★ 2 New Things That Any SEO Should Be Paying Attention To Right Now ★

Recently (one was actually from yesterday), there have been 2 updates that I believe are important for any online marketer, especially those that are using SEO as their main means of making money online. So I just wanted to make a quick post to those that are unaware know of these latest updates, and share my "2 cents" on the changes.

The first update is Majestic SEOs release of the top 1 million sites on the web. This is not as important to SEO as the second in my personal opinion, but it will definitely give you some extremely valuable insight and data on how the web and its users are evolving.

You can read the post about the top million and download the Excel file that lists the top million sites at their website:

Now the second update I wanted to share is yesterdays launch of Google's new "Search + Your World". I believe this may be one of the biggest changes they have made in a very long time.

I have posted links at the bottom to Google's own pages where you can find out everything you need to know about this latest change, and I urge everyone who is serious about SEO to take the time to read them for yourself.

Basically, this latest change will make Google search much more "personal" to any user that is signed in to Google i.e. instead of the normal 10 organic listings of webpages on page 1 that we are used to, Google will return much more information such as posts, shares, images/videos etc. from your friends, social circles, etc. Google's own quote:

"Search has always brought you information from across the web. Now, search gets better by including photos, posts, and more from you and your friends. When signed in with Google+, you'll find personal results and profiles of people you know or follow. You can even expand your world by discovering people related to your search." -Google

If you read the whole blog post and watch the video from Google, it looks like the SERPs will eventually be returning less organic SEO listings and more socially-driven content like I listed above to users that are signed in. If this happens, that instead of having 10 chances of getting on page 1, we may only have a few.

Now although the change will only affect users that are actually signed into Google, don't make the mistake of thinking that this will be just a small % of Google searchers.

Yes, it's true that right now the amount of users searching on Google that are signed in is much less than those that are not signed in. However, I believe we will start to see an increasing shift in those numbers due to Google + and their efforts to expand into the social arena.

A few key things that I think are important about this recent change for Google:

1. It has been happening slowly, but you can really see now Google is definitely moving more and more towards becoming more of a social network than just a search engine. I'm not saying Google is going to abandon their organic search, but you can definitely see they are making this change towards a more social appeal.

2. Social is the next big thing for Google. Pay attention to Google +, and if you don't have an account, get one and start learning how to use it effectively. Google has invested a lot of money and time into building Google +(Google Wave, Google Buzz, and a few other projects were all tests for different aspects of what is now Google +), and I believe Google + is going to become much more important from here on out. Also, don't forget the other major social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc...

3. Your authority in your niche is going to become an even more important factor in rankings. This means we will need to change our SEO game plan if we want to survive, and the best way to do that is to educate yourself now.

In no way am I saying that this is the end of SEO or anything even close to that. In fact, I'm the exact opposite, and I look at changes like this as an opportunity.

For example, a couple of good things that I can see will come from this change are:

1. Competition is going to decrease just like with every major Google change before. The marketers that are lazy and the marketers that can't adapt will give up.

2. Those that do their homework and learn how to adapt to the changes now will be setting themselves up for massive success. The more Google's social efforts expand, the more users will sign up for Google +(the numbers are increasing rapidly) which means more and more people will be signed in and using Google search.

Online marketers can use this to their advantage by becoming an authority figure within their niche, and being socially active(Facebook, Google +, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc) within their niche. The more authority you have, the more people will listen to you and want to share your content with others. The more socially active you are, the more people will follow you and share your content, and the more connections you will make.

Sorry for the long post, but I hope some will find it useful for their business. Also, please share your own opinions and thoughts on this latest change. I love to hear what others have to say.

Let's kick some ass in 2012 Warriors :p

Official Google Search + Your World Info