After a lull in the hay day of the brand and the world in which "brand was king" (see a nice post on this) it is worth considering the new (and increased importance of brand) as a result of changes to Google-- most specifically the implementation of personalized search on Google. While some along the way were writing the obituary for "the brand" had sort of gone out the window and the whole idea was that brand loyalty would grow increasingly dependent on social media and "web 2.0", this new development by Google has some pretty serious implications.
Image Via: Google (Shocker...)
1. Implications for SEO
The exact metrics Google uses to rank pages has always been a bit of a mystery. Though personalized search will add to this mystery a bit, it is unlikely to change things a great deal. At the end of the day, this may create a larger drive for raw traffic and return visitors and decrease some of the emphasis google places on linkbuilding, but at present the magnitude of these effects remains largely unknown and are but toolks in the larger SEO toolkit.
2. Implications for Linkbuilding
While the need for a "huge number" of links has been debated as to its value in SEO returns, the argument has always stood and has been fairly well supported (LINKS) that there is a great deal of value in having some good quality pages that link to your site-- the whole concept being (at least in SEOmoz speak) that power or "link juice" can be passed from one well respected site to another site.
Example: A link from the BBC to your website would be more valuable than a link from Bill's Local Plumbing (assuming, for the sake of the example that your site is a fashion blog).
While the birth of personalized search may in fact impact the way in which this "link juice" is passed along, it seems unlikely that it will impact the value of having links from a good site. This would seem self explanatory from the standpoint of: more relevant traffic (in greater volumes) is likely to be driven to my website from a BBC fashion website than from the page of Bill's Local Plumbing.
3. Implications for Search Results:
This will change things from a certain degree both for the way in which we talk about search results, but also for SEOs and Google users alike. The first change will be an increased inability to describe yourself as "the third search result for fashion blogging". This may seem a drastic change, but this would never really be a reliable way to describe yourself as location, whether one considers AdWords results and a number of other factors will have already impacted this.
The second change, will be the increased desire to generate click through from organic search results to improve rank and to improve the likelihood that an individual (and folks with similar search behavior and interests) will return your site more regularly when searching for relevant terms. This will be an impact for the user (insofar as they are likely to receive results that are impacted by previous behavior-- DUH!).
There will also be impacts for SEOs and other internet marketing folks: there may well be an increased push for Google AdWords campaigns. Though the exact way in which click through on Adwords results will impact Page Rank and likelihood that your site will rank for a certain term it certainly won't hurt!
4. Impact for Developers and Designers
Despite some calling personalized search "the death of SEO" this does not seem to be the case. More than likely it may require more joined-up efforts between SEOs and Dev teams, but this certainly does not spell the end for SEO.
Why? Because, if anything, sites will need to perform better and be enjoyable (i.e. generate return visitors) to continue to rank well. While this may see the rich get richer (please see a great post on this by Randfish) it will also hopefully force dev teams and clients wishing to build new websites to incorporate some of the best practices for which SEOs have been calling for years:
a. Make sure your site is crawler/robot/spider friendly.
b. Make sure your content is worth reading and relevant!
c. Encourage interaction with visitors and a coherent and strategic cross-media approach.
d. Try to earn links from the most appropriate and relevant sources.
Conculsion:
Though "Personalized Search" may have altered the face of SEO a bit, it seems to have done nothing but reaffirm the need for SEO and to continue with many of the best practices from days past. The ever-evolving beast that is Google may not allow SEO to continue "business as usual" (in as much as it ever has been), but this will not be a knockout blow to SEO.
While "brand" may not have ever died, these changes will almost certainly magnify the effects of brand loyalty on the web and the need to have a user (and search) friendly site to which people feel a strong desire to return. The only "new" prescription I've really seen come out of any of the SEO communities is the call for an increase in the tightness [of integration] in metrics with page rank tracking (to paraphrase Randfish).
Image by Me (though I obviously don't own the rights to Coca-Cola nor its trademark and did not create this portion of the image)
As always, please feel free to hit me up with any comments you might have!
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