Google Caffeine - Will the IM game change?

[Simo]

Hi fellow Warriors,

I have just seen a press release about Google's new Search Engine "update" code word - Caffeine.

Here is the link to the article below

Is 'Caffeine' Google's answer to Bing?

Plus a link to Matt Cutt's blog:

More info on the Caffeine Update

Webmasters and SEO gurus: What major changes do you forsee for IM'ers as a result of this?

Cheers,

Andrew

[Will Edwards]

Hmmm - interesting stuff. My conclusion from a bit of reading is that the update will primarily affect what has come to be known as 'video marketing' - it will become less effective. Other than that, I can't see much difference; my site is still ranking in the same position for example (whew!)

Will

[Simo]

Thanks for the feedback Will. Its seems that way (Using the Natalie Portman images example) regarding changes in the SERPS.

Any other comments from the community?

[Daniel Molano]

Originally Posted by Will Edwards

Hmmm - interesting stuff. My conclusion from a bit of reading is that the update will primarily affect what has come to be known as 'video marketing' - it will become less effective. Other than that, I can't see much difference; my site is still ranking in the same position for example (whew!)

Will

Yes, apparently it's nerfing video and image marketing.

Which in result will power up the good old written content.

Great news for me.

[InternetMarketingIQ]

Play with it. It's transparent to the user. I was running some of my sites through it yesterday and for me it's a good thing

But as much as Google Says it is not a reaction to Bing, I believe it is. And you can't rule out the effect Real Time Search at places like Facebook is having on Search.

In the future there will be less and less concrete information on how to rank, and more speculation.

When the search engines can truly incorporate user behaviors and history into search it is going to level the playing field even more... except for corporate dollars... money will always buy it's way to the top.

But if you remove the name... it's just another under the hood search tweak... just that Google's PR Machine is giving this one publicity.

[dburk]

Hi Warriors,

I have ran a series of tests over the past few days and found that their are some significant changes. Backlinks will not be as effective as they have been in the past. On-page factors are more heavily weighted. Some perennially top ranked sites have dropped a few positions if they rely primarily on backlinks.

I'm not convinced this is a specific reaction to Bing. This new upgrade has been in the works for a very long time and it is part of a major push to speed up the web. This has been a quest Google has been on far in advance of the conception of Bing.

They describe it as an infrastucture upgrade which implies new hardware or a change in platform. It isn't typical for Google to invite testing of a new algorithm in this fashion which, in my opinion, implies a very major change. The SERP load speed is very impressive.

[Daniel Molano]

Originally Posted by dburk

I have ran a series of tests over the past few days and found that their are some significant changes. Backlinks will not be as effective as they have been in the past. On-page factors are more heavily weighted. Some perennially top ranked sites have dropped a few positions if they rely primarily on backlinks.

I wouldn't be too sure about that.

For example, in normal Google I hold position #3 for "business consulting" (300,000 monthly searches, over 40,000,000 competing sites and over 5,000,000 under quotes).

IBM and Entrepreneur beat me. Those 2 are pretty much the definition of authority sites.

In "Caffeine" Google I hold position #1.

I see similar patterns across the 3 other niches I'm in, for the "impossible" keywords I'm ranking for. I beat all the authority sites in "Caffeine" Google.

Now, I'm not saying that I'm relying on backlinks solely, but they are a big part of my authority site SEO model (about 20%).

At this point we can only speculate, but my guess is that the authority factors of the sites, such as brand and antiquity will be lowered big time.

In addition of course to the video/image nerf.

[Intrepreneur]

Originally Posted by Daniel Molano

I wouldn't be too sure about that.

For example, in normal Google I hold position #3 for "business consulting" (300,000 monthly searches, over 40,000,000 competing sites and over 5,000,000 under quotes).

IBM and Entrepreneur beat me. Those 2 are pretty much the definition of authority sites.

In "Caffeine" Google I hold position #1.

I see similar patterns across the 3 other niches I'm in, for the "impossible" keywords I'm ranking for. I beat all the authority sites in "Caffeine" Google.

Now, I'm not saying that I'm relying on backlinks solely, but they do take a big part of my authority site SEO model (about 20%).

At this point we can only speculate, but my guess is that the authority factors of the sites, such as brand and antiquity will be lowered big time.

In addition of course to the video/image nerf.

I presume you own an article directory also? Do you?

[Daniel Molano]

Originally Posted by Intrepreneur

I presume you own an article directory also? Do you?

No I don't, at least not yet.

[intellect22]

Hmm well I am on page 4 at #31 in "regular google" for my one word search term which gets 150k+ searches a month and in Caffeine I am on page 2 at #13....I'll take those results please

[axleman]

Originally Posted by dburk

Hi Warriors,

I have ran a series of tests over the past few days and found that their are some significant changes. Backlinks will not be as effective as they have been in the past. On-page factors are more heavily weighted. Some perennially top ranked sites have dropped a few positions if they rely primarily on backlinks.

I'm not convinced this is a specific reaction to Bing. This new upgrade has been in the works for a very long time and it is part of a major push to speed up the web. This has been a quest Google has been on far in advance of the conception of Bing.

They describe it as an infrastucture upgrade which implies new hardware or a change in platform. It isn't typical for Google to invite testing of a new algorithm in this fashion which, in my opinion, implies a very major change. The SERP load speed is very impressive.

I'm not sure sure linking has changed. I am seeing higher rankings (even a new #1 spot) for some keywords that my site is only somewhat optimized for, but has been backlinked for the keywords a bit. There doesn't seem to be a lot of huge changes though (but overall my sites are a bit higher for the most part.)

[Simo]

Thanks for all the comments guys

So taking into account the changes Google is making, I take it that to be ranking our sites well in "Caffeine" that we as warriors should be:

-Providing good content to the user,
-Have at least an 8 page website
-Have ticked all the boxes of our on-page SEO
-Still be following a ongoing backlinking system for our site(s)

If this how you see it?

Cheers,

Andrew

[beempa]

Hmmm... well, for my chosen keyword, my site (4 years old) moved up from page 3 to page 1 in Caffeine -- and I also noticed some other older domains made it to the first page as well. We all got knocked out by newer domains with tons of backlinks in the regular Google. Perhaps domain history now has a more important role in ranking with Caffeine? Because all of those newer domains fell back to page 3. I am now doing backlinks now to get my site back on the first page where it belongs, but if domain age has something to do with it, I will be glad.

My personal opinion is that Google has been paying attention to how many people are now cicking past the first page of their results. They list too many videos and images and shopping comparison links on the first page of results, forcing many people to just skip the first page entirely and search from the second page on. I think this is why they are now removing the images from the search results, as well as the shopping comparison results.

[Daniel Molano]

Originally Posted by beempa

Hmmm... well, for my chosen keyword, my site (4 years old) moved up from page 3 to page 1 in Caffeine -- and I also noticed some other older domains made it to the first page as well. We all got knocked out by newer domains with tons of backlinks in the regular Google. Perhaps domain history now has a more important role in ranking with Caffeine? Because all of those newer domains fell back to page 3. I am now doing backlinks now to get my site back on the first page where it belongs, but if domain age has something to do with it, I will be glad.

My personal opinion is that Google has been paying attention to how many people are now cicking past the first page of their results. They list too many videos and images and shopping comparison links on the first page of results, forcing many people to just skip the first page entirely and search from the second page on. I think this is why they are now removing the images from the search results, as well as the shopping comparison results.

Domain age or site antiquity have nothing to do with it. At least not for the most competitive keywords.

In "Caffeine", my 6 month old domain is beating IBM (30+ year old domain) and Entrepreneur (10+ year old domain) for the "impossible" keyword phrase 'business consulting'.

[Simo]

Thanks for the comments guys - much appreciated.