Understanding Google

I'll be honest with you, trying to understand Google is kind of like trying to understand your spouse =) Yes, day to day, you "get" them... but sometimes they totally throw you for a loop!

Exactly HOW Google works will never be made public... and how it all works is very complex. Simply put, Google is a computer program that has ways of "reading" a web page, deciding what it is about, and then ranking it in the Google index. There are BILLIONS of web pages in the Google index. (Just for fun, go to Google and search for: .com - There are 25.5 BILLION pages that are in the Google index as a .com or have .com on their web page!) The pages that are in the Google index change in quantity constantly. The Google index is highly dynamic and ever-changing - just the nature of the beast.

When creating content online (ie, writing a web page, making a Squidoo lens, writing an article, etc), you will need to learn how to "tell" the search engine what your page is about.

Enter Keywords

Remember that the search engines read your page with a computer program (also called a spider, or bot, or crawler etc). These programs read your page, but they don't see pictures or videos - they read words. The words you put on your web page, and WHERE you put those words, help the search engines understand what your web page is about. In turn, when an internet user types their search words in Google search, your page will be returned for them to see. The closer to the top of a "answer" from Google your web page sits, the more likely an internet user will click thru and read your page. ( The pages that are returned for a search engine search are called Search Engine Results Pages - or SERPs - and where your page sits on those pages is called your ranking. If your web page is returned as the first "answer" from Google, you have a #1 ranking)

Remember all those 77-78 people out of the hundred that are looking for your information?

Research shows that folks searching for information on Google will only look at the first page of "answers" - maybe two. Therefore, in order to get the most of those 77-78 people to see your web page, you need to have your web page ranking as close to #1 as possible for best results and more organic traffic to your web page.

Organic traffic is free traffic that finds your web page via a search engine. Organic traffic is good - wait, no, it is GREAT. Organic traffic means you have a web page that is working for you. While you sleep, work on other things, golf, or hang out with the family - the search engines are still sending traffic to your web page.

Because the search engine bots are computers, they read your words fairly literally. Meaning, they don't understand reference or implication. If you type, 'It ran up the tree', the bot does not know what it is. However, if you type, 'The cat ran up the tree', the bot gets what you are talking about. Your goal is to make it clear to the search engines what your page is about while not messing up the user experience for your readers.