SERP change that removed commercial sites from the first page?

[ProjectLabs]

Suppose that Google made a change and all of a sudden a certain type of keyword phrase doesn't show any commercial sites on the first page of SERPs.

Have you ever had this experience? What would you do in this scenario? Would you give up on those keyword phrases and target a different keyword phrase?

[jesse-landry]

Yes most likely. Really depends on the keyword though. For example - I work for a SaaS company. Instead of targeting the term "cloud computing," we target more specific keywords with high search volumes.

While obviously "cloud computing" is searched for more frequently, the fact is that Google isn't putting many commercial sites on page 1 there for good reason: People Googling that term aren't looking for services, they're looking to learn what the term means/is. I'd imagine that this applies to what you're discussing. Most likely Google is keeping enterprise companies off of their just based on the fact that that isn't what the users searching that keyword are looking for.. They're most likely looking for broader knowledge.

Good luck!