The begging of SEO
The origin of SEO goes all the way back to the 90’s, along with the birth of search engines such as Yahoo!. This search engine introduced bots that would analyze the relevance of different websites through various algorithms. These algorithms determine what we now know as web positioning.
But above all, it was near the end of the 90’s decade when Google first appeared. It has since become the main search engine used worldwide since the beginning of the 21st century.
Since 2004, Google began to be the most popular search engine among users. Now in 2019, Google is strongly valued by all businesses based on their positioning in Google search pages.
Because of this, the evolution of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SEM (Search Engine Marketing) is conditioned by changes in Google’s algorithms. Marketers continuously try to keep up with these changes in order to reach the top of Google’s search results.
Improve your Google search result positioning
In order to analyze the evolution of web positioning within the last 5 years, first focus on the updates made by Google and how companies adhere to their conditions in order to position themselves among the first search results:
In the first decade of the 21st century, companies were betting, buying, and selling links when they found out that it was one of the strategies that worked best to improve SEO positioning on Google search results. In other words, the more external links that point to your website, the higher your website would show up in search results Go Digital.
However, during the early years, Google was not fully developed. In many cases, the results Google gave did not correspond 100% to the search terms made by the user. Users would get results that often had nothing to do with what they were looking for.
Starting in 2009, Google carried out an update called Caffeine, a new web content indexing system, which made it easier for users to find content more suitable for their search. This content was regularly updated and of better quality.
Google Changes Their Algorithm
However, the two subsequent updates called Panda and Penguin, which occurred in 2011 and 2012 respectively, did create a major impact on website positioning. Companies began to struggle in remaining on the top of the list of a Google search result.
The first update, Panda, focused on the quality of the content of websites, while Penguin focused on the quality of links. This system avoided artificial links entirely.
Today, some backlinks are listed as nofollow. This means that when search engines “crawl” a website, the link will not improve their ratings in search results. All other links are considered “dofollow.” So why is this important?
Improve your Content
Now, when trying to improve SEO positioning for a website, the content must be relevant. Producing meaningless articles that are not associated with the link will not improve your placement in a Google search result.
Also, the links must also be “dofollow” for them to help improve your site. Often times, in order to get a dofollow link, the quality of the article must be high and the link must be relevant to the article.You can improve the link building process by doing guest posts.
No-follow links often appear on profile pages containing a link, or in business direcroties. A user may still click on a link that will lead them to your website. Because of this, nofollow links can still help improve your traffic.
However, if you are using links to improve your SEO, then it is recommended that they are dofollow.
So how do I keep up?
Over the years, Google continues to change their algorithms in order to provide the most relevant and updated content as possible. In more recent years, they also contain links to videos, answers to questions, and even have sponsored links listed at the top of the results.
What is considered now to be a “top result” is also mixed in with the questions, videos, and information blurbs that appear on the right side of a search result. Google also constantly changes the format of the results, changing fonts and title lengths of each result.
So what is next? That is for Google to decide.
Emma Smith, PR and content manager at Fonvirtual. I’m interested in digital marketing, technology and international logistics. I enjoy writing for blogs where I spread the word of telecom services in international business.
