SEO, that complex dance of site quality, traffic, and
link building
, just got more intricate with the advent of Google Knowledge. How does Google’s latest Search tool attempt to figure out what you really want to know? And what will it mean for your
business
? Here’s a brief rundown:
- When you search on a broad subject, a new window, with options to refine your search, appears to the right of your results. For example, search “Oscar Wilde” and the new window has the Wikipedia listing, as well as a link to more results for the 1997 movie about the flamboyant writer.
- What’s happening is that Google has switched from simple keyword recognition to identifying entities, nodes and relationships. As a spokesman put it, Google is moving “from strings to things.” It takes link building to a whole new level.
- Since there are lots of “things” out there, you’ll be seeing this new knowledge graph, as Google likes to call it, almost as often as you see Google Maps in results, which is roughly 30%.
- In addition to finding the right “thing”, Google will also lead you to related “things”. For example, if you search “True Blood”, the Wikipedia listing on the right will mention other shows that fans of “True Blood” are watching.
How will Google Knowledge change the way your business operates? On one hand, if this new tool shows up in 30% of results, then obviously, your business will want to be listed among the top five. So the hard work of predicting your target audience’s behavior and understanding your customer base is as crucial as ever. On the other hand, it’s not clear yet how this model, which favors relationships and artificial intelligence over keywords, will affect your SEO. However, your content should remain accurate and relevant, and dodgy SEO tactics – especially questionable link building – are still verboten.
Image By: Marc_Smith
