Layout of Google SERPs Changing Daily

This is nothing new for marketers and SEOs who’ve been following Google’s Search Engine Results Page (SERP) trends for years, but Google frequently experiments with how they present the content on their SERPs.

After reading a story on SEOBook last week, I found my way to Google’s official blog, where I learned that Google was now promoting properties listed on GoogleBase, still below its AdWords but above its “natural” results. Of course this is of critical importance for a number of my clients who are residential realtors, and I scheduled a quick meeting with one of them to make him aware of this new avenue for lead generation. Lo and behold by the time I arrived at the meeting and tried to show him the results pages (linked directly from Google’s own blog), they’d already removed the GoogleBase property search widget from the results. I sense it will be back in a few days or weeks, but it’s just another example of Google refining its “one box” results with priority Google Maps, News, and Froogle entries, among others, over the past couple of years.

Also, for those who haven’t noticed, Google is now showing the AdWords above its natural results in an odd pale peach color–you can be sure that someone in Mountain View has done some sort of psychological study that people are now responding better to the third color in Google’s palette–or perhaps the study is ongoing based on data Google is collecting this very moment.