Google Instant – Does it REALLY change anything SEO-wise?

by Eric Blackwell

The Real Estate Group, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake VA

Author website

For those who want the Campbell’s Soup version of this post:

Not Really. It actually makes keyword research a little EASIER. 😉

For those inquiring minds who want to know why I am saying that, here’s my take. Google Instant does one thing and does it pretty well. As a person enters in a keyword phrase into Google, it suggests possible phrases based on the most common searches that have been done to date AND it shows the relevant results for that search on the fly. Here’s a screen shot or two of what I am talking about.

and then this one:

Okayfine. Let’s look at the finer details. I asked more than a few people to go to a search engine and start looking for a home in the Louisville area. Here are some things that I found out that they typically do. Mind you, I told these folks IN ADVANCE that Google had made a change and was suggesting phrases (and providing results) as they typed them in…

The results? The main behavior difference among them was that they would stop after a WORD and look to see what Google had suggested. NOT after a letter. That makes sense to me. So when someone starts typing “Louisville r “into the search bar in pursuit of Louisville real estate, they see Louisville Riverbats (our AAA team). When they type in the complete word Louisville real, it shows them the search results (and they REMARKABLY similar to Louisville Real Estates’ results)

So this would tend to suggest the effect that Chris Johnson indicated in his comment on John’s post…heading for shorter, more expensive KWs for those doing PPC. For those optimizing their site this is WAY too micro of a thing to worry about. The one percent of folks that truncate their search isn’t going to make or break more than a few clicks at most and CERTAINLY nothing in my opinion to sweat.

Let the dogs bark, the caravan moves on.

Another observation leading to this conclusion. Try typing in your city followed by homes. IF you hit the space bar AFTER homes, you will likely see the suggestion of city homes for sale. If you you do not hit the space bar, the wizards at G! realize that you are likely satisfied with the search and are preparing to hit ENTER and get their famously relevant results…so they provide them to you without the click. Nice for the user.

And I could not agree with John Rowles’ assessment of the technology more…it is impressive. REALLY impressive.

Now for using this for a little quick longtail KW phrase research. (I mentioned that it makes this easier, correct?) I have been spending a LOT of time looking at subdivision level traffic on search recently (more on that later). Check this out:

Lake Forest is a subdivision in Louisville. (also there are others in Illinois, Texas and Florida, if memory serves, so the person who indicated in the post that the results are geo-targeted gets a gold star ;-). They are right IMO.) Want a quick way to see which phrases to include in the titles of your blog posts?

Enter the subdivision name and your should see several likely ways to title your post. Happy hunting! (grin)

And for those who think this is the end of the SEO world and almost wetting themselves…put your big boy pants on and adapt. When Google does something for the user that helps maintain Google’s traffic levels for everyone who optimizes sites. Search Engine Marketing pros are the LAST people who should be sniveling about this.

They are in the adapting business not in the whining business. To quote Tom Hanks “There’s no crying in Search Engine Marketing!” (grin) Just my thoughts.