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Posts Tagged ‘google caffeine’

If you do not have a Google Webmaster Central account, you should.  If you have a Google Webmasters account, you should be using it.

Be sure to take advantage of their new speed tools. From your account, select your website.  Then:

Click Labs + Site Performance.

You will see a graph (if enough data exists about your website) depicting how fast your website loads in comparison to the general population of websites.

Under this graph be sure to read “Page Speed Suggestions.”  This will give you an overview of ways to improve your sites’ speed performance.

In case you missed the announcement, in April 2010, Google launched a new algorithm called “Google Caffeine” in which websites with slow loading pages can be penalized or even dropped from search engines.

If what you see makes no sense to you, contact and SEO / SEM professional to help you understand what needs to be done.   Just be sure to take any specific website cautions from Google seriously:  if Google is warning you that your website needs to be optimized for speed — do it!

If you are on an SEO contract that only gives you periodic “site refreshes” you better be checking your page stats.

In April 2010, Google changed its page ranking algorithms adding page load time as a factor in assigning rank (this change was dubbed, “Google Caffeine.”) Around the first of May, Google made another rather significant and lasting change in their algorithms for matching long-tail searches, and, to a lessor extent, head keywords (popular searches.)  Web masters have unofficially referred to the second change as “Mayday.” (View Matt Cutt’s video below.)

Do Not Wait for a Scheduled “Site Refresh” if Your Page Views Are Dropping Now

If your website is not rolling with the times (and that does not mean twice yearly refreshes,) you may be seeing your sites’ traffic drop (if you have not already suffered loss of page views and search engine visibility.)  We are not talking about “summer slump” when site traffic dips all over the internet world.  We are talking significant drops that last more than a couple of weeks.

Let me be clear:  “refreshing” your website is a good idea — but it is not SEO if it is not done often, as needed, and in targeted response to consumer web browsing trends and to changes in search engine algorithms.

Think of a site refresh of sprinkling baking soda on dirty laundry once or twice a year.  It does not get your clothes clean, it does not make them wearable;  it only temporarily covers the smell to give the appearance of clean.  Real SEO cannot be done on a calendar; it is labor intensive and requires knowledge of how search engines work — and a keen research-based understanding of how and what keywords people are searching for at any given time.

Most Websites Get the Majority of Their Total Traffic From Long-Tail Searches

It’s true.  We all go after those hot “mylocation civil rights attorney” type keywords for our clients, but that is not where the bulk of your traffic will come from — even if you are number one on Google for popular keywords.  More people, when similar terms are combined, use long-tails than short-tails.  And, if your site is no longer in sync with Google, you could lose a significant amount of traffic if your long-tail search presence in search engines drops.

We strongly advise you to check your page views – if they seem to be unusually low, call your SEO/SEM company and ask them why.

As web development professionals, we have no control over how and when search engines make changes that affect our clients.  But we do have a responsibility to immediately inform clients (which, by the way we, did) of changes and how their sites could be affected — and what we plan to do about it for them.

If your SEO company has told you there is nothing they can do about changes in your sites’ performance, “it’s a Google thing,” then you need to fire your web marketing company.  People hire SEO / SEM companies because it is a Google thing.  You hire us because we are supposed to know what to do about it.

Related: Google Caffeine: FAQS About Changes in Google’s Page Rank Algorithms and How it Affects our Clients