Ross just received a call from another SEO asking why we haven’t publically bashed Google for their most recent ranking weirdness. In reality, I think we’ve taken it to Google several times in the past year and rightly so. Google has a tremendous impact on the world of search and the availability of information to the general public. On a business persective, companies can be made and broken based on their Google ranking. This is important and we can’t forget that every business has an impact on real people’s lives. I think Google has a responsibility to live up to but I have no idea exactly how they should live up to it. More warning perhaps.
I think I will start taking pot-shots in print at Google’s expense and here’s the first. Google’s rankings were thrown totally out of whack last week with the oddest update we’ve ever seen. SPAM and totally unrelated sites ending up with the top rankings under specific keyword phrases. Sites that had been placing in the Top10 for months or even years suddenly gone from the listings… ARG. This update has been named the Florida update and, in a strange way, that figures. We’ve suspected the math in Florida to be sort of whacky for a couple of years now… 🙂