Business owners who invested in an SEO program will always want to know how they perform against all other competitors. Millions of customers are flocking online. Knowing that your business is found easily on the first page of Google, Yahoo! or Bing’s search results is a huge competitive advantage.
Anyone engaged in digital marketing would agree that rank tracking is one of the crucial metrics to identify brand positioning and online visibility. Outsourcing agencies often hire rank tracking service providers like Raven, Ahrefs and SEOmoz among others to get access to this information.
Suspension of Rank Tracking Services
Just recently, SEO tool providers Raven and Ahrefs announced that they’ll discontinue their rank tracking services effective January 2013. Online marketing professionals and business owners who rely solely on these providers for rank tracking were apparently shocked by the news.
Companies like Raven and Ahrefs use authorized (Google AdWords API) and unauthorized (scraped) data to provide SEO metrics to clients. Google is against the use of scraped data, the same information which shows business owners where they rank exactly on the SERPs. While the search giant is aware that scraped data is palpably used by these tool providers for years, it’s only now that it started imposing penalty on violators. To maintain their smooth relationship with Google, Raven and Ahrefs were forced to stop ranking data thus leaving many marketers, SEO professionals, and business owners panicking.
What the Future Holds for Rank Tracking
Many people question Google’s motives for penalizing the use of scraped data. Some say that above other metrics, Google is starting to give less value to rankings. While this could be true, this is not very realistic. Business owners will always want to know how visible their brands are to their target market.
At 365Outsource.com, we have projected ahead of time that this problem would soon plague the SEO industry. We have built a solid proprietary metric tracking system that allows our clients to monitor their rankings in real time. We understand the unpredictable nature of Google, Yahoo! and Bing and our aim is to provide our clients the best possible service despite the erratic changes implemented by these search engines.
If you have any question or concern regarding our services, call us today for a more detailed discussion.