Dubbed ‘Caffeine’, the latest round of updates to the Google algorithm reflects the company’s commitment to a genuine ‘real time web’ – benefiting users and publishers alike. Enabling the search engine to index more sites, and a wider variety of content, more quickly, the programme is particularly good news for nimble and responsive firms which - unencumbered by complex sign-off procedures and multiple tiers of bureaucracy - are able to produce timely, relevant content ‘on the fly’. Now, thanks to Caffeine - and its predecessor, ‘Mayday’ - a weekly ‘tweak’ to your home or landing pages will no longer ‘cut it’ in the natural search stakes. Instead, securing top billings in the increasingly competitive, increasingly cluttered, results pages will demand ongoing updates to your entire site. Which means companies who are able to regularly refresh their copy, videos and images have been handed a major advantage. As have those with a coherent social media strategy. Google was of course the pioneer of blended (or universal) search – incorporating media releases, blogs, Twitter feeds, Facebook pages, et al. And Bing has been quick to follow. Consequently, the battle for page one rankings is now fiercer than ever. And the case for an integrated online ‘comms’ campaign, combining your blog posts, Tweets, media releases, Facebook pages and video, is clear -- for web users, who are assured ever more relevant and up to date search results. And for switched-on SMEs – who now have a real advantage over their bigger budget, but less agile,...

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