Google recently started displaying ‘Mobile Friendly ‘ on search results and this update means you have to optimize your website for easy access from mobile phones. See the announcement here
We recently received an update from Google’s search team about the entire roll-out process and it is called as #MobileMadness. Here’s a list of things for you to know more about the search ranking changes by Google and successfully make your website mobile friendly.
See full schedule for#MobileMadness, Google’s month long campaign to help you prepare for the April 21 mobile-friendly ranking change.
Presentation for SMBs: Maximize your online strategy & search performance Focus on the right channel, Google Webmaster Tools (goo.gl/XQXGdw) and SEO as a long-term strategy http://goo.gl/lb1ASU
Live office hours for SMBs/SMEs Get 1:1 help for your website, Google Webmaster Tools (goo.gl/XQXGdw) and your Google Search presence. http://goo.gl/xr12ks
Live Q&A session for the mobile-friendly ranking change Ask your questions here. http://goo.gl/VB9qPT
We Hope this helps you in better SEO efforts for your website. Do share this page (click on the twitter logo) and make the web a mobile friendly place.
Google gets over 38,000 search queries per minute. Annually, billions of searches originate from India, what can one learn from the top charts comprised based on what 300 million online Indian searched?
Here are the essentials of 2014: Most ‘Trending’ search terms, Most ‘Searched’ term, and Most searched ‘People’ compared with the trends of 2013.
A quick glance tell us that IRCTC is the most searched term for both 2014 & 2013, What does this mean? A ‘search’ can be classified into 3 categories, they are ‘know’ (look for information), ‘do’ (an action, like download) and ‘go’ (visit a URL). Since IRCTC is household name, its safe to assume that people searched with ‘go’ intent to visit the URL; but were comfortable searching for it and then clicking the link from Google’s search results than typing the URL directly. Same goes for SBI Online and HDFC Netbanking, Perhaps no one wants to type in a wrong URL and pay a price by being victim of phishing! So, these brands are definitely on top of Indian minds, its just URLs that are not.
For a marketer, this also means that people are now transacting online and increasingly using online banking, this is a huge and positive change that indicates the reduced level of skepticism in opening up their wallets online.
Its good to see Flipkart and Snapdeal on top, this year has been great for Indian ecommerce industry. While Flipkart & OLX made it to the top list last year too, its Snapdeal that’s new.
In terms of most trending keywords, Election beats everything, thanks to a involved nation. FIFA triumphed over IPL.
The debut of a high ranking iPhone6 indicates how obsessed we are with new gadgets or is it its large screen? last year we had Samsung S4 in top searched phone category, while for this year it is a humble Moto G that has topped the chart.
Sunny Leone reigns supremacy as the most searched person. Poonam Pandey has moved up a rung in the popular people ladder, voyeurism wont fade, so does the maxim ‘skin sells’
Its entertainment, entertainment, entertainment
With 4 movies and 7 film stars across the lists, Lets cite Vidya Balan’s from Dirty Picture here. Its entertainment all the way and it gets accentuated on the internet pretty deeply. If you compare the Indian trends to Worldwide trends, then Jennifer Lawrence, Kim Kardashian & Julie Gayet are the top 3 people searched for. The web is what you make of it, for many people, its for entertaining them, whether through cat pictures or film starts, the theme remains.
What can we infer from ‘Google Translate‘ being on the top chart? Lets not disregard the fact that in India, English is not the only language. Because someone has access to internet doesnt mean they are comfortable in English. (vernacular newspaper have an estimated reach of 438 million Vs. 40 million reach of English newspaper). It is also interesting to note that Govt of India is likely to collaborate with Google for integrating Indian Languages Virtual Keyboard on Android soon. Brands that can embrace this will have significant amount of new customers coming their way.
Virat Kohli is the only sports person in the list (phew), and Honey Singh is no longer searched for (sigh).
SSC is out of list, maybe people now want job in startups?
And finally, our PM, NaMo makes his mark twice across the lists, once in trending & once in people; but only to trail behind Sunny.
Google recently announced how they are making website more mobile friendly, read the post here
To help website owners / webmaster The Google Search Quality team is doing a ‘Site Clinic’ to help Indian webmasters understand what they can improve on their websites in terms of mobile-friendliness.
If you don’t already know, in a Site Clinic the team takes a close look at the participants’ websites and points out specific issues that can be fixed. This Site Clinic is going to be over Hangouts-on-Air and focused around mobile related search issues.
You can encourage our communities to submit their website here or scroll down to fill the form if you want the Search Quality team to take a look at it.
Last date to submit is Thur, Nov 27.
Below are more details about the hangout:
When: Dec 4, 2014
Where: Over hangouts on Air (Link will be shared just before the event)
Time: 3:00 to 4:00 PM
Note: Since it will not be possible to discuss every individual website submitted, we’ll summarize the common issues observed among all the participants’ websites. However, we may pick some examples and point those out on specific websites if required.
This is a event conducted by Google, for queries reach Mr, Nitesh from Google here
The most essential digital element to get your business online is a website, but it is also a complicated process if you dont know how to get one. One can sure hire a web developer or agency, but a lot of us do not know how to get the best website designed and developed even at the cost of a web designer. There are far too many components and jargons associated with websites that make it sound very tedious and tiring process.
GBG Women wants to help women entrepreneurs of Mumbai to get their business online through websites, which is a valuable sales aid for their business and growth.
We aim to demystify the jargons, simplify the process of building a website, guide in creating content that is SEO friendly and choosing the right platform for your business such as e-commerce, etc.,
At GBG Women, Mumbai, we have always been around to help you use technology for business success, we love start-ups and SMEs. So, join us to take your business to the next level as we bring to you a interactive and detailed session on ‘How to get your business online, the basics of building a website‘
Entry: Free and by registration only (scroll down to register)
Event Date and Time: August 9th, Saturday. 4.45pm to 7.00pm
Address: Seminar Hall, Harkisan Mehta Institute of Journalism, Mithibai College, Vile Parle, Mumbai.
Note: The event is a interactive session tailored to benefit women entrepreneurs, small business owners, bloggers and SMEs to understand the basics of web design and development. No programming skills or prior knowledge is required. Anyone interested to learn is welcome. We do not plan to cover advanced website topics in this session.
The web comprises over 60 trillion pages, and is constantly growing at a tremendous pace. From the 5 page static website of a mom and pop shop to the excessive downloadable whitepaper stuffed Fortune 500 Company’s portals, everything is now indexed by Google. What are the odds that your website appears on top for a given set of keywords when a prospective customer is searching for?
The freelance SEO expert you hired last summer sure did his best, you probably got listed in the 1st page for a few keywords, but then, the search algorithms have changed at least thrice since. The Googlebot will probably be laughing at the silly link building tactics you deployed to achieve some miraculous results and spoil your premature celebrations of SEO success.
Im not trying to intimidate, im just trying to set the stage clear for this blog post, it’s not just another post on how to optimize, there are zillions of articles and slideshares about that topic; what I what you to realize is very simple. Have you understood your prospective customer enough? I believe that is the foundation on which your SEO strategy and tactics should be built upon.
So, how to understand your customer better?
Whatever the business you might be in, an individual ‘searching’ online broadly has three clear ‘intent’
Do – Users want to “do” something, a goal or engage in an activity, such as download software, play a game online, send flowers, find entertaining videos, etc.
Know – Users want to find information. These are “know” queries: users want to know something about a business, a service or just plain information
Go – Users want to navigate to a website or webpage. These are “go” queries: users want to go to a specific page or a website
Which of the above intent are addressed by your website? The right answer should be ‘all three’ in an order of importance as above.
You could be a school, a clothing store, an information portal (tech, movies, hotel reviews), corporate website, an app for download, a NGO in constant need of donations, whatever maybe your business, a prospective customer is looking forward to gaining firsthand information, meaningful reviews and reliable recommendations; and in bulk of the cases, this doesn’t happen by searching directly for your brand name. (Besides, optimizing for brand keywords is a cliché)
While understanding the intent is one thing, putting a context around that is quite another.
Consider the following search queries in Google ‘CBSE vs ICSE’ or ‘Apple vs Android’ or ‘Job vs Career’; in all three cases, the search results do not lead to a school, Android’s website (despite owned by Google!) or a job portal respectively. Here, Google clearly knows the intent and context of the user search; it aims to provide most popular news or blog articles for all of the three search cases.
If we tweak the search query a little ‘best cbse school’ the results are quite different, we get a page full of results with maps and reviews, and ofcourse, Google knows from which city you are searching from, so CBSE schools from your city will be displayed.
Once you have understood your customer’s context of search, here’s how to optimize:
Start with analysing your content and keywords and constanstly ask yourself “does your site has contextual message or is it just plain sales brochure like information?”
Have a entertaining, interesting and relevant content startegy that address the ‘know’ intent; your social media presence comes to help here, and do not ignore G+, genuine guest blogs and wikipedia (if you qualify)
Create compelling landing pages that addresses the ‘do’ intent, have rich media integration like videos and slideshare in the landing page explaining why your are the best.
Have error free links, and frequently updates sitemaps to optimise for ‘go’ intent.
End note: Intent is what you should to undertand clearly, it is for the context that you must otpimize.
