January 2004
Search Engine Marketing - predictions for 2004
Sam Steane
In this first edition of 2004, Sam Steane looks at some of the leading SEO experts' predictions in the industry press for the year ahead and how they may affect your online marketing strategies.
Some of the leading US experts are still talking about Google and the aftermath of the 'Florida Update'. If you are not aware of this, in November 2003 Google made some major changes to their algorithm, and as a result many commercial websites lost their high rankings in the search engines. It appeared that Google were favouring educational, informational and academic websites. Not all search terms were affected, but for many businesses relying on top results in Google, this was very bad news as their sales plummeted as a result of lost search results.
These changes however, do seem to be a start for some major spam filtering. Maybe Google are attempting to eliminate some of the tricks the cowboys are using to gain top search results. Eventually things will calm down on Google, but there may be a few more surprises in store before then.
So let's look at some of the predictions for 2004:
1. Google
Bruce Clay of has a few predictions for Google in 2004. For starters, he says "I think that ... while the initial Google cleaning has somewhat stabilized in the 20% of the high traffic sites adjusted, I think that the remaining adjustment could be traumatic" (1) - he clearly believes that further changes to the Google algorithm will be more significant for many websites than the recent 'Florida Update'.
Other experts such as Robin Nobles and Shari Thurow (1) also state that Google has dominated too much in 2003 and that things may begin to level out as a result of their major algorithm changes and the many takeovers that took place last year as well. The message is: don't put all your eggs into one basket, and spread your search engine optimisation campaigns across all of the search engines - don't just rely on Google to bring in the results.
Other Google predictions from Bruce Clay are that they will go public in 2004, push to get onto mobile phones and PDA, and may also step up further partnerships with HotBot, Ask Jeeves, Time Warner, particularly as a result of their contract with Yahoo! about to expire.
2. Other search engines
Predictions for the other search engine mainly centre around Yahoo! replacing Google with Inktomi search results, which it acquired in 2003. This will give the Inktomi search engine much more exposure. Dan Thies of states "Yahoo will switch to Inktomi as their primary web search results early in 2004" (1), so we may see changes taking place soon.
Regarding MSN, nothing major is expected in terms of launching their own search engine in 2004. Dan Thies again states "MSN will not roll out their own search engine in 2004. They'll continue to use Inktomi and Overture, both of which generate revenue". Bruce Clay and Mike Banks Valentine of (1) don't expect anything soon either, but possibly a flurry of activity in MSN search at the end of 2004.
3. General search & SEO
General predictions in search are quite positive with Chris Ward, Commercial Director at MSN UK stating, "In 2004, we will see the search market continue to evolve, and continue to be one of the most important web applications for both digital advertisers and consumers." (2) Martin Child of Overture Northern Europe believes that growth will continue in more sectors such as cars, computing, telecoms, homes and gardens and that "more people are using the net as a research tool to evaluate later purchases offline".(2)
But what about your optimisation strategy? What should you be doing in 2004 to maximise your rankings in the search engines?
Jill Whalen of strongly believes "that professional copywriting will be more important than ever this year in terms of gaining high rankings", and goes on to say "it's already clear with Google's new update that semantics are playing a bigger part in what ranks highly; they will only get more important".(1)
Scottie Claiborne of Rightclickwebs.com also has similar predictions stating "I predict we will see a shift from professionals who strictly do Search Engine Optimization into more 'holistic' web marketing approaches including usability and copywriting, link building from a viewpoint of driving traffic, and PPC. There aren't any simple formulas to increase rankings and traffic anymore - it's going to take more creativity and effort to do online marketing well". (1)
In my opinion both Jill Whalen and Scottie Claiborne have hit the nail on the head - good copy and usability are the essence of a good website to keep visitors coming back and making sales. And always remember, search engines love good content. Without content, how can they assess whether the website is relevant to the search. Relevant results are extremely important to the reputation of search engines.
4. Pay per Click
Predictions in the pay-per-click world have been mixed. Martin Child of Overture (2) believes that paid placement will gain a higher percentage of online ad spend in 2004.
Perhaps this could be fuelled by the changes that have recently occurred in Google - if businesses have lost good rankings in Google, then perhaps they will turn to pay-per-click to boost their rankings.
Contextual advertising seems to be a buzzword in 2004 with Overture and Espotting (2) predicting that text ads relevant to the content a person is viewing will become much more prevalent. Why advertise cars or credit cards when a surfer is looking for holidays or books? Both Google and Overture have contextual advertising models, Google Adsense and Overture's Content Match.
Shari Thurow of Grantasticdesigns.com does not have such a favourable prediction for paid advertising in 2004. "I predict that search engine advertising will slowly begin to cease being the "hot" thing. People still don't understand that search engine advertising is not too different than banner advertising. Instead of a graphic image, you have text ads. What are they doing with text ads? You can change the font, the colors, the borders. Not anything banner advertisers used to do? I predict that click-through percentages will eventually become the same percentages as banners. Maybe not in 2004. But the decline is already beginning to show." (1)
I'll let you make up your minds on that one, but pay per click will continue to remain popular whilst it gives a good return on investment to advertisers.
So what about our predictions?
I made some predictions regarding the search engines in the December issue of Marketing Karma, which you can read .
In terms of search engine optimisation, I would like to see content and copywriting playing a more important part of the optimisation process, as mentioned above. I also believe that usability is going to become more important as getting to the top of the search engines is one thing, but if the website is badly designed and difficult for visitors to navigate, visitors will be turned off and not make sales or return to the website.
In terms of pay-per-click, this will remain as popular, if not become more popular whilst the search engines are going through changes with algorithms (Google), and take overs (AltaVista, FAST, Inktomi). E-commerce websites cannot rely solely on free listings in search engines, particularly with all the changes that have taken place in 2003.
In terms of email marketing, Robin predicts that spam will get less annoying. "The technological fight against spam will continue, spammers will continue to circumvent the rules, and people will continue to be 'had'. But the more internet-savvy the population becomes, the less outraged we will be about intrusive, irrelevant email, and the quicker we will dismiss, delete and move on."
"Offline media will continue to tell tales about online," she goes on to say. "Old media publishers will continue to set the general public against the Big Bad Internet, SMS (which even
sounds illegal) and Anything To Do With Computers. We will continue to read yet more tenuous 'news stories' and dubious research highlighting the dangers of chat rooms, text-addiction, online banking and 'broadband bum' (
'Too many hours on the internet contributes to national obesity crisis').
Do you have any of your own predictions for 2004 - or ideas about how you will develop your online marketing campaigns? Email and we may include your comments in a future issue.
Sources:
(1)
(2)
January 2004
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