There has been a lot written about Google’s new SearchWiki in relation to SEO. The initial reaction in most of the posts I’ve read is that SearchWiki sucks and it’s going to ruin SEO. Some SEO bloggers have entered into full Chicken Little mode claiming the sky is falling. While the long term effects of SearchWiki can be debated I think a lot of people are missing the most immediate implications of Google’s newest “improvement” for their search engine.
By allowing users to edit the results they see in a search engine result page (SERP), Google has made SEO the most pressing and immediate need of any online business. SEOs, the next time you try to close a potential client, give them a few facts and see how they react.
- Users are now able to edit the results they see in the SERPs.
- When you thumb up a site listing in SearchWiki, you move that site to the top of any and all searches they might show up for.
- Right now, your competitors are ranking well, and having users vote for their site in SearchWiki, which means not only are you not ranking now, but you might never be able to outrank that competitor for any of the terms you share in common.
- That pattern is being repeated hundreds, if not thousands of times and will only become more prevalent as use of the SearchWiki feature increases. Every minute you’re not ranking, is a minute you’re losing potential rankings, forever.
SearchWiki is making first impressions more important than ever before. Once a user votes up a competitor’s site, you just lost the #1 spot (and all the traffic that’s associated with it) for that person forever. While some in the SEO industry are lamenting SearchWiki as the silver bullet that could kill SEO forever, your choice is to take immediate action or complain. The choice is yours.
