Personalized search results are the standard

Google has announced that personalized search results are now used by default, even if you are not logged in. This happens without giving an opt-in. It is possible to opt-out but it is unlikely that many people will make use of that.

New way return your search results

Google is now using the search terms you have been using in the past years to determine the best results in your search. Let’s say you are searching for "Ajax". What exactly are you looking for? Are you looking for the Greek hero or the programming language?

What impact does this have on your website?  Websites that are using little Search Engine Optimization (SEO) could now rank higher than your fully optimized website. What are your options? You need to make sure that you attract as many people to your site as possible!

Stay in control

How do you do this? You need to write attracting and unique articles. Google measures if visitors like your site or not in a matter of seconds (bounce rate). Fact remains that it is more difficult to measure how your site is ranking in analytics, but you will be able to see trends and see how visitors found you through the search engine and with the use of which keywords. Also see how your landing pages are doing. Why are they not looking into your site? What could you change?

Google gives more and more control to the searcher. By taking your readers seriously and closely following them in your analytics you are still able to rank high.