There is no doubt that Google has been a dominant force. There is no doubt that Microsoft has both the financial and staff resources to give them some serious competition and probably eventually get taken over again. As Google has grown to a size comparable to Microsoft, has lost much of the "little guy trying harder" appeal that once helped to create a great deal of public support.
Many users do not so much as a search engine they use as long as they get the results they are looking for. In this area, Google i
s lagging behind. In an attempt to filter out more of the sites using artificial means to improve their position, they have found a large number of legitimate sites out of the SERPs and often prevented from newer sites that appear to begin with. While we applaud their efforts to combat the sites using spam techniques to climb to legitimate sites, we can say with a doubt that if they do not find a better way to do that they will begin to lose market share in large style. There are several reasons, some not so obvious:
People want relevant and timely results. If Google continues to delay the newer sites and web sites ranking for the existing conditions, users will look elsewhere to find more timely results.
Many owners of sites using Google AdSense will start to switch to competing services from Yahoo and MSN - as they are likely to have traffic. Because the ads are a source of revenue for the owners of these sites they intend to deal with the search engines to help them make more money.
Many web site owners will remove the Google site search on their websites because they do not get traffic from Google.
Web-savvy people are often asked for advice from those who are not as skilled with computers. It will not take too many bitter site owners to tell these people to use a competing search engine before Google starts to see the consequences of their bottom line.
Microsoft has developed for Windows Vista (www.microsoft.com / windowsvista / default.aspx), in reality, the beta version already released. Microsoft will put a serious dent in Google's business with this because they have built a handy little search box right into the operating system.
For those of us who are farsighted enough to prepare for this shift, the next six to eighteen months will be very rewarding. For all others (especially those based solely on traffic from Google) it would be a bit like driving off the edge of a cliff in a Mini Cooper. So, what can you do to prepare?
Diversify your internet marketing strategy. Search Engine Optimization should only be a fragment of your internet marketing. For starters, you might consider advertising on other relevant websites, used a pay-per-click campaign and publication of articles on other websites.
Plan for the introduction of new technology. Blogs are here to stay and RSS is taking hold. Stay on top of new and innovative ways to use technology to multiply the effectiveness of your search engine optimization campaign. You can get a general idea of what technologies to look at by keeping abreast of advances in operating systems, browsers and related software and hardware.
Avoid using spam techniques to improve your ranking as hidden text, keyword stuffing, or link spamming. Most of these questionable techniques do not work and those not working well - and you risk having your site banned.
Update your site regularly. A web site that is in constant growth seen by search engines as more important, a side benefit is that by generating useful content other website owners will have a reason to link to your website.
