Does Google Instant Change The SEO Game ?

Google unveiled a nifty new way to search their index yesterday. It's called "Google Instant" and it automatically populates the page with the search results as you type. So, for instance, when I type "life" the search results for "lifetime" are instantly shown. 


When I then type a space and an "i" ("life i") those results are replaced with the results for "life insurance" and so on. There's no need to hit the "enter" key.


I read an article in PC World that made the postulation that "SEO could rely on letter rankings rather than word rankings in the near future." I've even read wild theories that Google Instant "will kill SEO" because no two users see the same suggestions as they type.
So does Google Instant change the SEO game? I say no, at least not in its current form.


Do you need to optimize for letters instead of words now?


Let's first debunk the "letter ranking" myth. SEO will not start to rely on letter rankings, at least not in the current form of Google Instant, because Instant populates the search results for the most popular keywords in the suggested terms drop-down -- not for the fragment of keywords the user has typed.


That is, when you type "life i", since "life insurance" is the most popular suggested phrase that matches "life i" it shows the results for the full phrase "life insurance." Google does not populate the search results with what's best optimized for the fragment "life i."
So you don't have to run out and optimize your site for "life i" in an effort to have your site show up first when a user typing "life i" is looking for "life insurance." Google is still showing the results best optimized for "life insurance", not "life i."


Does this mark the death of SEO?


I always roll my eyes when I read another article claiming that some change marks the end of search engine optimization. This situation is no different.


The claim some are making is this: Google personalizes the suggestions that appear in the drop-down box as you type keywords into the search engine, so no two users will see the same results. That is, if I type "Mexican rest" Google Instant automatically shows me the results for "Mexican restaurants Dallas" since I live in the Dallas metro. But somebody in Seattle would see a different set of results. So the crowd who thinks the SEO sky is falling is saying that the phrase "Mexican restaurant" won't have as much value anymore because Google Instant prevents people from ever seeing the results that are best optimized for that phrase without the location on the end.


A nice thought, but wrong. Google was geo-targeting results for local phrases long before Google Instant was released. Even before Google Instant automatically populated the results for Mexican restaurants in Dallas, I would see almost those same results if I just searched for "Mexican restaurants" alone. So not much has changed there. Webmasters have had to adapt to Google's geo-locating their results for a few years now.


The second part of the "death" claim is that the feedback given by Google as you type will change what people search for. They reason that because Google is instantly showing search results as you type, people will stop typing before they ever get to the long tail keywords you've optimized for.


Wrong again. For instance, let's say I want to sell my used car, so I start typing "used car values" to see what it's worth. When I get to "used car" Google shows web sites selling used cars. Why would I stop typing there? It's not showing what I want. On the other hand, if I continue and type "used car v" -- I get results for "used car values." So the web sites optimized for "used car values" are still going to get my visit! I'm not going to stop on results that aren't what I'm after just because Google automatically pops them onto the screen.


While it's true that some searches might be affected by that (e.g. the #2 result for "chicken soup" is for a chicken soup recipe, so if I was going to type "chicken soup recipe" I might stop at "chicken soup"), that hardly signals the "death" of SEO. It just means that webmasters will need to do their research to find out if they need to optimize for a different (or additional) set of keywords.


What Google Instant Might Mean For SEO


One thing that the release of Google Instant might mean for those of us optimizing our sites is that the suggested keywords are going to get more traffic than they did before. Since Google auto-populates the results based on the most popular keyword suggestions, people are going to be shown those results instantly and may decide to go with one of the phrases in the drop down instead of continuing to type out the query they had in mind before. This has been happening since Google first introduced the suggestions in the drop-down, but Instant may magnify that somewhat.


So it would be wise to research the keywords your site is currently ranking for to see if they pop up in the keyword suggestions list as you type. If not, you may want to do some additional optimizing for some of the keywords that do appear in the list.


What Do I Think Of Google Instant?


In case you care, I think Google Instant is pretty cool. It certainly does save some typing time, and it's fast enough that it doesn't slow me down even though I type 130+ words a minute. Once it reaches mobile devices it'll be great since typing is much slower on most mobiles.


But as far as SEO goes, not much is going to change based on this version of Instant. Google's Keyword tools will start to reflect the new search volumes keywords are getting due to the change over to Instant, and webmasters will optimize for those keywords as they always have.


If Google decides to modify the way Instant works things may be different -- but who could predict all of the changes that have occurred over the last few years that webmasters have had to adapt to? There's no sense in trying to second guess the industry. All webmasters can do is what they've always done -- adapt as it happens.


For now, however, the SEO sky is certainly not falling.

Number 1 In Google

If you don’t know what SEO is, SEO is simply the process of improving your search engine’s ranking for the keywords you are targeting.

As far as SEO is concerned, I’m essentially doing only 4 things to get the results...

1. Get as many 1 way incoming link from as many sites as possible


This means that you go out there and gather 1 way link from other sites to your site (make sure that the sites you’re trying to gain links from is “do-follow”, or to put in another way “nofollow free”). You can do this via blog commenting, forum signatures, social networking and bookmarking sites, submitting your site to directories, etc.


However, doing this manually is a monotone process which can get VERY time consuming and VERY boring (at least for me). Personally, I really hate doing repetitive tasks like these, which is why I’ve been using professional link building services for my link building campaign for almost 2 years now.


Not only does this save me hundreds of DREADED hours trying to find 1 way incoming links to my site, it saves me the hassle of having to keep track which sites have I submitted to gain a backlink to my site.


I might as well invest my money into professionals who know what they are doing and use the time I saved to focus on other more important larger-scale aspects of my business.


Seeking reciprocal linking partners where “I link to you and you link to me” almost no longer works. You might say that this method still work. But why invest your time and energy soliciting these kinds of links when you can instead build 1 way incoming links by spending the same amount of, if not less, time and effort?

2. Use the keyword you’re targeting as the anchor text for the incoming link


Getting 1 way incoming link to your site is great ONLY when you use the keywords you’re targeting as the anchor text of the link.


For example, let’s say you’re trying to target for the keyword phrase “make money on the internet” (without quotes). When seeking 1 way incoming links from other sites, be sure to make the phrase “make money on the internet” (again without quotes) hyperlinked so that when people click this link, they’ll be taken to your site.


This is VERY important and it will play a huge success in the success of your SEO campaign. The more incoming links (with your targeted keyword phrase as the anchor text) you have, the better your sites’ ranking will be in Google.


CAUTION: If you’re seeking links from a lot of sites, be sure to vary your incoming links a little. You should have at least 3 different but related keyword phrases that you’re targeting.  Doing this will help your site “fly under the radar” so that Google will not penalize you.

3. Put the keyword you’re targeting into the title tag


Although not as important as the first two factors mentioned above, inserting your targeted keyword phrase into the title tag will help your search engine ranking.


You do this by using the tag within your site.
Using the same example again, if you were to target the keyword phrase “make money on the internet” (without quotes), you’d use this:

You can insert additional words before or after your targeted keywords to make your site look natural to human eyes as well.

4. Make sure that the keyword you’re targeting is mentioned in the body content of your site


This is the least important factor compared to the other three when it comes to ranking your site on Google.


If you can, strive to insert your targeted keyword a few times (DO NOT overdo it) within your site and you should be fine.


So to summarize, if you want to rank well in Google (especially number 1 in Google), you have to:


1. Get as many 1 way incoming link from as many sites as possible
2. Use the keyword you’re targeting as the anchor text for the incoming link
3. Make sure to put the keyword you’re targeting into the title tag
4. Make sure that the keyword you’re targeting is mentioned in the body content of your site


Last but not least, make sure you IMPLEMENT the methods outlined above. If you simply read and learn and you don’t do anything about it, you won’t get any results. Period.