Personalised Search Rankings and SEO Success…

At the PubCon Search Marketing Conference in Las Vegas, Bruce Clay (bruceclay.com) gave a presentation in which he discussed how search engine optimisation (SEO) as we know it today is changing rapidly in line with the personalisation of search results that the search engines are moving towards, with Google being the leader of the pack.

He then re-capped his presentation in an interview with WebProNews: SEO About to be Turned on its Ear?

Chances are, that if you search online, you’ve already experienced personalisation of the search results. You would have received a different set of results based on your location or search history. In his interview, Bruce explains how he anticipates this being the tip of the iceberg as technologies improve and other media, e.g. video, contribute towards the rankings that a web page enjoys.

With mobile search entering the mainstream and search results by IP (location) becoming increasingly accurate, the ability for the search engines to send different results to individuals based upon intent, location and history is sure to feature prominently in the future. If we’re all seeing different search results, how do you measure success of your SEO based on search rankings (SERPS) alone?

Many site owners are fixated with SERPS to the detriment of other areas, e.g. the quality of the traffic. It is far better to work with the analytics for your site and to understand other factors such as bounce rate and conversions.

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