It’s been just about a month now since Google has rolled out it’s unified privacy policy, and on some frequented corners of the internet people are still making a fuss. Calling the change in the way Google delivers it’s results and it’s ads, a breach of personal privacy to all who use Google products.
The fact that the privacy policy has been put into place, and all of the fuss and noise that was being made didn’t even slow it, let alone stop it, should be evidence enough that the people who pull the strings are on board. It’s a single document, which pertains to all of Google’s properties online and it basically makes everyones job easier. No more do you have to accept a privacy policy for any, and every, Google product you create an account for. Think you’ve been slighted by the company, take the policy in hand, get a lawyer and make your play. But in the end, the average internet user won’t be doing any of the sort. It’s the internet, there is much more than a single search provider. Don’t agree with their new policy, there’s always Bing ready and willing. But that means also no Youtube, no Places searches, and no Gmail to have synced across your platforms. There are absolutely alternatives to pretty much and and every Google platform, but you’d be fooling yourself to think they’re all better, or even comparable for that matter.
In all the ruckus made about the issues of privacy that people keep bringing up, it always comes back to the same question. If you’re so unhappy, why don’t you just stop using it? The real issue with privacy and being online that the vast majority don’t, or won’t realize, is it doesn’t truly exist. If you want your information to be private, never sign anything. Never use the internet, don’t get an email address and move to a mountain side. And even then, even if you lived all alone in a shack on the side of a mountain, if someone sees you and writes a blog about you, sorry, no more privacy. All you can do to maintain control online is to be aware of the sites you use, what their policies are and what they change too if they change. Google didn’t change anything about how they do their work, they simply stream lined it to make it easier for the user, and for them. Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo, all massive companies all of which became that way because you’ve used their products and given them your information. Companies don’t grow like trees, they grow with your personal, private information.
Instead of harping on the one company which has a single privacy policy, and an easy to understand one at that, go and find Facebooks policy and give that a read. If you really dig into what the policy is telling you, I think you’ll find yourself more than a little shocked at just how un-private you are.
It’s not a secret that the search engines have to frequently tweak their algorithms in order to shake things up a little on the SERPs. It also isn’t a secret that Google, Bing and Yahoo occasionally like to shuffle those results and sometimes you may find yourself without a positive ranking as you were accustomed too, only to find that a few days later you’re back where you’ve always been. So what point does it serve to remove you from your positioning, only to place you back? It can make you think, do search engines and SEO really make any difference at all if they can change things on a whim? The short answer is yes, the long answer.. well it’s the long answer for a reason.
In keeping with the times, you need to remember the web is everywhere. At home, work, on smartphones and tablets, it’s never been easier to be connected. And with all of that information at their fingertips, 9 out of 10 times people will search. They’ll visit Facebook or Twitter, Google or Yahoo and they’ll search for their answer or ask their friends for an opinion. For some it’s as small as what to have for dinner for any given evening. For others it can be as life defining as what area of a city to buy a new home in.
So yes search engine optimization matters and yes having a website is important. Google and Bing send out their robots and scour the web so that you don’t have too. They arrive on a site, chew through the content as quick as can be and ranks the new site against it’s current list. As a business, having your plumbing business on the top of the maps listings when someones water heater suddenly dies, means hundreds of dollars in difference to not taking the 20 minutes to set it up properly. There’s also the adword side of the search game which works on primarily a bid and auction system, so long as you have the best bid on a keyword you could rank on page 1 number 1 in the ad spaces.
That’s the cookie cutter steps that everyone should be taking or at the very least, be very well aware of that are available. This is where organic SEO comes into play. For what you could spend on an adwords campaign, if you put those resources and time into properly building and working on your website, you can rank in the organic listings for your key terms. This is also where you’ll notice when the search engines are doing their big shuffle when they reindex their results pages. First rule you need to remember about organic listings – if you randomly disappear with no warnings or emails from the search engine, don’t panic. Take a look at your site and ensure you haven’t broken any of the rules. If you’re good on all fronts, just wait at first. Be patient and wait to see what shakes out. Search engine optimization matters, as do search engines and having a proper website, not just a Facebook or Google+ Places page.
