Caffeine
I often tell people that Google is my favorite website. I don’t think they understand what I am talking about when I make that statement. I like the design of the site because it is clean, easy to use, and you know exactly what they want you to do. I also love the technology behind the home page. Google has been doing an awful lot lately. With the merge of Bing and Yahoo search, Google is not sitting back. We have all heard about the exciting rollout of Google’s Caffeine. So what exactly is Caffeine? It’s a friendlier algorithm that takes user experience into ranking consideration even more than before. I keep hearing two words every time I read or hear about Caffeine “Site Speed”. Google has stated recently that site speed plays a role in your Adwords ranking and with Caffeine it will play a role in your organic listing.
Why in the world would Google care what your site speed is? Google is in the business of delivering a user experience. They want to give you everything you want and more when you stick your few little words in that box of theirs. Your website becomes their product when the search engine results appear. They want the top result to be relevant to your search and they also want the website to be structured properly and the load time to be quick on all computers. This tells us that flash, big images, lots of java script, and videos will negatively affect ranking. This will raise questions for a lot of automotive dealers with full flash sites and tons of javascript. Analytic code includes a lot of Java Script. I recently found a site that had both Google Analytics and separate “live analytics” code on their site. This will likely cause problems for that dealer. Your server can play a role in speed as well.
Enhanced Local Listing & Maps
Google is currently testing a new product called “Enhanced Listing”. Enhanced Listing is to help you stand out from all the other listings on the Search Engine Results Page and the Local Maps Page (See examples below). This newest addition isn’t like any other product they have. It’s not a Pay Per Click, rather a flat rate of $25 monthly billed on the last day of each month. They hired a sales team to make outbound calls which tells me they are serious about growing this. The Enhanced Listing is by invite only.
As of right now this new feature is being testing in only two markets, San Jose, CA and Houston, TX. You have to have a minimum number of impressions and that number is unknown at this time. If you are in one of the two test markets, login to your Google Local Business Center account and “view report”. You may see an offer for $25 monthly to add an Enhanced Listing. After speaking with Google they confirmed they are plannning to launch this “Enhanced Listing” nationally but they are gathering data right now. Based on my conversation with them it’s about one month old. That is why we have not heard anything about it. You can choose to offer a highlighted link to your website as seen below or directions to your location. I am familiar with the business listed here. They have not tested the location yet because their goal is to drive traffic to the website at this time.
As you may already know, Google has spent some time trying to make the local details page more like a website for small business owners that don’t have a website. Carol Tice wrote a blog on Entrepreneur.com stating
“last year, an Ad-ology study found, 46 percent of small businesses surveyed said they did not have a website.” So Google did what they thought was right and offered the opportunity to list your own “Google Micro Site” as your link on Google Local. This benefits Google because they run ads with your competitors on your listing. Not good for you! But on the other hand you would have never been found had that option not been available.
So does the Enhanced Listing work? Aaron Overhead Door tested it over the past two weeks and here are their findings (shared with permission).
The verdict is still out on the improvement of conversion. It is cheap enough not to complain if it isn’t dramatic but it’s also cheap enough not to expect too much from it. Google has found a safe number that business owners are willing to pay and it will generate revenue for Google. This feature will likely be a no-brainer for dealers once available on a national basis and is worth trying for dealers in the test markets. Below is a screen shot of the particular listing for this business….
This is an expanded view of the link on the map. Above you see a stat that they actually track how many times it expands.
A downfall was that only one credit card may be used for all of your listings. The folks at Aaron Overhead Door voiced concerns about that with Google and they agreed and said they will work on it. That problem should be corrected by the time they roll out nationally.
Social Stream
Being in the Chat business I know what it means to have NOW information. I read transcripts everyday where people are at work and want an answer before they can call or email. Social Stream on Google is something that is very interesting to me because it represents more than just twitter updates. It represents the future of communication. Wait, it represents now! The demand for information is so high that something posted a week ago is old news. Google has implemented live social updates on their Search Engine Results. See below…
This effects the car business in a few ways….Dealers are going to have to learn how to make a dynamic website that changes or updates content on a regular basis. Old content is….old news. I see a day when dealers will have writers on staff that writes new content for their websites every day. Blogs, research information, etc….
Adwords
Wow, how adwords have changed over the past few years. I remember when I thought 50 cents a click was a lot of money. Now it’s not abnormal to see $15.00 a click. It was reported on drivingsales.com recently about click to call in adwords. This feature gives consumers the opportunity to click to call directly from the ad. Some of you know I work for a technology company that specializes in communication and we are the leader in automotive chat. I predict that we’ll soon see click-to-chat within Adwords as well. Based on conversion improvement we’ve measured working with other media companies, adding click-to-chat could increase Adword conversion by at least 25%
Google has already started offering movie times, flight info, and much more directly on the SERP’s. Adding presence-aware click-to-chat to organic listings is another way that Google might think about increasing the “now” factor of SERP’s.
All in all, my crush for Google has grown over the past 6 months learning what they are doing and how they are doing it. Site speed, better user experience, enhanced listings, click to call via adwords, and social stream is just the tip of the iceberg and all of these things are sure to benefit dealers that take advantage of them.
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