We all know that Google keep their cards close to their chest as to how they rank websites.

You may have heard recently that Google announced a big change in their algorithm. That’s the method they use to rank your page in the search engines.

It has meant that many sites have dropped their ranking on Google. Some sites that depend on traffic from Google to create income have seen a drop in profits too, which is a bit scary if you rely on that income.

Should you be concerned?

Well, it all depends what your site is like.

This is what the latest algorithm changes do, according to the Official Google Blog:

This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites-sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites-sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on.

So what’s the secret formula?

It’s not that secret… here’s an oversimplified list of what Google is looking for in your website in order to rank it high:

• Create a high quality site
• Create original content
• Create in-depth content
• Be helpful!

There’s a lot more to this than those four points, but if you focus on them, you’re more likely to get the rest right.

We announced right at the start of the new year that we would be bringing you even better quality blog posts that you can actually apply to your business. Looks like this was a wise move.

The SEO newswires have been abuzz lately with the news that JC Penny, a huge department store in the US has been penalised by Google for cheating and using “black hat” SEO techniques to boost rankings for many keywords.  But what did they do and how did they do it? More importantly, how can you ensure you don’t fall into the trap and get penalised yourself?

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If you’ve had a blog on your website (or your website is a blog) you’ll know that it can be quite a challenge to actually get people onto it.

We’ve been getting quite a good amount of people on our blog and here are some of the things that we’ve learned on the way.

1. Commitment

Sorry. There may be some exceptions to the rules, but most blogs take time to build a readership. So the first bit of advice is to commit mentally to the process of building your blog. It will pay off as you build your reputation in your market. Read the rest of this entry »

This is just a short post and update to the details of our upcoming event on the 11th August in Birmingham:

“Turn Your Website into a Sales and Marketing Machine”

We have decided this month that we will be donating half the money from the tickets to Barnardos. They are an awesome charity (in our opinion), running 415 projects across the UK.

Whatever the issue from drug misuse to disability; youth crime to mental health; sexual abuse to domestic violence; poverty to homelessness; Barnardo’s believes we can bring out the best in every child.

So we thought, as a business, let’s get more exposure and money to them so they can do more of what they do best.

We hope to see you at the event if you can make it.

BOOK HERE… http://www.eventelephant.com/onlinemarketingevent

… According to Fifa, it didn’t…

This was the joke banded around yesterday after the terrible decision of disallowing England’s second goal even though it was a foot over the line. There was uproar for about 20 minutes, until German scored their third and fourth goal to finish England off.

After 90 minutes, when all was said and done, it was the poor performance people we’re talking about. Not the fact that the goal line technology should be upgraded and they should allow the referee to watch replays. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s search tool open season at the moment! A few weeks ago ‘WolframAlpha’ was launched with a fanfare and the headlines saying it was a ‘Google Killer’ which it obviously was not, and now it’s Microsoft’s turn.

Having pretty much failed to set the world aflame with ‘Live Search’, they hope their next big thing will be ‘Bing’.

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The problem with being in ‘I.T’ is that you get called upon to fix anything even remotely computer related. So when I was round a friend’s today, the task in hand was to connect the Wii to the Wi-Fi to ensure it got all its updates.

This involved some configuring of the router and that’s when I thought it had all gone terribly wrong…

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I said this was catch-up!

One of our recent customers thought their existing website was confusing to customers and so they asked us to make it simple, easy to navigate and eye-catching. We did all three and using some clever technology we created a site that never needs to be updated, yet has the flexibility of a fully blown CMS system.

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Recently, we’ve been approached my many companies who are just fed up with their current or recently sacked web developers or SEO team. Sometimes they’ve had their website development handled by someone in house (usually the IT team – a big mistake) or sometimes they’ve just had a pretty poor relationship with a freelancer or designer.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s impossible to be on the same page with all your customers and it’s the mark of a good company when they can stand proud and move away from a relationship when it’s not working.

However some, especially in the search engine world, will try anything to keep hold of a company. They will even resort to giving promises and guarantees that are just impossible to keep. Have you ever been told by a company that they can get you to number one on Google guaranteed? I’m sure you have, it’s almost an addiction within the industry to blurt out the word whenever they’re talking to potential companies.

Well, it appears a company in the US has been taken to task over it.

http://www.atg.wa.gov/pressrelease.aspx?&id=21378

This is important. It states that companies making promises that they can’t keep will be chased down and taken to task. Will this ever happen in the UK? I doubt it, but the fact that it’s happened and is quite high profile means that it will help to inform business that this company that phones up and says “We will make you number one on Google” are obviously stretching the truth.

But why can’t they guarantee it?

Well, Google (and other search engines) really don’t have any obligation to index your website. They’re a company just offering a service to users and if they don’t want to index a site then they are quite within their rights to happily ignore it.

And that’s it. There are no guarantees with search engine optimisation. At all.

It seems that there can be no good news at the moment. Even ‘not too bad’ news is seen as ‘bad news’ in a media that is constantly looking to put down the economy, the country and the general state of the world.

For instance, news out yesterday (Startups.co.uk) and repeated constantly on the BBC tries to paint a poor picture for retailers. Apparently, sales are down on a year ago (considering we’re in the middle of a recession, not too much of a shock) and are the worst for three years (again, if three years ago they were similar when we weren’t in a recession, isn’t that ‘not too bad at all‘?)

But the real ‘non-shocker’ is that it is expected that Internet sales will rise over Christmas. If you’re an Internet user, developer or marketer then you can happily blow a raspberry in the direction of the world and say “I told you so”.

For some, the Internet is a mystery. These are probably the same individuals that think the Renaissance happened to other people.

The Internet is here, it’s ubiquitous and it’s bringing riches and prosperity to many. The fact that retails sales are down isn’t bad news, it’s ‘things have changed’ news and it should be welcomed. However, the recession is bad news and constant harping on about statistics that mean essentially nothing to a layman serve nothing but to worry and confuse.

If news and media keep on their apparent crusade of downplaying economic data in this way, we will hit the recession hard and full on. It will take companies down with it who don’t deserve to fail.

Now is the time to make the best of a bad thing. If you’re a marketeer, go and point out to your clients that today is the day to stand out from the crowd and make a difference. As most other companies are running scared, the ones who are brave can really put their head above the parapet and shine.