What does Top of the Pops and Google have in common?

30th July 2006, a date that signalled the end of the world's longest weekly music show. As a child, I would sit every Sunday and wait for the Top 10 to be counted down, an event so ingrained in British culture that we would be sat in our living rooms waiting to see who made it into the Top 10. For some artists, being number one came easy. Bryan Adams managed 16 weeks at number 1 with, “Everything I do, I do it for you”. But for others like Amy Winehouse, Bon Jovi and Guns N’ Roses, the elusive top spot never happened, they all achieved many top 10 singles without ever making it to the pinnacle of music validation.

Now you may be asking yourself, what does this have to do with Google?!?

Well, let me tell you! With Google moving further towards a pay to play model, the historical top 10 organic rankings are being phased out. No longer is position 10 on Google’s charts good enough for a large number of keywords. In fact, we regularly see SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages) for eCommerce keywords that only have 6 organic positions! The top 6 sounds more Premier League than Top of the Pops and we know how that turned out, mentioning no names… European Super League… cough cough.

So what does this mean for businesses?

Basically, a one size fits all SEO strategy will no longer work. In fact, for keywords where Google Ads are prevalent, it may mean that investing in SEO is not the right strategy as PPC ads combined with a low number of organic rankings means the first organic position is in the bottom half of the SERP.? However, it is also possible that both paid ads and position 1 organically are both above the fold (This means the upper half of a Google results page that is shown without you scrolling down).

Here we can see the SERP for LEGO. A perfect storm of Google Shopping, Search and Organic. LEGO completely owns this page above the fold and maximises its chances of getting the optimal return from people searching for LEGO.?

Why is Google doing this?

One reason could be to do with the fact that the vast majority of users don’t click beyond page two, unless they are searching for a specific academic paper, for instance.

The benefit for the user is that they can get to where they want in fewer clicks. Want to buy Fifa 22? There’s no need to click on a gaming website, head to the product page, and add it to your cart. Simply search for the game, click the very first thing you see (the product carousel at the top) and boom(!), you’re taken straight there.

The second, and maybe rather cynical, view is that it's most likely to do with money. Google’s ad revenue is one of the main ways they keep the lights on (and remain one of the four biggest tech companies in history) so if they can squeeze more money out of users by incentivising them with higher rankings to use paid options, then you can see them doing that. The classic list of 10 blue links that used to come up on the SERP is either going, or has already gone, and you can probably put that down to Google wanting to increase ad revenue.

If I rank highly for SEO should I run Google Ads or is it a waste of money?

The answer is, it depends. But in most cases appearing multiple times on page one of Google will allow you to capture more of the monthly traffic. Think of it as a large billboard on Oxford Street in London. If one million people a month see it but it is divided into ten squares, would you be more likely to be seen if your ad appeared in one square or two? Would this make you notice the repeated ad and make you more likely to remember them? What if it wasn't two squares, what if it was more than half? Just like LEGO.

What does this mean for organic SEO?

This kind of action by Google is certainly significant, and will affect how SEO is done in the medium to long term. However, as we’ll detail, the key to making sure you're found on the SERP - be that for an organic, lovingly crafted piece of content or a paid ad - is to adapt your strategy for pretty much every keyword you’re wanting to target.?

Be flexible, adaptable, and you’ll still be able to make a success of your organic and paid strategies.

Some people will run to the hills in “won’t please somebody think of the children?!” style, ala Helen Lovejoy (wife to Reverend Lovejoy in The Simpsons), upon seeing these changes. And while there is some cause for concern, you’ve just got to be cleverer. At the end of the day, Google’s bread and butter is organic search and the reality is that it isn't going away any time soon. A simple remedy of checking the latest updates, following people who know about upcoming changes, and putting more thought into each individual campaign (easier said than done, granted) will see you ride these waves of change fairly easily. Acting very Helen Lovejoy, you will not.

So how do we define the right strategy that ensures we maximise our returns from our ad spend?

Good question! The answer is a very granular strategy that treats each of your top performing keywords individually. Some keywords will only need you to invest in PPC, others will point towards organic. Some keywords will need both paid and organic while others will be so competitive that it doesn't make sense for you to try and rank on page 1.

How can I work out which keywords need which channels?

Well, you have two options:

1. The Hard Way

Build up a spreadsheet where you can analyse each keyword against the information above. Look for commonalities, for instance, if your competitors aren't running ads on a particular keyword, then there is likely to be a reason why. If ads are running and position 1 organically is low down the page then SEO is likely to be less valuable. Apply common sense!

2. The Easy Way

Send me an email at [email protected] and I will get our team to do the audit for you!