Google’s First Radical SEO Change of 2012

1/19/2012 Google started the New Year with a radical change to its search algorithm called “Search Plus Your World.” Previously, personalized results and search results were displayed separately. With the change, personal, private, public, and social results are all mixed into one results list by default. Google’s search engine results will be based on your previous behavior, social connections, content from the Google+ social network, and photos from Picasa. (Search Engine Land’s article by Danny Sullivan provides more details about this change.)

“Search Plus Your World” is a dramatic change that will transform your Search Engine Marketing and Social Media strategies.

Companies will feel forced to join Google+. Content from Facebook, Twitter, and the other social networks will not appear on the new personalized results. Besides seeming legally unfair, this will force companies to have a Google+ page for SEO purposes. However, it won’t necessarily force an increase in the 15 million unique visitors Google+ has or the average five minutes they spend on the social network.

Companies will feel forced to invest in PPC. Personalized results will make it harder for traditional SEO best practices to work as smoothly as before. Reaching potential customers may become a challenge, and PPC will be the tool that enables companies to reach users regardless of personalized results.

The PPC arena will be more competitive. If more companies begin to advertise on Google, the boost in competition will increase keyword bids and PPC costs, and will decrease click through rates and conversions. Additionally, more time will need to be invested in monitoring and optimizing PPC accounts and websites.

It will be interesting to see how “Search Plus Your World” changes Internet Marketing, and if it will be able to influence users as much as it will influence companies.