation marks is a simple concept, but they can prevent you from getting a lot of unnecessary emails.

Criteria – There are six options available for criteria: news, blogs, web, video groups, and comprehensive. Unless you are looking for something specific I recommend using comprehensive so that you get alerts for everything Google finds.

How Often (Frequency) – There are three options available for how often: as-it-happens, once a day, and once a week. This setting will depend on what you are searching for. I set up alerts for my name and my company. I receive them on an as-it-happens basis. However, in the scenario above, I would rather choose the once a day setting for “web marketing” abominable snowman since having that information is not as urgent.

Deliver To – You can choose from whatever email addresses you have set up with Google.

After clicking on create alert, you will be finished and you can now manage your alerts. While I was on the manage alerts list I went ahead and added another search: “web marketing” yeti. This way I have a pretty comprehensive list that allows me to see how well those snow monsters in the north are handling their web marketing.

2¢ – Your two cents
Do you use Google Alerts? Have you found it to be a valuable tool in your web marketing arsenal? Is there any other advice you would recommend when using Google Alerts? What other Google products do you use to enhance your web marketing? Let me know your thoughts in the comments. I would love to get your two cents.

In preparation for that post, I thought this would be a great question to ask everyone out there the “Triune Designs zone”: do you use Google Alerts?

Our way of saying thanks
As my way to thank you for your thoughts, here is an annoying, yet very catchy song. I hope you get a laugh out of it like I did. Thanks Dan (@djByron) for introducing this to me.