Lately Google has been extremely busy overhauling services and rolling out new changes left and right, many of which will have a major impact on your Google search and social marketing campaigns.

Below we are highlighting five of the most important of these recent Google changes, and how they will affect you:

Google’s “Search Plus Your World”

“Search Plus Your World” (SPYW) is the new Google update that integrates social results from your Google Plus account (if you have one) into your Google search query results. It is Google’s hope that these “personal” results-which include things like your friends’ photos, recommendations, and profile details-will help you find even more relevant content from trusted sources.

Almost immediately after SPYW went into effect, outcries of protest seemed to be coming from everyone, including users, who complain that personal results are mostly irrelevant, clutter the stream of search results, and may be violating their privacy. Gizmodo even boldly proclaimed:Â Google Just Made Bing the Best Search Engine. Ouch!

How this Affects You: Google seems to be forcing you to adopt Google+ if you want your site content to gain more visibility. If you haven’t yet set up your account, it’s time to get cracking.

Social Search: Search Engines Care What Your Friends Say

All of the big search engines are now using social content to shape results pages. Time to rethink your online marketing? In a recent Inc.com article, Web Ad.vantage CEO Hollis Thomases explains the impact of social search and how search engines now incorporate relationships as a measure of relevancy.

How this Affects You: The integration of social content into search signals the future of traditional Search Engine Optimization (SEO). You have to move beyond the message on your website alone and now broadcast it to the world-using social tools, interactions and conversations. More of what you post on your social networks is going to be spidered by search engines, and being more deliberate about what you’re sharing can improve your visibility.
Is Your Content “Fresh” Enough for Google?

Is Your Content “Fresh” Enough for Google?

Google’s latest search algorithm updates, which impacts a whopping 35% of online searches, is all about the “freshness factor” that favors recently-updated content. Relevant results that are most recent will rise to the top of Google’s search results.

How this Affects You: Prepare to blog more frequently and keep your news and press release pipelines full. We can help you develop a content strategy that takes advantage of Google’s “freshness factor” to gain more visibility.
Link Your Webmaster Tools Account to Your Google Analytics Account for Improved Keyword Reporting

Link Your Webmaster Tools Account to Your Google Analytics Account for Improved Keyword Reporting

With Google’s recent rollout of encrypted search, the Google Analytics dashboard now displays “(not provided)” for a significant volume of search queries instead of revealing the actual keyword that referred logged-in visitors to your website. Though Google originally estimated this change would only impact a small percentage of your traffic, webmasters across the globe have been reporting”keyword not provided” percentages of 15% or greater-a significant difference that constitutes a major “blackout” of useful data.

How this Affects You: A kind of work-around solution is for you to link your Google Webmaster Tools account to your Google Analytics account. Webmaster Tools aggregates search queries and displays additional information about keywords that Google Analytics alone lacks. It begs the question: if keyword data is available in Webmaster Tools, why is it not available in Analytics? Why make this additional step necessary? If you don’t know how to do this, don’t have the time to, or don’t routinely review and analyze your Google Analytics to extract useful data, perhaps it’s time to get some experienced assistance.

Google to Retire Urchin Analytics and Other Services in 2012

Google recently announced it will soon be retiring six products and services in the upcoming months, including Urchin Analytics. Other affected products included Google Sky Map, Needlebase, Picnik, and Google’s Social Graph API.

How this Affects You: If you’re currently using any of these soon-to-be-retired Google products, especially Urchin, you need to be aware that these products will either be merged, open-sourced, or phased out completely Now is the time to set up Google Analytics if you’re not already using it. New Urchin licenses will no longer be available after March 2012.

Need Help?

Still confused about all these Google changes and how they will impact your search and social campaigns? Let us know if we can be of any assistance. Send an email to [email protected] or give us a call at (410) 942-0488.