Since the Spring of 2009, a storm of discussion has made it’s way to the blog-light across the internet. Did Google change the way it ranks pages? Why has my site PageRank decreased? As we role into the Fall of 2009, the discussion and speculation has grown substantually. So what changes have been made to the Google Search Algorithm? Keep in mind, Google has been tweaking and updating the Search Algorithm since conception. As any SEO or Web Marketing individual knows, Google, and other search engines are always making changes to improve upon an ever growing internet’s search capability. For the small to medium sized company that wants a functioning web presence, these changes should not have any major impact on business if you continue to follow the same basic principals I outlined in the article Advertising Your Website. For the rest of us, including the e-commerce sites, these changes have created noteable changes in our day to day results. I’ve spent a good part of the last week or so looking for specific results of recent PageRank changes in the SEO and Web Marketing Community. Mixed opinions. At the top is potential backlink topology changes. Some feel recent analysis indicates page rank is reverting back to the original ‘quantity over quality’ for PageRank. Ironically, many results posted by SEO experts indicate that just the opposite has occurred. Another key discussion across the web is based on the ‘sandbox effect’. There is much speculation that Google is now placing more emphasis on the age of the site. The ‘sandbox effect’ seems to be a trend to prevent sites developed for the sole purpose of increasing page rank. Often these sites are used as launching platforms or landing sites for an existing website. 
Either way, all the speculation is just that: Speculation. And the majority of discussion on the subject is immediate results driven. I prefer to analize the long-term trends associated with Google’s PageRank development. Google is the leading search engine on the web. It has been successful for many reasons, but primarily they wanted to create an unbiased web search service that ranked websites fairly and gave quality results to the users. Today, Google’s motto is ‘Don’t be Evil’ and was coined for their desire to concentrate on long-term competitive position rather than short-term profits. I strongly believe that Google PageRank follows this same model in developing it’s PageRank methology. So rather than analyzing immediate results to speculate on what Google is looking for when crawling the web, I recommend a close look at what Google has done and is doing to improve functionality. There are three main trends to focus on:
- Security. Security, Security, Security. A couple of years ago Google began a campaign and implemented changes to warn potential ‘clickers’ about sites which may be considered a security risk. In the search results, an indicator would show the site as a potential risk for malicious content. At the time, a site ranked #1 for your search criteria could potentially cause problems if clicked through. In development and continuing at full-force today, Google has integrated this capability into its PageRank algorithm. Look at the construct of PageRank with more and more emphasis placed on TrustRank. Even the domain your site resides on and the code that makes the site work are analyzed for potential security risks. These changes will significantly impact immediate results based on your sites age, and the number of, and quality of backlinks.
- Intelligence. There is a trend to make the search experience smarter and more interactive. Back in 2008, Google introduced a data collection program to see what users think about the results they receive. In a search listing, you will see three icons by each result that allows the user to write a comment, promote a link or delete it from the results. Google has also made huge strives in analyzing user data to provide more relevant results for each individual. The most noteable being the placement of ‘Local Search Results’. By sniffing the network and analyzing ARP/RARP data, Google is beginning to base results more on geographics. This said, to manage a website better, maintainers will need to consider balancing global and local marketing plans more and more. With IP address data, a trend is also set for customized results for individual users. By combining existing services such as GSA (Google Search Assistant) software for content search of enterprise intranet data, and applying this to global search technologies, PageRank is being tailored to give customized results based on previous searches. Note now, that search results now annotate how many times a user had visited a specific result
- Traffic. Just as the world has to manage an ever-growing population and increased traffic on our roadways, so Google and other search engines need to be able to manage increasing internet traffic. Thanks to technology strides in communications and bandwidth capabilities, more and more people are able to access the web at growing speeds. Today, many experts estimate that well over 50% of internet traffic is multimedia: Streaming video, audio, live chat, etc. With that said, SEO professionals will need to look more and more at the management and promotion of existing multimedia content on their website. I wouldn’t be suprised to see streaming video content not only displayed within search results, but also embedded with results for instant streaming.
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