Google’s Super Bowl ad search results are not the same as actual results… but at least better than Bing

If you are not from the search marketing industry, you already know that rankings fluctuate. They change over time and this is were SEO companies use ranking reports checking how rankings change over time, looking at the trend and seeing the benefits of these ranking improvements in terms of traffic, conversions and ROI. Knowing that ranking change all the time due to different factors such as personalization, geographic location, all sorts of Google One-Box algorithms, Google Subscribed Links, Image Search, Video Search, Real Time Search, the search engine results page (SERP) may always look different from two different people. So I decided to check last Google commercial that was aired during the Super Bowl. This is actually not a new commercial, it was uploaded by Google online on YouTube last November 19, 2009 and many people in the search industry already knew about this commercial. A full set of all their other video commercials can be found on YouTube’s Search Stories.

SEO Flash Solution Explained by an Optimized Flash Example Implementation

There are many SEO tips out there for people doing flash, but sometimes all these tips still keep some people in the dark on how this is really implemented. Some people say Flash can now be read by search engines, and you should not worry about it. Some say just use swfObject, and others say use sIFR and you should be good. For me I am not going to recommend any specific tool or script framework. You can use what works best for you. I am just going to talk about the SEO issues of running a full Flash website and it’s corresponding solutions. And to explain this better I’ve created a Flash demo site that implements most of the concepts enumerated in this blog post. This may appear more like a tutorial than a blog post, so expect this to be a bit lengthly. I plan to make this a bit detailed because I get the same questions over and over again from SEO clients who we give consultations on how to fix their Flash issues and this blog post shall serve as a good reference our clients could always go back to. So I talk about the following:
Enumerate the SEO issues with Adobe Flash.
Give the solutions to the SEO Flash issue.
And explain why our recommendation is a good solution to the Flash SEO problem.
Issue 1: A full Flash website is not an option?

Probably some SEO professionals have recommended this to you in the past. Just do not make the whole website in flash. Simply because you cannot optimize it in the same way you would optimize HTML. Although this statement is true, this does not mean just because a website is made all in Flash, it cannot be optimize to rank well for a keyword.
Recommendation: Our solution to doing SEO on complete full Flash websites

If Flash really helps in your website’s user experience and can help users in a way that helps in the overall selling/marketing of your products and services, then there is a good reason to keep Flash on your website.

Always note that doing SEO for a non-Flash website is easier to do, which translates to lesser working resources and just might also mean a lower price tag. Some SEO companies may not have any difference in pricing for Flash and non-Flash website, and this simply means their price is already adjusted to expect the worst or they are probably not aware yet of the SEO challenges of a Flash website.

The bottom line is, if Flash helps in making your customers happy or increasing sales, then keep it, otherwise remove it. And if you do keep it, be prepared for the challenges in SEO.

Is Your Company Built for Speed?

We discuss usability and conversion optimization frequently, but there is one simple piece of the puzzle that can get overlooked. Website speed and performance!

Users are becoming more and more impatient as they surf the web. Now the majority of people really only focus on the first few results in Google so companies spend a lot of time, energy, and money performing search engine optimization and running paid search ads. Once the user lands on your page, you have about eight seconds to capture their attention or they are gone. But before you even worry about your design, layout, and call to action you should consider your site’s speed and performance. If you page does not load within a few seconds, that user will leave and go to the next search result…and will likely never come back.

If your company’s website is slow, the first thing you need to do is determine what is slowing it down. It may be due to a number of factors such as image file size or general architecture. Here are a few simple steps for getting started. You will first need to load the following on your computer:
Mozilla Firefox web browser
Firebug (getfirebug.com)
Page Speed (code.google.com/speed/page-speed)

Once this is set up, open Firefox and go to Tools and choose Firebug. Open Firebug and choose page speed. This will give you a list of factors involved in site speed and make recommendations for improvement.

Here are some things to consider for website development for your business to ensure proper structure, speed, and performance:
Use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and combine them into one file
Streamline the CSS by eliminating unused styles
If you are running on a blogging platform like Wordpress install a caching plug-in
Always trim down image size and resolution when possible
Avoid flash based site when possible – combine HTML and Flash and limit the amount of flash on each page
Use a dedicated server if possible or make sure you are using a high quality host provider