Michigan Women Bloggers, Part II

Posted by Laura Bergells

September 6, 2007

So, yesterday, I blogged about the importance of identifying myself as a Michigan Woman Blogger — and why it’s important for other women to do so, too.

To summarize: Google currently gets over 50% of all search traffic. Google’s formula attempts to give top rankings to pages that provide the best information for the search term. So when I searched for “Michigan Woman Blogger” yesterday, I hoped to find other Michigan woman bloggers. Instead, Google’s formula determined that sites about “women as victims or objects” were primarily what people mean when they search for women bloggers in Michigan.

That was yesterday. This is today at Google — this very battractive.com blog became #1 for the term:

Michigan Women Bloggers

Is this Google Bombing? Now, you might say that I’m engaging in Google bombing — but I’m not sure that I am. I don’t anticipate that I’ll be numero uno for this term for very long. In fact, I’d appreciate it if the top 100 ranked links at Google went to other professional women bloggers in Michigan. And as far as traffic goes — let’s face facts — the term “Michigan Woman Blogger” is not exactly a popular search term. Being #1 for this term isn’t going to get me a wealth of valuable site visits.

Further, I am not the sexism police. I’m not saying that Google ranking system is sexist. In fact, it’s absolutely not. Rather, Google’s ranking formula is objectively based on PageRank — a popularity system of sorts — as well as on-page factors. It more or less reflects everyday perceptions.Google’s ranking formula is a social indicator. With 50% of all search traffic going to Google, what does it say when women bloggers are ranked as victims instead of professionals? I think it may indicate:

a) folks are still writing an abundance of blogs and news stories about women as objects and victims
b) other bloggers and authority sites are linking to these types of posts, and
c) Michigan women bloggers are not publicly identifying themselves as, uh, female bloggers.

Google’s ranking formula gives us a glimpse of world view. When women identify themselves as women bloggers, they can help change the current “victim” world view. My being #1 today means that one more site about “women as victim” gets pushed further down in the rankings. If ten strong and competent Michigan female bloggers identify themselves — they can put negative stereotypes on “page two”. Then ten more females — and the negative stories get pushed to page 3, then 4 — and soon, if enough of us identify ourselves publicly — the image of weak, victimized female gets buried on page 9,000.

Why have women been so bashful? A reporter interviewed me about blogging earlier this year, she remarked that what I was doing was “very unusual for a woman.” I remember furrowing my brow and thinking, “Really? How so?”I thought (think) that women using technology to professionally communicate is a pretty widespread phenomenon. But I can understand why some women may be hesitant to identify themselves as women — after all, Kathy Sierra stopped blogging publicly because of threats. The threats seemed to be motivated by nothing more than her gender. That can certainly give a gal pause — and a cause.

Blogs can attract all kinds of attention. Ms. Sierra received very public and very negative attention that paused her blogging. But blogs can garner positive attention, as well. So why shouldn’t a woman blogger use her blog to help promote a more positive image?

Victim stories spread faster. True, it is much easier to spread a salacious story than a noble or uplifting one. Urban legends and fear-lore fill our inboxes more than stories of competence, diligence, and warmth. But just because uplifting the public perception of women is more difficult than spreading a horrifying “poor little thing story” doesn’t mean that we should not even try.

Spreading a nobler story takes more effort and creativity. If you are a woman blogger, take a small stand. Identify yourself publicly in your blog. Get your blog on the first page of Google. And push fear off the rankings entirely!

You can make a difference in the way society perceives women bloggers! Do it today!