5 Things to Keep an Eye on in the SEO World in 2005

After the latest PR update at Google and MSN's beta search going live, there is one thing for certain in 2005: the world of search is in for some major changes.

1) Reciprocal links, while not becoming totally dead, are decreasing in value, and there will most likely be an algorithm update to lessen their importance. The original thought process behind the importance of a link was that it was seen as a "vote" for the linked-to site. Now that reciprocal links are everywhere, it is hardly a great way to count "votes" for a website. Reciprocal linking will continue around the internet, although the amount of people who try to get away with one-way links (by never getting back to you once you've added their link) will increase significantly. This will, of course, be an attempt to acquire one-way links, which brings us to our next subject.... 2) One-way links and triangle linking, though already quite popular, should explode over the course of 2005. Both are much harder to control and acquire, which makes Google happy. The triangle link "ploy" makes links look like one-way links even though "Site A" is returning the favor to "Site B" through "Site C". There will be attempts to sell triangle linking programs and systems by SEO companies, however, the complexity, difficulty and time involved in this scheme will produce ridiculous prices. 3) What this about a new search engine that is going to index every site on the internet, EVERY 10 seconds? 4) MSN will scrap the "beta" tag on February 1st from it's sparkling new search engine, which is currently live at www.abalone.ca), which offers Search Engine Optimization at affordable prices.