A Google Break for Small Business Owners?
The Big Hammer (Google) may lighten up a litte bit on small Business Owners. Check this article from Search Engine Land — “Google Working On A Softer & Gentler Panda Algorithm To Help Small Businesses.”
It states …Cutts explained that this new Panda update should have a direct impact on helping small businesses do better.
I am a small business owner and I was impacted by the Nov/Dec algorithm updates. What I observed as a result of those updates: Zillow dominated page 1 results (often with stale & irrelevant data). Further, their affiliate, Diverse Solutions (more on that later), had one or more IDX domains on page 1 as well – not much space left for the rest of us!
Although, according to the article, the update is still a couple of months away, I have already noticed more choice with address search results.
Are there any observations you can share in the comments?
Drew Meyers
Posted at 22:28h, 23 March“Zillow dominated page 1 results (often with stale & irrelevant data)”
Doesn’t matter in seo world. How is Google supposed to know that data is stale?
Bryn Kaufman
Posted at 10:38h, 24 MarchI believe they can check bounce rate to decide if the data is interesting or not. Time spent on the site would be another factor that gives clues to the usefulness of the data.
If the bounce rate is really high then people don’t like the search result.
In Zillow’s case, perhaps users don’t know any better because their bounce rate is not so high.
Mark Hankel
Posted at 04:34h, 25 MarchI don’t think it is that difficult to differentiate. What I see in a typical search result “123 Main St” The top spot goes to zillow with something similar to the result “54 Main St”.
The 2nd spot typically goes to zilllow as well, wtih the stale listing data.
This is all works out within a day or so, as their feed catches up.
Jeff Manson
Posted at 09:40h, 24 MarchZillow dominates because agents across the country have givin them all the authority with back links.
Bryn Kaufman
Posted at 10:40h, 24 MarchI wonder why agents are linking to them?
They normally showcase a few competing Realtors, so in my case I won’t link to them because I don’t want to put ads from other agents in front of my buyers.
Gabe Sanders
Posted at 09:32h, 29 MarchAgents that specify specific farm areas and communities through their integrated IDX should continue to do well on the search engines when competing with the ‘big boys’ who continue to be much less oriented toward specific neighborhoods and communities.