Business News: Google Changing the Way Websites Attract Visitors

For the last few years, many new entrepreneurs have jumped on the "sure thing" internet business model. This process is generally:

1. Create a domain


2. Fill it with articles you paid $3 for or stole from other sites


3. Ad Adsense or other ad blocks to the site


4. Sit back and wait for the money to roll in

For a while, this business strategy worked. People would land on the site, realize it was full of junk and either click back or click on an ad, giving the site owner a profit. Throughout 2011 and continuing into 2012, Google is kicking "content mills" to the curb and letting better sites rise to the top of their search results. Here is how this business news affects you and your site.

In early 2011, Google rolled out their first major algorithm change, called Panda. This change was designed to target sites that steal other people's content or simply have worthless sites. Their goal was to put these sites farther back in search results while letting quality sites become the first results a user receives when they use the search engine.

For big-name retail sites, this was great news. They became the first thing Google users usually saw. For many small websites, though, the Panda was nothing less than a kick in the wallet. Small sites that still offered decent information were pushed back in the search results, giving them less traffic and ultimately less add clicks and less profit.

Another Panda was rolled out in the summer of 2011. While many businesses with decent sites found recovery, sites that didn't understand Panda lost even more footing in search results.

The Panda updates seem to be an ongoing effort by Google so smart website owners would do well to make their site fit Google's criteria for a first page search result. Here are some tips:

• Get rid of broken links and redirect pages.


• Link to other sites or businesses instead of just your own pages. This can look spammy to Google bots.


• Add quality content written by professional writers. If you're paying just a few dollars per article, you're not getting quality. You are more than likely getting spun content that is easily identifiable by search engines.


• Make sure your site is targeting a small niche. Long-tail keywords seem to be the best way to individualize your site.


• Forget old SEO tactics. They don't work anymore. Adding a keyword a certain amount of times to your article or only writing articles that are exactly a certain length doesn't get you higher in search engine ranking anymore.


• Make sure your visitors stay for a long period of time. If they click on your site and then leave seconds later that tells search engines that your site isn't a quality site. You can make visitors stay longer by hooking their attention and providing them with quality information.

Once you have put these tips to use on your site, it should receive more traffic in just weeks. While content sites aren't the get rich quick scheme that many hoped for, they are still a viable business idea as long as you focus on quality.