How Google is forcing brands to reassess their entire business model

How Google is forcing brands to reassess their entire business model.

Jonny Artis, Director of Search, Stickyeyes.

Online: www.stickyeyes.com or call: +44 (0)113 391 2929 @stickyeyes

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About Stickyeyes Stickyeyes is an independent, full service digital including GlaxoSmithKline, Hertz, Hilton, ghd, marketing agency that combines world-class Ladbrokes and Staples. creative thinking with innovative insights to deliver success to some of the world’s biggest brands.

Recently named by RAR as one of the top 10 most recommended agencies in the UK and in the top 15 Established in the 1990’s, before Google even Elite Agencies in The Drum Digital Census, we’ve also existed, we have more than 120 staff in Leeds and won a number of other major industry accolades in London, providing services including Search Engine recognition of our digital excellence. These include Optimisation (SEO), Paid Search (PPC), Content Best Social Media Campaign, Best Use of Search in Marketing, Social Media, Online PR, Blogger Gaming, Best use of PR and the Grand Prix Award for Engagement, Insight & Digital Consultancy and our work with GSK-owned Maximuscle.

Design & Development.

We service international businesses in 17 countries, cover 22 languages in-house and count some of the world’s best-known brands amongst our clients,

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Google forcing new business model

About the Author Jonny Artis is Director of Search at international digital marketing agency Stickyeyes. He has worked in search marketing since 2003. Recently, he has played an influential role in the creation and ongoing development of our multi-award winning Roadmap tool; a truly game changing development in natural search.

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Google forcing new business model

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Contents page Pg02 - About Stickyeyes Pg03 - About the author Pg05 - The Shopping mall effect Pg06 - The Undemocratic System Pg07 - Business solutions to a digital age Pg09 - Iteration over innovation Pg11 - Taking advantage of the algorithmic diversification Pg12 - What does it mean for search professionals?

Pg13 - About Roadmap

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Google forcing new business model

The shopping mall effect Picture yourself in a shopping mall - a big one, anywhere in the world. As you wander through the frenetic maze of glitzy storefront displays, busy escalators and stony-eyed manikins, your eyes are drawn to the glowing insignias of the mall’s largest stores.

Then there’s the small guys (or at least, the ‘smaller’ guys). Make no mistake, they have great products, they’re well priced and their stores are tastefully decorated. They’re just harder to find; their smaller units are tucked away in the darker corners of the mall, away from the main thoroughfare of shopping traffic. They pick up fewer sales than the big guys With their palatial interiors, huge entrance ways because their prospective customers are less likely to and floor spaces spanning multiple floors, they’re stumble across them. Why? Primarily, they lack the unmissable. Most importantly, they’re front of financial firepower of their bigger rivals. house, in the most prominent areas of the mall – the areas packed with consumers champing at the bit to This commercial landscape is in many ways the spend their hard earned cash. They’re the big guys, bricks and mortar embodiment of Google’s organic the commercial juggernauts, the household names, search listings in recent years. Those with the and they’re there because they can afford to pay deepest pockets secured the best, most prominent the substantial price for the very best spots. positions. Those without? Good luck.

Google forcing new business model

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The Undemocratic System There were, however, some problems with this arrangement; and not only for those lagging behind or those championing a fair and equal economic ecosystem.

The biggest problem, it seemed, belonged to Google. For almost as long as it has existed, the ethos of the search giant’s ranking algorithm was built on a democratic system – a system based on votes, or specifically in this case, links. The trouble of course, with any embryonic democratic system, is it’s susceptibility to manipulation.

And so for all the money changing hands, it wasn’t changing with Google, but rather with a growing link buying ‘black market’. Not only that, but this manipulation of Google’s organic rankings posed a threat to the company’s primary source of income – Google Adwords. Rankings shaped by corporate

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budgets, rather than what’s best and most relevant, could conceivably have a negative impact on user satisfaction and the integrity of its results, and in turn threaten Google’s market share. A smaller market share equates to reduced AdWords revenue.

Naturally then, something had to change. And whilst it may have taken some considerable time, it seems that Google has finally fulfilled its ambitions of accurately and successfully identifying and chastising those attempting to exploit algorithmic loopholes, and conversely reward those following a nobler path of adding richness and value to the web. For years Google has appealed to webmasters and SEO professionals alike to take off the black hat and ‘create quality content’ – only now are we seeing consistent and tangible evidence you’ll be appropriately rewarded for it.

Google forcing new business model

Business solutions to a digital age The answer, in my opinion at least, does not lie within the confines of your SEO strategy per se but rather, at the heart of your digital business model.

The importance of a unique proposition.

Let’s just get this out of the way – links still matter.

A lot. The following graph is an excerpt from our ‘Roadmap’ search technology suite. You can find

the methodology in the appendix at the bottom of this article, but in top-line terms, Roadmap looks at more than 300 potential ranking factors with a view to identifying trends in performance. In this case, we can see quite clearly that a higher Domain Authority appears to correlate with better rankings – the higher the DA, the better a site tends to rank.

Mean values for Domain Authority

75 72.5 70

Domain Authority

67.5 65 62.5 60 57.5 15

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So links in general are by no means obsolete in the graph, which plots ranking correlation with total SEO mix; just the crap, cynically manufactured links linking root domains linking to a given subdomain. that fail to add any value. Take a look at the following

Mean values for Root domains linking to subdomain

18k 17k 16k

Domain Authority

15k 14k 13k 12k 11k 15

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Google forcing new business model

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I don’t think it’s necessary to evidence that when people share or link to something online in a natural, unsolicited fashion, they do so because it is remarkable in some way. Why would anyone, of their own free will, share something entirely unremarkable?

interactive infographics and so on. Every day, digital marketers are creating and promoting these kinds of initiatives; some successfully, others less so.

But instead of just making remarkable content, why not make your business remarkable at its core? Why not have a proposition or a brand story that makes you truly unique?

One method of encouraging that kind of unsolicited, natural linking pattern is of course creating bespoke Let’s briefly examine some of the places natural links content for the cause. We’re talking here about to commercial web sites commonly originate: content of all kinds; the written word, videos,

›News › publications ›Online › magazines ›Consumer › guides ›Blogs › ›Forums › The first question to ask yourself is why any of the above sources might refer to your business (in a positive sense, crucially) over and above any of your rivals. What makes you stand out? What makes you remarkable? If the answer doesn’t immediately spring to mind, it’s unlikely that they will – at

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least consistently. And if you do have an answer, is it robust enough? If you were to promote your business’ standout feature (or features) through PR or above the line, would you expect people to readily talk about it (and crucially, link back)? Honesty is the key here.

Google forcing new business model

Iteration over innovation If, in the cold light of day, your business currently lacks ‘smartphones’ might well be big business today, this kind of standout and substantive distinction, it’s but search volumes were understandably low at the important to note that the answer may lie more point of their entry into the market. down the path of iteration than innovation.

The premise of iteration meanwhile is more about Innovation implies the creation of something new taking something already in existence and making it and unprecedented. Of course, creating a brand new different; making it better. Perhaps the best resource marketplace that is, for the time being at least, can on tackling this potentially tricky task is Kim and be highly effective but of course, if carries incredibly Mauborgne’s Blue Ocean Strategy. high risk. Will any new market be large enough to sustain your ambitions? Unprecedented initiatives Their basic framework rests on taking propositional are also, by default, unproven.

components taken for granted by an industry and increasing, reducing, eliminating and introducing Moreover, search is not typically a useful vehicle certain elements to your business’ proposition. One for a new and innovative proposition. For example, such example highlighted in their excellent book

Search interest in keyword “smartphone”

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is that of Cirque du Soleil. Its creators took on a rapidly declining circus industry by removing animal performances (a point of contention amongst an increasingly morally aware consumer pool), introducing a theatre-style storyline, artistic dance and music, grander venues whilst substantially increasing ticket prices.

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The ‘strategy canvas’ (a graphical representation of one or more business propositions) below demonstrates how Cirque du Soleil’s offering deviated from the traditional values taken for granted by the industry.

The result? Cirque du Soleil soared from its humble beginnings in 1984 to revenues of over $850m in 2010.

Google forcing new business model

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This, naturally, is very much an offline example with its beginnings in a very different era to the one we operate in today, however its principles remain as valid as ever in the modern online arena. Retail monolith Amazon is one excellent example of this kind of strategic approach in action with a proposition which could easily be mapped contrastingly against the competition on a similar canvas.

In particular, Amazon dramatically reduced prices and the complexity of buying online, raised its product range well above anything available elsewhere and created an integrated seller marketplace so that potential competitors worked for them, rather than against them, further increasing Amazon’s product range in the process.

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Today, Amazon.com is the fifth most visible site in organic search results in the US, according to Search Metrics – only behind social behemoths Facebook and Twitter and web institutions Wikipedia and IMDB. Evidently, the sheer depth of Amazon’s product portfolio is a key piece of that jigsaw, however its dominance is equally reliant upon the 325m+ links pointing at the domain (source: Open Site Explorer).

Crucially, those links exist primarily because the site has, since its inception, remained distinct from its competition, offering a wealth of tangible and substantive benefits. It has a clear and meaningful proposition, and it delivers it with precision.

Google forcing new business model

Taking advantage of the algorithmic diversification Of course, Google’s algorithm has long since been entirely about links. A richer and more diversified algorithm inevitably makes its results less manipulable – a long-stated inferred goal of the search giant.

One of the major developments we have seen in our own data sets is an increase in consideration for on-page engagement factors. The following two graphs, again taken from our Roadmap technology suite, show that healthier average visit durations and bounce rates correlate well with top rankings.

Mean values for Average time spent on site

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Average Time Spent on Site

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Mean values for Bounce rate (%)

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Bounce Rate (%)

41 40 39 38 15

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Additionally, a recent post by Bing’s Duane Forrester drew attention to the importance of returning visitors.

Naturally, the matter of enhancing user interaction metrics on site is a complex one. However, the

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effects of multivariate testing, conversion funnel analysis and other related tactics will only be aided by a foundation of a distinctive proposition that strikes a chord with your target audience.

Google forcing new business model

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What does it mean for search professionals?

These changes don’t necessarily move the responsibility of SEO into the remit of those with strategic control of the business, but it does mean that search considerations now must move beyond the traditional basics and start asking questions at the boardroom table. This is now an issue of how brands operate and sell themselves, how they set themselves apart and how they bring their brand story to life.

comes not only from the likes of Google, but also a more savvy and cautious society on the back of economic turmoil, it remains an imperative nut to crack. You don’t have to be a footwear brand that supports children in some of the world’s most impoverished countries, nor do you have to be a retailer committed to customer service and fairness, but you do have to be different and you do have to be worthy of discussion; you have to be remarkable.

Clearly, this challenge is much greater when working with larger, more bureaucratic and less agile enterprises than with smaller, less complex businesses. But in an environment where pressure

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Google forcing new business model

About Roadmap Roadmap is a proprietary tool developed by Stickyeyes to help shed light on the specifics of Google’s algorithm. Specifically, it considers over 300 potential ranking factors covering metrics such as link data, on-page engagement and social factors across a keyword set in excess of 2,000 terms.

Data is then correlated for each factor in order to assess the apparent influence it has upon search engine ranking. The stronger the correlation and Development is currently underway to take fewer the anomalies, the greater the likelihood the Roadmap’s capabilities a step further and uncover factor in question is a key ingredient in Google’s the mysteries surrounding cause and effect. ranking criteria.

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