Well for the first time, Matt Cutts has announced that the visable Page Rank update as seen in everyone’s Google Toolbar is going to be updated in the next few days. This marks a milestone, as often webmasters around the world discuss when, how, what will change, and simply guess as to when the next PR update is coming. This go around Matt Cutts from Google has formally posted on his blog that the next PR update is going to happen in the next few days.

I applaud Google for advancements in communication and think the more Google shares with the internet community the better, and each little baby step they take in keeping webmasters aware of what is going on at Google and what Google’s plans are, will better the internet community.

I am excited to see this and hope that this upcoming PR update turns out to be everything, that everyone is looking for…

It is becoming more and more evident that Google is making some serious changes to their algorithm. Webmasters around the world are seeing very inconsistent results. It appears that most webmasters agree that wholesale changes began on June 4th 2008, and have been going on ever since. I personally agree with the general population on webmasters. I have been seeing some major changes in results, on a multitude of websites. Some sites that were in the top 10 for say 15 to 20 keywords, bouncing all over down to 30 back up to 2 and so on. Other sites, maybe number 4 now, in 1 hour will be number 9 and then 15 minutes later back to number 3. One day last week, I was just hitting refresh on my browser and I could see the rankings changing real time, I also noticed the search results changing from IE to Firefox although I assume this was just the rapid changes in results being diaplsy only a few seconds apart, although you never know?

One thing I have noticed is, that the shuffling going on seems to be primarily from number 3-10, sites with number 1 ranking are staying put and the number 2 seems pretty solid, but after number 2 your guess is as good as mine as to where your ranking will be in the next 5 minutes.

I have two primary theories, the first one is that this is the new way Google will be displaying results, nearly real time shuffling. This will be with the hopes that people and seo (search engine optimization) companies, will not be able to really track a website’s search engine results. It is quite disturbing to see a site ranked number 3 one minute and number 10 the next. The difference in traffic from 3 to 10 can be 1000%.

My second theory is that Google is making major changes, and attemtping to implement a large scale change to their algorithm. While they are doing this they are constantly tweaking, testing and changing and this is causing the massive swings in results.

On a different topic, I am seeing penalties being potentially thrown around a lot more often, I am quite certain that in the last month I have seen or spoke to website owners and webmasters that are certain they have gotten penalties for certain keywords. They wake up one day with a -30 or -60, the problem is they appear to be somewhat short lived. The next day they will be bouncing all over the place, at times they can be 9 and 15 minutes later -90. I am not sure if this is also tied to the algorithm changes or if this is the “new way” of Google doing things.

In summary some crazy things are going on in Google’s search results and personally they are not good. It really seems that Google is more interested in staying in control, then they are in giving their users a good experience. I think they better keep their eye on the ball, as their search engine directory (remember what Google is) is only good as long as users like it and continue to use it. With these types of results, I think most users will start to become disenchanted with Google results bouncing all over the place. Personally I often search for a keyword (say cars), and make a mental note  that the 3rd result was the website I wanted to go back to, but now I can do the same search and that site might not even be on the first page.

It appears that webmasters are beginning to simply write off Yahoo. Recently Yahoo started to scan websites and display the results within the search results:

Yahoo has labeled this “searchscan” and this with the over active crawl of Yahoo’s slerp is beginning to annoy webmasters around the world. On a thread in webmasterworld there are discussions about slowing down Yahoo Slerp and banning it all together.

Personally from an SEO standpoint, I am torn, traffic is traffic and even if Yahoo only gives you 10% of your traffic that is still good quality free traffic. Now the “gray hat” seo part of me, says block Yahoo Slerp, but not because of it’s over active crawl or because of its new site scan, but block it to stop your competitors from seeing what you’re doing with your link campaigns. Most software tools and competitors use Yahoo to check websites back link profiles. Your back links let your competitors have a clear picture as to what links you have, what links may be new and what links may be paid. Blocking Yahoo will eliminate the competition from seeing what links you have and what links may be new.

If you want to block Yahoo Slerp here is where you can do it.

If your heavy into link building in a highly competitive market, blocking Yahoo may be the answer to staying ahead of your competition.

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… C: wait… SD: wait…

I have been reading and studying the term negative search engine optimization (SEO). I find it quite funny how people at Google in particular (Matt Cutts) says Google Bombing or negative SEO is difficult or nearly impossible without high jacking someone’s website. This is totally wrong, but then again he is the same guy saying you need links to get your site to rank, but don’t buy them… (If I hear that loaded answer one more time!).

Google is very smart. What they do is rely on a human being’s general perception that if something is deemed wrong or is generally unacceptable, that most will avoid it. They have been pounding down everyone’s throat that paid links are bad, if you buy links your a bad person or evil webmaster. They talk about penalties and banning websites. In the past penalties were very rare, but recently I have seen several link buyers penalized.

As soon as I see a client penalized, I see the clear path to negative SEO. Each and every time I see or hear about a website penalized for off site SEO work, I create a log of what transpired and what the effects were. Does Google think SEO’s or people involved in search engine optimization are dumb? Well we are not. I have a list of places where links are penalized, I have a list of the types and quantities of links that have been penalized, I know how long it takes and how to avoid it or how to cause it.

I am not talking about buying links for Viagra for a number one ranked website for the search term homes. But you know if the site that ranked #1for homes, ranked between 4-6 for home sales, sell homes, buy homes etc., and that these are the keywords that a top quality website can be penalized for, then you simply build just a few too many really good links. Do not be obvious, do 100% legit SEO (buying links is OK in my book) work for the target site, just do a little too much, a little to quick, and guess what they will be given a -30 or a -45, for several of the over optimized keywords. They will not be penalized for their primary keyword which would require a 100% hand removal from Google or a Hand Penalty from Google, but it is not difficult to get them hammered for their 2nd tier search words.

Needless to say, I can present Google with multiple instances of proof that this is a fact, and I can certainly repeat the results if required.

Google is crossing its fingers that the general SEO community will frown on the part of negative SEO, because of the bad Karma, but in reality what is the difference between getting your site to rank higher (therefore lowering your competitors site) or simply lowering your competitors site so your site ranks higher?

Google is really beginning to upset me with these link threats, and link penalties. If they continue this barrage on SEO companies, everyone will just do very low profile SEO for their client’s sites, and over optimize 3-4 of their competitor’s websites. When multiple SEO companies adopt this theory, Google is really screwed. They will lose nearly all control, and be left unable to properly address which sites should be rewarded and which should be penalized.

For now Google is OK, because of the bad Karma factors and the “it’s wrong to do this”, but it will only take Google penalizing 2-3 top clients before SEO companies will all decided it is so much easier, and more profitable to negative SEO their competitors.

I will say that it is NOT hard, it is NOT difficult. If a group of top SEO and link builders got together, they could probably get nearly any site penalized.

I spent this evening reading about Link Building. The question is now, what is acceptable link building? The all mighty Google has recent issued warnings to us yet again. I know what used to be OK, but nowadays Google has said that any link that is paid is against Google’s guidelines and that Google plans on penalizing sellers and buyers of links.

I never quite understood penalizing buyers of links? Are you saying now, do not buy links for your website to rank well, buy bad links for your competitors sites so they get penalized? I think I may have to run an experiment on this :-P.

Well it seems now that the masses are kind of fed up with Google’s rules, and I have read in a very popular SEO (Search Engine Optimization) forum that based upon Google’s latest guidelines that nearly every single SEO (Search Engine Optimization) company on earth is now going to be considered black hat (black hat, a term used to describe SEO companies that do not 100% obey Google). Google does not want people “optimizing anything”, they do not want link building, they accept link baiting (although link baiting it now the equivalent of fishing in a pond with 8 BILLION other pieces bait, even if you have the best bait in the pond how is the fish to find you? Google. Can you answer this?) So tighten your drawers, Google is going to change the rules, yet again.

Many SEO experts have been discussing whether anything is really going to change, or if they are just going to scream longer and louder this time? The truth be told that most sharp link builders are always going to be 3-4 steps ahead of Google, and Google will never catch up to these guys. So why bother, all Google is doing is increasing the profitability of the really good link builders. Links are the glue that keep the internet as one, and without them, the internet would be 100’s of 1000’s little internets all completely separate, can never do away with links Google.

Most SEO’s now know that Google does not look fondly upon: links in footers and sidebars, labeling links as sponsored ads or sponsored links, so these old school techniques are now fruitless and hardly worth paying for.

So what Google has done is raise the bar, what we are all going to see is the price of great links going way UP! In recent history, you could get a nice bunch of PR4-5 links for say $35 per month, well I bet in the next 6 months a solid PR5 link is going to be $250 a month, why you ask? Because Google is making it much harder to build out links that are going to pass link juice and count towards your search engine ranking and placement. Google has been applying discounts to nearly all links, footer links, sidebar links, site wide links and any kind of link floating around your website is probably only worth about 25% of what it used to be worth, because Google has been discounting these types of links further and further.

Knowing this a multitude of options and opportunities for links in text have been born. Google views these links in text as a premeditated link. Of course people are all over this theory. There are Pay for Review sites now (where you post a review of a site or product and they include links back to your website), there are 4 versions of software that will index a website and turn any piece of text into a link and so on.

So the next step in Google trying to stay ahead of the link market is relevancy. Not your old standby, a couple of sentences on topic, now you will be required to have an entire page probably 400 words or greater on topic (and you better not even try to have more then 5-6 links per page) or Google will probably not count those links.

Google is driving the price of good, under the radar links UP, so you better forget about the old stand buy link brokers, where quantity was the ticket.  Now you better look for quality, as this is all that will matter, 1 super high quality link is going to be all you need to get vastly improved ranking in the near future.

I woke up this morning to find out that Google had seriously altered the path of my weekend, two of my clients pages dropped in search. Man, why is it that Google has to play big brother? Google created a good system for ranking websites based upon numerous criterion, based upon meta info, page content, website architecture, links (both internal and external) and numerous other off site components. The problem is that smart people have figured out what Google does to rank websites, and they are exposing it. Now, instead of Google constantly working to improve its method, it has decided to simply become the enforcer of its territory. They invented numerous technologically advanced theories 10 years ago, and have basically become the fat cats and not continued to expand on their technology. There are numerous things they could do to improve their search results, but they are now a public company with billions of dollars in profit and are spending every resource possible to ensure that their profits and revenues continue to soar.

People involved in search engine optimization (aka SEO) are constantly watching, reading and sharing everything they figure out about search engine spiders, how they act, and what works and does not work. The internet (the vehicle in which Google has used to reach fame and fortune) is the ultimate tool for real time communication, the internet is what people involved in search engine optimization use to share insights and theory about search engine spiders, they post these thoughts and ideas across the net, on blogs, forums, wikis and email. Amazing how the internet (Google’s Playground) has become its biggest hurdle for future growth …funny how that works.