*** Update July 2011 – The Wonderwheel Product from Google has been discontinued ***

How far has Google come in terms of understanding search patterns and related terms?  Well a long way would be one way of putting it, but after playing about with the Wonder Wheel (not my voice or vid) for a few months now i wanted to see how far i could stretch the term SEO to see where i ended up and although a lot of people have us seo`s pigeon holed much like your own industry ,the results are very suprising.

So let`s start with “SEO” as the main search using the Wonder Wheel

The search for SEO according to the wonder wheel tells me Google relates 8 seperate levels below the term in importance.

1. SEO Book
2. SEO Blog
3. SEO Software
4. SEO Techniques
5. SEO Guide
6. SEO Tips
7. SEO Tutorial
8. SEO Tools

A lot can be read into why these terms are appearing here like this, maybe the great work over the years from Aaron Wall and his SEO Book brand might explain why that term appears. Again SEO Blog shows another appearance from Aaron and Michael Gray`s Wolf-howl.com.

Ok let`s delve deeper into each of these second level terms.

SEO Book

A click on SEO Book explodes into a 3rd level which as an SEO i can immediately associate the terms with SEO`s within the industry.

1. seo chat
2. seo elite
3. search engine land – Danny Sullivan
4. seo book aaron – Aaron Wall
5. Matt Cutts
6. seomoz – Rand Fishkin
7. google adwords
8. adwords

Good branding? Why does Google Adwords appear here? SEO Elite as far as i know is “SEO Software” so why is it a sub category of SEO Book?

SEO Blog

Before i even click on that term within the wheel i am expecting to see the SEO thought leaders in there but what suprises will i get this time? Let`s have a look.

Yes as suspected, not exactly what you would expect to find in there but a few are.

1. Keyword density SEO
2. San Jose SEO
3. SEO WordPress Blog
4. Black Hat SEO Blog
5. Long Tail SEO
6. Matt Cutts SEO
7. Search Engine Optimization SEO
8. SEO Search Engine Optimisation

2 versions of the spelling for “optimisation” personally as you can see i prefer the “s” but our friends over the pond lean towards the “z”, San Jose SEO which should imho be in a category for SEO Conferences, Keyword Density under “SEO Tools”. But surely i am just nit picking, right?

SEO Software

Ok, so we are expecting to see SEO Elite appear here due to the affiliate program associated with it and the large number of links it must have garnered. Let`s see.

1. inbound links seo
2. seo submission software
3. seo ranking software
4. seo elite software
5. seo link popularity
6. free seo software
7. search engine optimization seo
8. best seo software

Ok SEO Elite has made an appearance, but we expected that and rightly so it is in the right category of the Wonder Wheel.

I did not expect to see seo link popularity in therre i would have that down under SEO Tools.

SEO Techniques

Moving on with SEO Techniques, now if you are wondering am i second guessing or targeting anything in particular within this post, no i am genuinely writing it as i see it and guessing at results before i click the results within the wonder wheel.  I have to say though that i am intrigued to what i will find when i click on SEO techniques.  Will it be the expected white/gray/blue/black seo? or will it point me into up to date methodologies in the SEO art? let`s have a look.

1. anchor text seo
2. doorway pages seo
3. seo copywriting
4. meta description tag
5. seo robots txt
6. search engine optimization seo
7. seo meta tags
8. seo search engine optimisation

Nope completely wrong, was i right to assume what i was going to see? of course i wasn`t, as an old fella once told me, “to assume makes and ass out of u and me”. Again though there are a few suprising inclusions.

SEO Guide

What every soul new to seo craves, a guide to SEO something to make their life a little easier, something that is going to lay down an a – z of how to optimize their sites, will we find the holy grail within the wonder wheel.

1. seo wordpress theme
2. seo meta tags
3. seo rel nofollow
4. seo duplicate content
5. seo robots txt
6. matt cutts seo
7. wordpress seo guide
8. seo search engines

Well i am afraid King Arthurs SEO Quest got confused somewhere along the way, wait a minute King Arthur never had an SEO quest, now i am babbling but it seems wordpress as an seo tool is very apparent among this wonder wheel result.

SEO Tips

That`s what we are after, seo tips, that little bit of something that will help us through the rainy days and guide us out of the wilderness, am i becoming slowly bitter at the wonder wheel as i use it? should i be getting bitter at a google tool like this?

1. seo meta tags
2. seo ranking tips
3. anchor text seo
4. seo advice
5. seo search engine optimisation
6. search engine optimization seo

SEO ranking tips, seo advice, fantastic stuff! just what i would be looking for.  You have probably noticed by now that i have not delved into the 3rd level results of the wonder wheel.

SEO Tutorial

So you are looking to learn SEO from the beginning and you are looking at the wonder wheel shortly after discovering it, you click on “seo tutorial” and you will be faced with how to articles galore.

1. keyword density seo
2. seo sem
3. seo robots txt
4. reciprocal link checker
5. inbound links seo
6. search engine optimization seo
7. anchor text seo
8. search engine optimisation

Not one mention of how to seo this or seo that, just more results that point to what i would expect to be in different 2nd level categories. In fact “tutorial” does not even get a mention. hmmmm.

SEO Tools

Now before clicking on this result i would be suprised if i did not see an immediate relation to Rand, Aaron and SEOChat in there.

1. seo tools pagerank
2. seo robots txt
3. seo keyword suggestion tool
4. keyword tools
5. search engine optimization seo
6. google seo tools

Call me suprised but i could not see an immediate relationship to any of the aforementioned, i am pleased to see that there are related queries in there, not perfect but a great starting point.

So that is a brief look into the wonder wheel for “seo” but what have i learned from it? Well taking all of the results from the second level and throwing them into Excel i find that of the 60 results Matt Cutts appears 3 times within different categories and seo is mentioned 51 times.

Overall Googles Wonder Wheel is a great tool that does help you delve into more recent search results through the search options panel and it is intriguing using it, but as yet i am still to adopt it as a keyword research tool. I am even willing to try a little experiment to build a complete website using only wonder wheel as my inspiration, i am yet to decide upon an url or keyword and phrase for the experiment, but i will keep you posted.

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