Thanks to Barry Schwartz for the update on Caffeine.

Google actually launched a site at this URL. On this site, you could perform searches and get a glimpse into the world of the search results from the Caffeine algorithm. As we investigated the ranking results in Caffeine, we noticed the top 10 rankings were undergoing daily fluctuations, for brand and non-brand search terms and phrases. Overall it was very unpredictable. There were times when the rankings for one keyword would change throughout the day. One thing we could all agree on: Google was presenting results more quickly. Google must have decided that users wanted results more quickly.

Google updated the Caffeine algorithm every day. With the rise of real-time search (i.e. Twitter and Facebook updates), as well as the continued explosion of image search and video search, we were expecting to see a lot of new results in the top 10 rankings for any given keyword or phrase. In fact, many SEOs are guessing that this new algorithm will affect the core nature of how URLs are ranked via links and PageRank. Caffeine was also a way for Google to test the placement of news, images, videos, shopping results, etc… in a new layout for universal search results. You can see a lot of that today already. There’s more images, videos and news items in the top 10 results. It appears that Caffeine will bring about even more changes in the layout for universal search.

Today, Google took down the Caffeine sandbox::

We appreciate all the feedback from people who searched on our Caffeine sandbox.
Based on the success we’ve seen, we believe Caffeine is ready for a larger audience. Soon we will activate Caffeine more widely, beginning with one data center. This sandbox is no longer necessary and has been retired, but we appreciate the testing and positive input that webmasters and publishers have given.

Matt Cutts, Google’s chief spam cop and all-around spokesperson for all things search, followed up on his blog with this:

I know that webmasters can get anxious around this time of year, so I wanted to reassure site owners that the full Caffeine roll out will happen after the holidays. Caffeine will go live at one data center so that we can continue to collect data and improve the technology, but I don’t expect Caffeine to go live at additional data centers until after the holidays are over. Most searchers wouldn’t immediately notice any changes with Caffeine, but going slowly not only gives us time to collect feedback and improve, but will also minimize the stress on webmasters during the holidays.

One thing to note is that the algorithm change will not be launched until after the holidays. We believe the new algorithm will have an impact for our clients, but it is virtually impossible to know what those changes might be, especially now that they have taken down the Caffeine sandbox. They will have 2-3 more months to update Caffeine even further before it launches, so it would be pure conjecture to predict the ways it may or may not affect the rankings for our clients. However, we do believe that Google will still continue to lead the search engine world in rewarding solid SEO strategies while providing the most relevant results.

In the end, the search results page layouts and keyword rankings will change. But that should be no surprise. Google launches major algorithm updates 2-3 times per year, and they do not typically publicize it. That is precisely why SEOs are taking note of Caffeine. In my opinion, Caffeine is a call-to-action for all search marketers to expand SEO campaigns to encompass images, videos, press releases, news, shopping, books, related searches, social accounts, etc… Google has shown us that they are presenting more and more of those items in the top results. The need for a solid, aggressive SEO strategy is indisputable, simply because the competition for homepage real estate has increased with the introduction of the universal search elements mentioned above.

SEO can no longer remain in the background of your search marketing campaigns. SEO cannot be paused. SEO cannot be offset by bigger PPC budgets. In the long run, you can’t afford to ignore social media, mobile search, image search optimization and asset management. Heaven forbid, you may even need to get a Twitter account. You must embrace all aspects of SEO. Or you will be defeated in the SERPs.

Google has thrown down the gauntlet. When Caffeine goes live, your rankings may not fluctuate very much in the short term. I mean, c’mon. You’ve got a huge brand name, and your website has tons of inbound links. You are a PR6! Well, don’t get too comfortable. You may not be able to simply rest on title tags, meta tags, inbound links and PageRank. With the increased competition, it is getting tougher to rank in the top 10. And the big question is: What are you going to do about it?

I am relatively new to the world of blogging, and I made a promise to myself to share much of what I learn in this world of blogging. Now that we have our first comment spam, I figured it would be a great idea to share my knowledge about comment spam.

Comment Spam: Anyone up for some Final Fantasy Football?

It is easy to identify spam comments because they typically have the following elements:

• It is completely off-topic from the blog post.
  Before this post, our blog had no mentions of Fantasy Football or Final Fantasy.
• It has a lot of keywords that are obviously stuffed into the comment.
  As you can see, there are a bunch of keywords in this comment. They are stuffed into a grammatically-incorrect statement. And they are separated by commas.
• All of the keywords are off-topic from the blog post.
  Again, none of the keywords in this comment relate to the blog post.
• It has a link in the comment.
  This is the tell-tale sign of comment spam: links. Comment spammers use these links to influence search engine rankings. And some comment spammers even use these links as a traffic source.
• It has a link in the name.
  Why stop with links in the body of the comment when you can also link the name field in the comment?
• The email domain is suspicious.
  In this case, the comment was obviously a spam comment. I didn’t even really need to investigate the email address. But the email address can be an indicator of spam comments. For this comment, the email is from yandex.ru, the most popular search engine in Russia. It’s like the Yahoo of Russia. Anyone can get a yandex.ru mail account, so this email is not completely suspicious. However, I have seen comments from info@gmail.com, and that is definitely a fake email address.
  

Now you know about Comment Spam. It’s purpose is to generate links, higher rankings for keywords, and traffic from our blog. The bad news is that people still use this technique for link building. And even worse, they only do it because it works. It’s definitely not something we do or recommend to our clients. Anyways, the point of this blog post is to teach you what to look for. Mission accomplished. Right?

For SEO, if you’re already using it as a secondary or even primary tracking tool, you’ll want to consider adding a few of these items:

• Want to know exactly where your natural search listings rank? Here’s a settings hack that lets you capture this information when Google includes it – http://yoast.com/track-seo-rankings-and-sitelinks-with-google-analytics-ii/
• Are people clicking on your video or image thumbnails in the normal Google web results? Use this code to find out – http://www.searchcowboys.com/seo/256
• Find out if your content is making it into Digg, Reddit, and other social media sites with this Firefox plugin (in beta) – https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/9393
• Create a quick list of keywords that are suddenly driving you new traffic with another Firefox plugin (in beta) – https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/11120

Those are just some of the options you might want to look into. In fact, you might even develop a custom solution to your specific needs. The possibilities are wide open with SEO and Google Analytics.

Because of its mysterious nature, people draw a lot of false conclusions about how a web page can rank. For one, there is no magic bullet to ranking. In fact, Google has over a hundred data points it factors into rankings. They usually deliver good results, too, which keep getting better. What that means is that you should focus as much on creating what a visitor would like to see highly ranked, as well as working on SEO tactics.

Some other common misconceptions are:

• You can’t have a flash(y) site and rank well. Not so, in fact, you can have a great looking site with graphics and even Flash movies widely used with careful planning. Using CSS techniques and font alternatives you can remove many unnecessary images. Those images that are kept can be thoroughly optimized. Flash movies can also be better optimized and integrated. With that in mind though, stick with text first and add in these elements when they add to the user experience.
• Traffic is the measure of an SEO campaign. While it’s true that a good SEO campaign will drive more traffic, the traffic needs to be qualified. Search phrases with low conversion rates, low bounce rates, and low visitor loyalty rates should be lower priorities than well performing phrases. Additionally, landing pages need to be well designed for conversions as well as capturing search traffic.
• A lot of sites assumed an XML sitemap wasn’t important, so long as you have an HTML sitemap on your site. In fact, Google discovers new pages on a site much faster when an XML sitemap is present and updated frequently. That means your new products start getting traffic quicker.
• Ranking well is your goal. Yes, ranking highly in Yahoo is nice, but is anyone clicking on your listing? Search visitors won’t simply click on the first listing, they will quickly scan some listing before clicking. Your title, description, and URL need to convince a user to click.
• SEO just affects your site pages. While the HTML pages of a site are a huge part of SEO, pages are not the only content appearing in search engine results. Videos, images, PDFs, RSS feeds, Flash movies, and more appear sprinkled throughout search engine results. Including elements like these in your site, and ensuring they are optimized, means more opportunities for your site to appear.

One of our travel clients recently signed on with us to do SEO.  Now keep in mind that this particular client has a very well-established brand and secure market position, so we were going to have to bring EXTRA big value to the table.  Our task from the outset was clear: take SEO and “integrate” it with all other site initiatives to give our client the biggest bang for their buck.  To be fair, the client-side team is excellent and was instrumental in getting this done.  As such, RANGE can’t take all the credit—“Other site initiatives” included copy updates, new page design/implementation and many other projects not strictly related to SEO (rankings and traffic).  Regardless, we knew they were related in this particular situation, and we had to find a way to manage all of them together.

Basically, we got together via the magic of a conference call and divided the labor between the design/copywriting team, the client-side web designers, the client’s account team at Range and Range’s SEO department. We established up front a communication channel and schedule, broke the project up in phases and then got to work.

It sounds pretty intuitive, but the results were almost instant.  Not only did the set-up allow for easier communication between the parties involved, but more importantly it also resulted in better work.  Every design project was SEO-friendly…every SEO project was design-friendly.  As we move ahead into the second quarter of this year, things are rolling along nicely, and the client feels their money is well-spent.  Credit is due all around, but from the RANGE and client side, everyone has just been phenomenal.

So the next time you’re at a loss as to how to position SEO effectively within a larger organization, take it from me, integration can make your life a whole lot easier.