With the new year there will be some major changes to how Yahoo! gets their natural search engine listings (organic listings picked through the search engine’s robot) for any given keyword result, including yours. The way Yahoo! used to gather the sites eligible for top results involved allowing sites to pay a flat rate to have their site’s feed (list of links) submitted to the search engine. With this program, called the Yahoo! Paid Inclusion program, sites would typically rank pretty well on Yahoo! for a small cost per click fee. We’ve gotten a few clients amazing #1 and first page listings through this system and it was by far the most cost effective program on the Internet. Another way that we used to get listings for clients on Yahoo! was to pay a nominal annual fee to be included in Yahoo’s search index… which will also be discontinued. (Click the below image for a larger version.)

Paid vs Organic Listings

Many designers, artists, and luxury product manufacturers out there reading this right now are thinking to themselves blah blah blah, so what???… but wait!

This is where the future of the search engines takes another turn. Yesterday Yahoo! announced that they are experimenting with providing real-time search results from services like Twitter. Google already announced similar developments with their search results weeks ago; so now it appears as though we have a “social results race” that has officially been kicked into high gear. Who will be the first to have fully integrated, real-time social media in their search engine results? Who will do it better? Who will gain more searchers? Why should YOU care?

This is why you should care, this will affect your business in one way or another:

The possibility exists, and is getting stronger by the moment, that tweeps (the equivalent of ‘peeps’ on twitter e.g. ‘people on twitter’) will be able to tweet their way to the top of the search engines by having strong, influential, authoritative twitter accounts. This means that if your competition already has a twitter account, or if some angry customer has been on twitter for years, you can probably expect that their tweets from twitter will be served right up there with your corporate website when someone searches for your brand name on Google or Yahoo! If someone went to a showroom and wants to get more information about your products or services and searches for your name or brand name you don’t want the competition’s tweets showing up above yours for everyone to see.

What should you do???

Sign up for a twitter account with your brand’s name and start tweeting daily, or better yet, hire us to do it for you. We manage numerous twitter accounts for ourselves and for our clients and these accounts have become some of the most high quality, influential twitter feeds in their respective industries. The next step is to really take this social media marketing thing seriously, because your company’s tweets and your company’s website will not be enough. You will need to be in numerous social networking arenas such as facebook, digg and others if you want to be able to have enough search engine listings to push ‘joe shmo’s’ tweets down in the search results. The more content and social media you put out the better, and this cannot just be done in a quick blast, but must be continuously maintained so that it doesn’t hurt your brand’s image. I often see a brand that makes a good, initial effort at creating and updating a twitter account, but then they let it die with their last message tarnishing their brand’s image with something like “We will have big news for all of our followers tomorrow! Stay tuned! 3:25 PM Mar 18th, 2008″.

Social media marketing is not new, but the impact that it will be playing in the near future with millions of people on twitter and facebook could have on every website out there is monumental( note: there are more people on facebook worldwide then there are people in the U.S.). It is much better to be prepared for the social search listings by maximizing your social presence through social networking platforms today, then be very very sorry tomorrow. Don’t forget that by building your own social presence now you will also be catering to your clients and consumers of tomorrow. Those companies that do not increase their brand awareness online and through social media will miss out on the new luxury marketplace of tomorrow.

The types of Online media outlets have grown tremendously over the past few years. From e-newsletters and blogs to social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook, as media outlets grow so does client Online coverage. Any type of Online coverage has always been a big piece of the pie, so to speak, in terms of overall client coverage. Blog coverage on average has grown by over 50 percent. Online coverage grows at a steadier pace, but grows nonetheless. Online coverage on trade related sites is up by an average of 7 percent compared to non-trade related sites. These statistics support the growth of Online reporting and how we are constantly trying to win our clients coverage using new mediums.

This is the way the Web and search engines function:

1. New, updated or more feature-rich websites gain more exposure by both people and the search engines.
2. New, unique and interesting content is highly valued by both its readers and the search engines.
3. New and compelling exposure through the Web sits in the mind of the buyers so that when they are ready to purchase they’ve already made their decision on your brand, or at the very least your brand is fresh in their minds.
4. Search engines see the added Online branding efforts as a plus for your company’s brand and its website/s.

Regardless of whether or not you’re actively writing new content for the Web, putting pictures on your site, engaging Web users in all the different forms of social media or improving your websites – your competition is! This means if you’ve been so stressed about your business (and rightfully so in tough times) that you’ve totally forgotten about the Web, then you’ve actually taken an even bigger step backwards. In fact, many of your competitors might have been putting more into their Online holdings while your business was doing nothing.

Based on the cost effectiveness of investing in websites and content verses any other form of marketing or business expansion, many businesses use these downturns as times to really focus on the Web. The experiences, search engine listings, bookmarks and ideas that the active Online marketer has gained during the tough times will come back ten fold as the economy picks up and consumer confidence returns. Just think, even if someone has never heard of your company, but they are ready to do some research on a product that they’re interested in for their home,  the first place they’re going to do research is often the Internet. If you have been actively building your Online presence and show up in the places they are looking for information, then you are much more likely to get the sale. If you have been letting this part of your business sit on the back burner during the recession, then I fear you’ll be coming out of this downturn even worse off then you would have figured.

It’s never too late to market your brand Online, but just keep in mind that the longer you wait, the larger the hurdle gets as the competition gains your market share and Online authority with the search engines and Web users.

It was created in 2006 by CEO Evan Williams, and now it is mostly owned by venture capitalists investors that have yet to really monetize the micro blogging service. It appears as though the owners of twitter will be trying to inject ads similar to those seen on Google.com & Yahoo.com as a way to make revenue with this website.

There are myriad ways that people are using twitter today, but the main features and usability of the service is quite simple. When you sign up for an account you get your own link www.twitter.com/yourusername and then with this new account you can post as many “tweets” as you want. These tweets are then displayed on your profile page listed above. Tweets show up on other people who are following you (“followers”) homepages when they are logged in. When you publish a tweet you can prohibit access of delivery to those in their circle of friends or allow anybody to see them. Tons of different services, mobile applications and other websites allow you to send and receive tweets with their software, applications etc.

The phenomenon of the growth of twitter as one of the largest social platforms on the Web is amazing, but not entirely unexpected. With the use of the Internet growing widely, combined with the direct messages from advertisements throughout the day, people’s attention span has grown accustom to bite sized bits of information. Everyone has jumped on board the twitter bandwagon, everyone from companies like Starbucks and GM to the President of The United States now use twitter to update readers on their day to day happenings.

The reason that so many people and businesses are using twitter on a daily business is because it gives them another, very effective way to connect with thousands of real people every day. Many consumers value social communication like that of twitter posts more than any other type of customer service, marketing, or form of communication. People who use twitter are receiving tidbits of information that they are very interested in, and it comes from across all the Web. These microblogs keep twitter users entertained, informed and in touch with the people, products, services and companies they love.

Here are some interesting industry twitter feeds that we have found valuable and entertaining:

http://twitter.com/styleture – Notable Designs and Functional Living Spaces
http://twitter.com/methome – Metropolitan Home Magazine
http://twitter.com/InStyledotcom – In Style Magazine
http://twitter.com/Interior_Design – Interior Design Magazine
http://twitter.com/archiCentral – ArchiCentral – Architectural News
http://twitter.com/hgtvdecorating – HGTV Decorating