By now, you’ve probably seen some of the changes that Google is making to “provide a better user experience.”  With these changes come a more personalized search experience, but on the flip side of the coin is privacy vulnerability and limited access to analytics for your website.  Some may consider these changes good while others may feel otherwise. The important thing is to know what they are and to understand how they may affect your business and/or you personally.

So, here are the top 5 Google changes that you need to be aware of and how they may affect your business. 

1. Google will no longer give full search-query information to businesses for free. Google says the change in policy is to protect consumer privacy. But, for $150,000/year, Google will sell you all the information and analytics about your site that you want. 

2. Google is also making a big push to collect personal cell phone numbers.  They have released a new feature that requires users to provide their cell phone information before logging into their gmail account. Google will text you a code that you will need in order to login. Google says this is to prevent anyone from hacking into your account.

3. Google is moving towards consolidating all their accounts into one place so they can use that information to monitor your search behavior and provide a more personalized search experience. The Google update is called SPYW, which stands for Search Plus Your World. I’m a big fan of convenience but I am reminded of an old parable, "Don’t put all of your eggs into one basket."  I approach with caution whenever a company makes moves to consolidate information – the downside is that when you are trying to track consumer behavior, you will be limited in what you can track. For example, if you are not logged into Google and you do a search for "Orlando Catering" you will see a certain set of results. But if you log in and do that same search, you may see a completely different set of results. That’s because Google starts monitoring search behaviors and tends to show what a user previously searched for, making the search more biased and decreasing site neutrality.

4. Google launched a freshness update at the end of 2011. Google is now requiring website content to be continuously updated with new and unique information. Never again will we see the days of a "set it and forget it" website or the field of dreams website "if you build it they will come." For the sake of the user experience your content needs to be continuously updated.  One way to do this is through a blog that publishes on a frequent basis, preferably a couple of times a week.

5. Watch for Google’s changes in mobile search. When Apple released their iPhone4S with the "Siri" function, Apple took a chunk out of the mobile search industry. I’m expecting Google to respond with changes to the Droid Operating systems.

Google is evolving to keep up with the times and is positioning themselves to be the dominant force in information gathering and search marketing, whether it’s on a PC or a mobile phone. 

Get your website "Google Ready" for 2012. Contact Xcellimark for more information.