The Google Effect

The Oprah Effect: The almost viral phenomenon that occurs when Oprah endorses a cause, person or product, resulting in its popularity escalating to the point of frenzy.

I was completely dumfounded after reading a couple of articles on Oprah and the influential power she holds resulting in not only brand demand but instant authority and wealth. If you think about it the internet; Google in particular, holds almost as much power – if not more.

Over the past few years there has been a lot of success through the internet; product sales escalating, musicians’ skyrocketing to stardom – success via the internet isn’t unheard of. The Australian Government isn’t wasting any time with their recent interest in internet social media including; Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and YouTube – it seems almost ludicrous that Kevin Rudd has a MySpace; however, the internet is quickly becoming the best marketing medium available and Google is where it can all be seen. Through a single keyword millions of results can be unleashed revealing new innovative products and services. However, it is only those in the top ten who have the most authority.

There are two ways in which SEO provides a site with such authority and they include on page and off page techniques all aimed at getting a website to the top of Google.

On page techniques involve identifying keyword phrases and including them in:

- The URL
- Title Tags
- Meta Tags
- Headlines
- Sub Headlines
- Body Text
- Internal Linking Structure
- Site Map
- Site URL Structure

Off page techniques include aspects that are done off the page to improve search engine page rank in order to achieve traffic and include:

- Submissions to Industry, Local Business and other relevant Directories
- Blog Commenting and Conversation on relevant industry blogs
- Social Bookmarking and other Web 2.0 Mediums (Facebook, Twitter, Myspace etc…)
- Press Release and Article Submissions
- RSS Feed Submission
- Inclusion into Yahoo Paid Directory, DMOZ, Best of the Web and other authority site directories

Google has slowly developed into a mass media avenue becoming a celebrity in its own right. A first page ranking provides businesses with instant authority, branding and increased sales much like a segment on Oprah does. When someone says “Google It” wouldn’t you feel at ease to know you’re business is there?

The Google Effect: The almost viral phenomenon that occurs when a first page ranking is achieved for a product or service, resulting in increased demand to the point of frenzy.