In 2007 Google began displaying “Universal Search” results . This was a big change in the way search results were delivered to viewers and it affected all web site owners that depend on Google traffic for their business.

What is Universal Search and why does it matter?
In the past, when a search term was entered into Google’s search field, the SE returned the web sites that best matched the query. So a particular site competed only with the other web sites vying for placement with the same keywords.
With the introduction of Universal Search, Google began displaying results that included other digital content such as video, images, news, books and blogs. Now the competition for valuable first page real estate grew much more fierce as websites not only had to compete with other web sites but also with digital media of all types.
Since Universal Search was introduced websites have a broader and more competitive playing field. To be successful with Universal Search, website owners need to broaden their reach to viewers using digital media such as Images, Video ( YouTube) , News ( Press Releases) , Social Media ( Facebook, Twitter) and Google Maps.
In the new era of Universal Search, business need to be proactive in using these opportunities to stay ahead of the competition.

Why Facebook Surpassing Google in Search Volume May Mean Very Little to Business

This morning, BusinessWeek posted an article on this and many other Google woes. While Google may indeed have other issues, in my opinion, search isn’t one of them. Here’s why. (more…)

I may be a total girl when it comes to actually using most of the tools in anyone’s garage, but I absolutely love them. I love the magic that happens when a painstaking task becomes effortless thanks to a brilliantly engineered device. Since I like to nerd-out about my favorite things while talking about SEO, let’s see if I can draw some parallels between my three favorite actual tools, and their theoretical SEO counterparts!

The “mini power tool” (shown in the photo) that was developed and used by NASA for the last repair of the Hubble Space Telescope combined with the fastener capture plate developed for many uses on the same mission is an awesomely specific and effective combination. The mini power tool was developed specifically to allow astronauts to remove tiny screws from one panel of the Hubble telescope. It had to be made smaller than previous power tools in order to gently remove the small screws, and a light was installed in the front of it so astronauts could clearly see them. The fastener capture plate allows for the screws to be removed cleanly, capturing all the screws as they are removed so they don’t drift off into space… or worse, inside the telescope.

This tool reminds me a lot of Yahoo! Site Explorer. It is an invaluable tool to SEOs for either evaluating your own backlinks or looking at the backlinks of a competitor. There’s really no better tool for the job. SEOmoz’s Open Site Explorer is a close replacement, and certainly offers some nice metrics in addition to links, but we’ve found that it doesn’t give as complete or accurate a list as YSE. We are devastated with the thought that it might go away. Both of these tools are great examples of tools engineered to a very specific purpose. However, they also both share a ginourmous fault – being a one-trick pony. Yahoo! Site Explorer only shows us backlinks – why not also show local citations and reviews? Why not allow an option to see social media citations? Yahoo could also take a page out of SEOmoz’s book and show some trust rankings. My next favorite is a much, much more versatile tool…

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Google released the news yesterday that they had reached an agreement with MySpace, and now MySpace will be available in their real-time search results. I find this interesting, since MySpace is a dying social network by most accounts, but what I really find interesting is that Facebook still isn’t being included. Why do you suppose that is?

Well, I think it’s because Google is a Bitter Betty.

Yep. I said it.

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