Webpage Accessibility and Google SERPs

Creating a site that generates traffic is a struggle and it's an even harder task to bring in organic traffic. Organic traffic are visitors that are produced through search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, and MSN. The ranking you hold in the SERPs(Search Engine Results Page) is directly related to how much traffic you receive from these search engines.

USWeb.com recenty published a press release stating the importance of Google's ranking methods and where it may be going, in regards to a sites accessibility. Google has long built their results page based on a number of hidden factors, including public ones such as page rank(PR). Now Google is adding another search function, which takes into consideration accessibility.

The ability of a site to remain at the top of one search function and not at the other lays in the hands of SEO(Search Engine Optimization) experts. What was once a level playing field, is not pitted against quality coding techniques and a sites ability to adapt to the needs of visitors.

Doing a search on Google for the term "Flowers" results in the site 1800flowers.com in the first position of the SERPs. However, once you do the same search through Google's accessibility function 1800flowers.com is not even located on the front page. The site that can be found ranking #1 is testco.com/flowers, a very well coded and user friendly site.

In addition, 2 of the top 3 sites for the search used USWeb.com as their search engine marketing firm. Not only were sites appealing to the eyes, offered function, but they were accessible. To take this test a step further we notice that a search for "Internet marketing" yields a position #8 for USWeb.com in regular search and a position #2 in the Google Accessible Search(GAS).

The results are startling for only a few of these keyphrases, but the impact will be wide spread. This will be especially true once Google Accessible Search catches on and it will be important to be diligent with your search engine optimization. Therefore, if your planning on choosing a search engine marketing firm to do your SEO work for you, USWeb.com is a safe bet, to keep that affiliate traffic rolling in.