SEARCH engines today look nothing like the they did 10 years ago, let alone a few months ago. There have been major changes in the way the search engines select what sites show up in the results, and in the range of devices used to make the search and even the manner in which the user searches.

Of the top three search engines, Google, Bing and Yahoo, Google still holds the title for the largest market share. This explains why Google is the engine that online marketers study most in order to get their clients’ websites to be seen in the search engine results. In January 2010, Google held 90.77 per cent of the worldwide market share, while Yahoo had 4.12 per cent and Bing 3.41 per cent. In January 2015, Google has lost some ground, holding 88.1 per cent of the worldwide share now, while Yahoo holds 4.13 per cent and Bing 4.53 per cent. China’s search engine Baidu has risen from 0.37 per cent to 0.61 per cent during this time.

The changes in the actual search engine results reflect their goals, which focus primarily on giving the users a more accurate search experience. They aim to display information more relevant to the search query, bringing into account the user location at the time of the search, and they give better rankings in the search results to websites with quality content.

Also, as a result of the massive changes in technology and the diversity of gadgets that can access the web, consumers’ search behaviour has also changed. Users are no longer searching by typing in a single keyword, they search using keyword phrases and often full sentences.

Mobile is mainly used when people are on the move, doing local searches for addresses and driving directions; while the PC/laptop is more often used for in-depth searching. Fifty-two per cent of users indicated that a bad mobile experience made them less likely to engage with a company. Again, I can’t emphasise enough the importance of having a mobile-friendly website for your business, as this is also taken into account by search engines when determining your websites ranking position.

Keyword research

Keyword research is a vital aspect of the overall development of any website and online marketing campaign. Long-tail keywords (keyword phrases with three or more words) dig down into the niche of a business and tend to be less competitive in many cases. Single-word keywords will drive untargeted traffic and it will be much harder to get the coveted top spots on page one of the search engine results for these keywords.

Keyword research is said to be 90 per cent insight and 10 per cent skill. This simply means that when a marketer is discussing your business with you, they need input from you about what your business has to offer, what are the terms people may be using to refer to the products or services that you want to rank for. Then, they will use this information to do research in Keyword research tools to check out the competiton for the terms suggested and to “drill down” to find any special terms that may have gone unnoticed by the competiton.

It is also important to note that, while looking at what the competitors are doing is key, the other very important factor is the monthly search volume for a specific term, and this can be looked at globally or locally by setting the geographic parameters in the keyword tool of your choice.

The sad news is that Google analytics, which used to be a wonderful tool for tracking the keywords that are currently bringing people to a particular website, no longer offers the volume of data for this metric. This is a move that many in the industry believe is financially motivated and the steady increase of the keyword described as “not provided” in the top slot in Google analytics is a sign that this is here to stay. A websites Google analytics report of organic Google traffic offers “not provided” as the top keyword. The website that tracks this trend can be found at notprovidedcount.com. Fortunately, Google’s Webmaster Tools offers more data for your current website. SerpWoo Keyword Finder, KeywordTool.io, Spokal, and Niche Laboratory are all pretty good tools for finding keyword ideas.

Every website should be built with keywords at its base. These are the building blocks on which the content is developed. Once this has been done, the search engine bots know that when the keywords you have built into your site are searched for, they must show your site. Once the research is done properly, the task then rests on the marketers to do ongoing content marketing, targeted Google campaigns and further search engine optimisation to increase the online reach of your website in the organic results.

Melanie Phillibert is a web developer and Internet marketing consultant. A multiple-award winning online marketer, she has studied Internet marketing and web design/development, SEO, PPC, Spcoa; media management and e-commerce development for the last 10 years. She can be contacted via e-mail at melanie@internetmarketingsynergies.com.