It is tough to stay competitive for Search Results when the algorithms change. Then again, the goal of the SERP’s is to return the most relevant results. For Web based business, manipulating those results is becoming more and more difficult. You must also look at your total Marketing Plan and really work to incorporate other means to protect your revenue stream.

After reading this and a couple other articles and watching the official video at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJ6CtBmaIQM

I still have some questions:
* What is meant by “long tail” keywords? Numbers please – 1,000 searches/month? 100? 10?
* Besides “have better content” are there any other suggestions for improving long tail searches?
* What specific factors in the algorithm changed?

You seem to be making Google responsible for your business’ demise. However, I’m sure you were thrilled when they had you ranked #1. YOUR complete dependence upon them is what cost you. That’s not there fault.

There are many updates every year, and this has been going on for years. This is nothing new. Every significant update some people start crying like babies and blaming Google. Things keep improving for me. So far I’m up almost 20% from last year’s revenues. More traffic and higher revenues. Put my first web site on the internet in January 1996 and things have been up hill ever since. My only ‘down’ year was 2007. If a site has good content, it will thrive. However, anyone who bases a business on the internet, particularly based upon ranking high in search engines, is taking a great risk. If you go down in flames, you can’t blame Google. You have to blame yourself for not doing what is necessary to stay ahead of the competition. I’m so tired of hearing people complain that Google isn’t ranking them where they think they should be it’s laughable. Year after year, web sites that can’t make it blame Google for their own failings. If someone chooses to make their living on the internet, they should know the risks involved and quite complaining when things don’t go their way.

Yup.
I’m that unsympathetic.

Sorry folks – but what parts of things like;
* Unique
* Original
* Useful
* Interesting
Doesn’t make sense?

The majority of sites that are likely to be effected are those with little/no original content.
Those with mass Duplication.
Those that simply copy/paste from other sources.
Those that give nothing of value/use to Users compared to others.

If you are basing your business
a) on Organic Search
b) on Content that can be found on X other sites
then tough luck!

The concept of Original and USeful, of Quality and Interest is Not New!!!
It’s been banded about for Years.

People need to grow up and start listening.
There is NO easy money on the net!
You have to invest/expend Resources.
Either You learn – or you hire others.
You focus on the User.
You provide Quality and Usefulness.

Providing the same descriptiosn as foudn on 1,200 other sites is Not Useful!
(And lets face it … a description of 24 words is not exactly Quality either!)

Pick yourselves up off the floor.
Put your toys back in the box.
Dry your eyes.

Now get to work!

Go and talk to your clients/customers;
* ask them what you can do better
* ask them what they hate about your site
* ask them what would make them come back for more
Go and look at your competitors.
Look at the successful and the those soon to disappear.
Then ask yourself;
* what are they doing that is so good
* what are they doing that is bad
* what are they doing that is plain old ugly
* what can I learn from them
* what can I emulate
* what can I do better

And before any of you even think about whinging…
… if you are not willing to make that bit of effort – do not expect to have a net-business that makes you money.

Your choice.

(For those of you that are going to do the work – best of luck!)

with all the recent updates my analytics show google is delivering much more traffic to the same pages. my competitors pages seem to have been downgraded.

for the poster:

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Its costing us a lot

We’re a small firm and competition is very fierce. Google is making it far too complex for the average Joe to be where he belongs in ranking. We have been around for 15 years online and always have been #1 organic in our area of expertise. Now? We’re ranked 4 or 5. It has had a horrible impact on our sales so much so that we are on the brink of bankruptcy because of a 20% YoY loss in revenue since 2008. I do blame a lot on the changes Google made since over 65% of our web traffic came from Google.
——————————————————————————————————————–

your on the brink of bankruptcy – well don’t rely purely on google, geeze – not a good sound business model you have – dependent on traffic from google.
What are you staff doing to get round this, since 2008 – that’s more than 2 years ago

come on google isn’t the be and end all!!!

think outside the box

If you gripe about the changes, ask yourself: why are they making the changes to begin with? It’s to make it harder to game the system. If you want to blame someone for your lost revenue, point your fingers at black hatters and other unscrupulous practitioners.

I think everyone would be a lot more upset if all that came up on the first several pages was crap, thanks to the system-gamers. That’s what would happen if Google used a static logarithm. Think about it.

With so many black hat seo types who manage to take advantage of the system, it’s good that google changes their algorythym. It’s also good for legitimate seo companies to continue contracts with their clients.

Do I like it? Not so much, but do feel it needs to be done.

For the past few years, the only sites that were coming up in the search results were landing pages with adsense ads all over them. It would be nice to have “real” search results for consumers.

If you’re on your game, then this shouldn’t be a problem for you. If not, then maybe hiring an seo expert will be in your future business plans.

I noticed my Google referrals really tanked for my online shop (http://www.pinkycrafts.etsy.com) several weeks ago, but though it was just by chance and I hoped that traffic from Google would increase. It hasn’t. Thank you for posting this article, now I know its not something I did! On the other hand, I hate knowing that its a bit out of my control Who knows, it seems that Google makes frequent changes, so perhaps this won’t last forever.

I think Google will be history soon. Those Adwords ads as first listings are going to kill them. Google is not a search engine anymore but a PPC engine. If you have top spot organic, you’ll see a decrease on amount of visitors to your site. Google has changed for the worst. It is time to promote and support Bing or Yahoo.