Getting (and staying) indexed is gonna get a LOT harder...

[bcowan]

Hi All,

I've just spent the last two hours reading through a fascinating book speculating on search engine developments in the near future. Now this book is based on interviews with some of the leading 'web experts' and I must say it's got me thinking....

As you would guess the clever money is on the fact that the se's will continue and enhance its ranking technology on content, content, content resulting in 'vortals' (verticle / niche market searches). While this is all and good there are a number of particular issues that spring to mind:

1. Penalties for 'duplicate' content.

Well, you might think 'Quite Right Too' but, wait a minute 'sharing' content has been a mainstay webmaster content building / site promotion technique for years. What will happen to the ezine sites? Every site will need (100%ish) unique content, etc, etc

"All of the search engines will continue to tighten their filters on duplicate contentwhich will reduce the SEO impact of some strategies like article distribution, press releases, etc..."

2. Affiliates being listed in their own category.

It seems that there is a view that Google particularly (so others will follow...) to differentiate between the source 'vendor' and affiliate sites, i.e. those offering some 'duplicate' content from the vendor.

"Private Label content (or affiliated sites) ... will be registered in a new directory of affiliate sites"

Mmmm, where is this leading? If I were a buyer where would I go the 'vendor' or the affiliate?

3. Preferential ranking of PPC customers.

No surprise here, the general consensus seems to be that your rank will be influenced by how many dollars you spend.

These are just the immediate thoughts that come to mind but it does make me wonder whether continuing with the 'search engine tango' is worth it? Maybe would should all take a leaf from Harvey Segal who has come out and declared that he's 'Finished with Google!'.

I hope this has given some food for thought....

(Get a copy of the full report here...)

 

[KLB]

1. Penalties for 'duplicate' content.

Well, you might think 'Quite Right Too' but, wait a minute 'sharing' content has been a mainstay webmaster content building / site promotion technique for years. What will happen to the ezine sites? Every site will need (100%ish) unique content, etc, etc

"All of the search engines will continue to tighten their filters on duplicate contentwhich will reduce the SEO impact of some strategies like article distribution, press releases, etc..."

I've been saying this for years and it is the way it should be. Duplicate content does not add any unique value to the Internet as a whole and from a SE's perspective does not serve the interests of the consumer. I've always felt that building one's web business on duplicate content was a flawed plan in the long run.

Personally I spend a lot of money paying writers to write original articles that add something unique to the Internet. Let's face reality, web publishers produce duplicate content because it is easy and a cheap way to generate SE fodder to get ads in front of users and generate income. If SEs can successfully weed out duplicate content, then unique content will become more valuable and web publishers will be forced to actually add something of value to the collective knowledge rather than just scheming of cheap and easy ways to get eyeballs for ads.

Yes this means some affiliate sites and programs will have to rethink their strategy, but the good ones will adapt and it could mean that there is less junk in the signal to noise ration in search results.

 

[Rob_TID]

Exactly right,

If you have something of value on your site, then there is no need to worry. Working to try to "trick" the search engines is a race against time because they will only get better and better at spotting it.

If you provide something of unique value then you have nothing to worry about.

As for affiliate links being penalised, again if you have provided unique value and content then I don't see how they could be penalised. If you provide copied content then you should be worried.

 

[bcowan]

SEO Rankings

Thanks for the responses.

Please don't misunderstand I'm certainly not defending spammy websites that simply regurgitate published information.

If anything I'm more concerned about the idea that SE rankings should be dictated by your PPC spend. This surely undermines the efforts of SEO specialists in that, despite your high quality, unique content, the higher rankings will simply be a matter of advertising budget...

Increasingly internet marketing development is evolving around 'viral' campaigns it is no surprise that many are abandoning the SEO route (read Harvey Segal's comments here).

In other words are the SE' forcing many away from that route?