Another layout change for Google's search results

[leeds1]

Google changed the layout of their SERPS this week to add an additional 1-2cm white gap between the search box and the results with the word "search" on the left and "about 10,000,000 results (0.15 seconds)" above the results

This additional gap has pushed down all organic results so would essentially reduce the number of referrals for people (it certainly has for some of my sites)

[edited by: tedster at 7:25 pm (utc) on Sep 16, 2011]
[edit reason] moved from another location [/edit]

[Dave_Hybrid]

Yep, its got to a point whereby 90% of the screen is ads.

Google is simply a MFA site.

A scraper covered in ads.

[indyank]

Google changed the layout of their SERPS this week to add an additional 1-2cm white gap between the search box and the results with the word "search" on the left and "about 10,000,000 results (0.15 seconds)" above the results

It is an atrocious layout inducing people to click more on what meets their eye at the top. This is similar to a google instant that forces a normal user to use the suggested keywords.

someone there must be partying for the major rev. impact that this small change will do to them.

[rowtc2]

Google changed the layout of their SERPS this week to add an additional 1-2cm white gap between the search box and the results with the word "search" on the left and "about 10,000,000 results (0.15 seconds)" above the results

They should be hit by Panda :)

Too many ads on their page will drive users to competition like Bing.

I see a small decline in traffic.

[walkman]

someone there must be partying for the major rev. impact that this small change will do to them.

Maybe this uses less electricity or something. Or maybe it reduces pollution overall by having Google keeping more of our money, for example if you have no money you don't drive to the mall to buy stuff. They have to be for a good reason, all these enhancements we see almost weekly. Google is a different type of company I heard.

[shazam]

Another obvious move to push the organic results down and off the page in an attempt to increase revenues. No surprise really.

It's actually rather funny though, they're not even trying to hide the game plan these days. Why bother with scraping content and calling it a 'feature' when you can just add a bunch of white space. They also have an insane amount of padding/space above the adwords 3 pack.

With their infinite greed and arrogance, I predict they will soon throw away the 3 pack and replace it with a five pack.

[supercyberbob]

I just saw this.

Are you serious Google? What kind of mental retardation have you regressed into?

[Dave_Hybrid]

Every PC and phone i have access to was changed to bing today, tired of this rubbish. I hope your greed ruins you google, you deserve it. You're slowly killing off each and every webmaster that put you where you are, and, believe me, we can all take it away again. Just watch and see.

[johnhh]

Just noticed if there is more than one advert at the top the first one says "Ad" at top right, the second one says nothing. And is it me , but is the background color even closer to a white ?

And why on some searchs the ads are only in the right-hand column rather than at the top - confused

[Donna]

Literally on a 1920 x 1080 res Half the SCREEN is ADS. And then if I put that much ads on my sites I get de-indexed.

It's been a slow and painful process we all paying the price for and we keep tolerating this $hit. Why ? Because the webmasters community is all talks and no walks. Everyone is holding to his greens but not willing to admit that the green is slowly vaporizing. Leave alone the fact that Google is getting whats yours but the fact that users are moving away from search as Google is not actually delivering "the better " searches anymore and killing it for both sides of the wall as IT IS the doorway to the internet these days.

You're slowly killing off each and every webmaster that put you where you are, and, believe me, we can all take it away again. Just watch and see.

Everyone's day is coming or already here, now is the poor small guy being tossed around tomorrow is you. In our modern capitalistic society nothing is permanent and set in stone , today you are A god tomorrow you are being laughtered at in the ditch.

The only way I see Google going in the near future is straight into the government as they will not tolerate this either. We all know they are already involved in some way but when it deepens people will get more aware , when people get more aware they start looking for new alternatives as past has shown.

Bing will not overtake Google, nor will any other search engine but Google will just kill itself the term "internet search" the same way it created it.

Yes this is a little rant and it's not at Google but at us the mindless zombies watching our screens 16hrs a day and trying to accomplish something in this life, but not keeping at bay the only thing we all "created" and promoted equally. At this level Google is not about Page or Brin or Schmidt or that tool Cutts, it's about EVERYONE.


Have a nice day.

[tedster]

And why on some searchs the ads are only in the right-hand column rather than at the top - confused

It's always been that way. An Adwords ad needs to be performing very well in order to be promoted to that top position.

About that background color for the ad block - it's now #FFF8E7. I've got a record some place of the last time I checked it, but I can't find it right now. However, I starting noticing at least a week ago that, subjectively at least, the color had nudged even closer to white.

[MrSavage]

Ironically the color white represents innocence and purity.

[Reno]

Everyone is holding to his greens but not willing to admit that the green is slowly vaporizing ... Yes this is a little rant

Your rant is on the mark, but the fact is, it's human nature to think it's happening to everyone else but "we'll be spared", or if we have been hit, "we'll bounce back". Sorry, for most it will not happen. That's the ugly truth and deep inside ourselves, we know it.

The game has changed but we, the players, are still on the field. One by one we're getting picked off because we don't know the rules. Google covered themselves very nicely in saying they can't tell us the rules, because if they do, there are webmasters that will game the system. They won't even provide a detailed explanation of what they mean by "quality". And there's folks here who will defend that position to their last breath, which I'm sorry to inform them (given the status quo), is coming sooner rather than later.

........................

[miozio]

Why are you all surprised? You thought those guys were angels? Greed took over Google a very long time ago but you kept your faith till now. I can see even Tedster's religion is falling apart!

[Donna]

That's the ugly truth and deep inside ourselves, we know it.

I am doing OK with my online ventures at the moment, but I do know that this is the most unreliable and unstable business out there. Google is long time out of control and it's just a matter of time for anyone to have their down more than ups. And please don't mention capital gains and shareholders and all the yappa yappa that Google needs and why it's headed this direction since day 1 .

The better medium is long gone as all you need to do is search and see soon 3/4 of the screen covered in ads. If they cannot survive without such a huge ad property they should be out of business. I am not using all my blood and tears for broken cause.

Risk taking is part of me and keeps me motivated tough when the system is so broken we all have to agree that a fix is needed. Think long term. It's like in communism more than socialism, we all equal as long as we all follow the rules of (Google). Problem is it's the 21s century and I had enough of communism already. Maybe it's time for the real Digital Revolution.

Have a nice day.

[Reno]

it's just a matter of time for anyone to have their down more than ups.

To a considerably lesser degree, it kinda' reminds me of what I have read in history books, about societies where a person's neighbors disappear one by one. Historians ask "how could the citizens allow that to happen?" And of course it's because of what I said earlier, it's because "I'm still here, so everything must be OK". Well, it's not OK, and it won't be OK until things change, and they won't change until something better comes along, just like when Google came to prominence a decade ago, when Alta Vista & Hot Bot & AllTheWeb et al were ruling the roost. When I look out over the horizon, I'm not seeing any contenders, so for the foreseeable future at least, what we've got is what we've got, and they hold the aces, so we better get used to it.

<And for you oldtimers at this venue, think about all those webmasters who used to regularly post, many in support of Google, but are now long gone, disappeared into the night>

.....................

[superclown2]

I'm looking at it here in the UK and yes there is a white space but the Google logo is now very small. There's just as many SERPs (5 on my screen) visible as before. Is this the same elsewhere?

[sem4u]

There is now too much white space between the search box and the top PPC results. I wonder if they will reduce this space and slip another PPC result in, making four before the organic results come up?

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

If Google was launched today looking like that it would be labeled spam, fast. The "Cached" text is also larger meaning it's even more likely a visitor will see your site ON google and you'll never get the impression. A nocache directive as well as a frame buster for the images is now officially a must imo. Google's been getting far too rich off our content to be pulling stunts like this.

As a webmaster It's time to make getting off the Google crutch in all its forms a priority.

I did a search for city name + locksmith to see how the new template works out and only ONE result is visible under places and go figure that's a mashup site, followed by 6 other directories and one affiliate site. Only 2 natural links exist to actual locksmiths in that area.

D-

[tutu]

Google is always like simple,now it adds gap,I don't think it accord with google's style.

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

I agree tutu but the style is conveniently making it less and less likely to get a visitor, it's not so much what they look like.

The biggest threat to Google is webmasters everywhere standing up in one voice and saying no, you can't have my content. I think Facebook hinted at that recently and Mr Schmidt responded by saying they'd get the data some other way anyway. I think things are going to come to a head even more quickly with the new layout, especially considering how many BILLIONS in profit Google is taking from webmaster content.

[Dave_Hybrid]

Change search to Bing, drop analytics, drop +1 buttons, drop gmail, drop adsense etc.

I have done it all. Take a stand, dont be bullied. Dont be bought for adcents.

It's really not that hard, there are many excellent alternatives to Google products.

[Web_speed]

Yes this is a little rant and it's not at Google but at us the mindless zombies watching our screens 16hrs a day and trying to accomplish something in this life, but not keeping at bay the only thing we all "created" and promoted equally. At this level Google is not about Page or Brin or Schmidt or that tool Cutts, it's about EVERYONE.

It is like you took the words right out of my mouth. I feel your pain.

[walkman]

Did anyone read Steven Levy's 'insider' book? All I read is reviews of it, after seeing that certain Googlers were promoting it. Smacked of propaganda.

I'm just trying to see what's happening with "the big thinkers" at Google. Looks they want to really change the world, but by ripping everyone off. Google also raised the prices for their App Engine after locking the developers in that 'free' platform. That made many young developers angry since it isn't even cheap.

And now they are cloning another service: Flipboard. Right after flooding the internet with their Google Travel service. Do webmaster even get paid for those ads? Does Google compete for the right to be shown on your site via adsense?

And G+ outranks everything, a clear case of organic serps manipulation.

So there's a pattern.

[edited by: walkman at 12:35 pm (utc) on Sep 16, 2011]

[superclown2]

Did anyone read Steven Levy's 'insider' book? All I read is reviews of it, after seeing that certain Googlers were promoting it. Smacked of propaganda.

I'm just trying to see what's happening at "the big thinkers" at Google

Yep, I read it. It seems they want total world domination by Christmas. At the moment they're slightly ahead of schedule.

[smithaa02]

I do a search for my favorite term and get above the fold...

7 google ads in the right column.

2 google ads in the 'banner area'.

1 honking map.

2 actual results...no make that one result. Google decided this one page got to double dip because it is 'that relevant' (which it isn't)

So on a 1680 by 1050 resolution, I only see one unique listing above the fold. How sad... This will only get worse as google has hired too many overpaid MBA's and programmers who looking for phoney projects to justify their jobs, as keeping to simple plain honest SERP's doesn't generate internal busy work and corporate political points so it can't be in the future.

[greenleaves]

WTF?


Only 1 organic result above the fold in the most commong resolution?


They can hit me with incorporating social media. I'll deal with it. They can hit me with incorporating google +1, with incorporating google blocks, with incorporating bounce rate, with incorporating page speed, with incorporating xyz factors into their algorithm. I'll deal with it. They can even try and destroy certain niches; I can always switch niche.

But for pete's sake; if users don't click the organics because they can't find them; I'm totally and completely screwed.

[miozio]

DO NOT switch to Bing, it's even worse. Try to search for "jeans" and you will see the mess! Looks like Internet search should look like this in the modern world. Organic results were only good in stone ages of IT! There is no alternative now, or is there?

[walkman]

@smithaa02
you're lucky your search doesn't trigger any of the following: any moron's post with a G+ account, Youtube videos, G News...G Images and that you only have two ads.
For my 'domain name' Google in addition to letting a Fortune 50 company be #1 (absolutely not relevant for 99% of users) I have at least 3 ads on top--sometimes 4--and countless of them on the right, images and news are also triggered. As soon as someone decides to spam Youtube with the keyword the videos will also show.

This has nothing to do with MBAs wanting to seem busy, but with Google's main motivation, MONEY. They are no longer a search engine, but a made for adsense site. They will do everything to stop people from click on organic, non-paying links. Google is always testing 'user experience' and different rankings, now we know what that means. Someone must have run a calculation on how many organic clicks they send, they already know the value of each keyword so they have must have decided to keep an extra x%. Next year it will be higher and so on.

[MrSavage]

Another clear indicator that this isn't about an algo change, it's not about improved search results, it's actually all about a clear change in philosophy at Google. That's why nobody is talking about Google SEO. It's clear. This thread and the post in it pretty much sum it up for me. Ranters? Possibly. Or is it the pulse of webmasters and people don't want to see, listen to, or face that reality. People are officially pissed imo. That's why for me, I don't actually care to indulge in SEO so much. SEO with Google is more about how to become less dependent slash what the exit strategy is. That's reality whether people care to admit it or not.