SEO and chasing SERPS have been a topic since Google came onto the scene and there has been trends and techniques have depreciated. That being said, I was talking with my former boss, Jeff Phillips, during a chance encounter at Wal-Mart about staying active blogging and generating inbound links. I notice when I take a break from those things my rankings drop. It’s not that my competitors start getting more relevant content than me, or more links. I’ve heard some rumblings here and there on other blogs or forums about this latest trend, but no one has come right out and said it: Google thinks site growth and activity is extremely important! It likes a huge site with tons of inbound links, but it loves a medium site with growth and inbound activity. I’m trademarking that term, I posted it here first. Pretty soon it will be everywhere.

I think this a push towards tradional media buzz being a relavant factor in rankings. Google is now telling us our site must generate some sort of buzz around it or else you must not be very important. Its no longer all about proper html coding, the number of inbound links on your site or the amount of content. Getting people to link to you isn’t a new concept. Blogging isn’t a new concept. But I think Google has taken the two and decided to watch closely how active they are as opposed to how much there is. A site with a 1000 links to it but with a steady stream of 10 or 20 new ones a day will out rank an identical site with 4000 inbound links and 1 comming in a day, everything else being equal. GoogleTrends is now intergrated into the algorithm. Thats right, you heard it here first (or at least I hope I’m the first).

The big sites don’t have to worry because they’re always an “active site”. Amazon, Microsoft, Adobe and IMDB always have buzz. It’s the middle class websites that are going to forced to fight it out in the trenches.

UPDATE - While my good friend Garret French didn’t know what he was writing was a game plan for my post above, he has outlined how to keep your inbound activity strong and your site growth in puberty. Check it out:
garrettfrench.com…maximum-link-value-from-your-content/…

Just quick update

Fireworks CS4 and Firefox 3 whoohoo!