2011 was a year of very dramatic change in the world of SEO, with the most notable change coming from Google’s Panda updates, which significantly changed how the search engine processes and ranks web pages. Since Google typically sends most sites in the US about 80 percent of their search traffic, this algorithm change had a pretty dramatic impact.

While most of the dust has settled on that update, we expect more changes to come that will significantly affect SEO strategies. So, what exactly is it we expect to see in 2012?

1. Mobile surfing will overtake desktop surfing.

Mobile usage continues to grow at an astounding rate, and tablets are definitely contributing to the growth. Whether it be a mobile site (built in html 5) or a mobile app, having a mobile strategy will become critical to our success as marketers. That said, mobile SEO is really not very different from traditional SEO (See Seven Mobile SEO Myths Exposed).

2. Voice Search will change search behavior.

With the release of SIRI voice, search will finally take off. Searchers want answers, not a bunch of results they have to navigate through. Since SIRI gets its answers from multiple sources, making sure you are present in each of those sources can ensure that SIRI recommends your site. A small study by The Arora Report followed 40 iPhone users and their Siri vs. Google usage. All 40 users saw no need to use Google ever again. 27 of them hadn’t used Google since they got their iPhone, and the other 13 only used it twice. Of course this was not a comprehensive study, but it is pretty suggestive of where things are going. (more…)

Google has done it again. Recently, Google conducted the “Panda Update.” If you pay attention to tech news, you may know this reshuffling of search rankings as the “Farmer Update.” This update is the largest that Google has conducted, reshuffling 12 percent of all search rankings. This reshuffling has already impacted several web pages, both positively and negatively. The impact of the panda update upon your site is highly determined by the quality of your content.

Some of the largest sites that were impacted were Mahalo and eZine Articles. These sites run solely on user submissions and the quality of content is considered to be low. While these are two examples they are certainly not the only sites with poor quality that were impacted they are among the largest.

The update has not only helped to push low quality sites down in rankings but has also had an impact on sites with strong, well written content. Google has stated that no algorithm will be perfect. This means that they will not make any exceptions or considerations for any one site affected.

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