Duck Duck Go

I was recently asked my opinion about Duck Duck Go. There was another opinion that SEO is “good for people who use search engines to advertise, but not so good for people who want their search results to be based on accuracy over whoever paid the most for SEO.”

My response:

They have a decent algorithm that shows pretty good search results. They currently, emphasis on currently, don’t have advertising. All of these companies follow a similar script; build a following based on some hook like no advertising, privacy, etc., then they start adding advertising to pay the bills and investors, then they go public and add a lot more advertising to pay the shareholders. I’d venture to say this will be no different. There is nothing for free and advertising is not a bad thing. Something has to pay the cost unless we are all willing to pay for each search. It’s not a bad thing for companies to make money, pay shareholders, and make big bucks on their risk.

Almost all companies on page one and two of competitive searches are paying something for SEO. There is nothing wrong with SEO as it can level the playing field.  It’s like David and Goliath for most of my clients; trying to get some space on page one of a Google search when up against Amazon, Walmart, and Ebay.

After a few searches I can see the results of DuckDuckGo are not much different from other search engines; well I kind of like them better because all my clients rank higher in DuckDuckGo. They have been influence by SEO; all search engines will be. They have to use a program/algorithm to figure out where to rank a website and at the end of the day SEO people will figure it out enough to help their clients rank on page one and two or lose their jobs.