Importance of ranking #1 in search engine results?

I'm having a disagreement with a colleague regarding the importance of ranking high on a Google search (or any other search engine, for that matter). I'd like to solicit your opinions on this matter.

My colleague says that ranking #1 is nice, but not very important. As long as you appear somewhere on the first page, that's what matters.

I agree that there are many other important factors; however, I think that there's a big psychological advantage to regularly appearing in the #1 spot. I believe it helps reinforce the idea that your company is a leading expert in your field. I also like the idea of ranking in the top position, as it gives you more of a margin against sliding downward in the rankings later on.

What do you folks think

I think being in the top spot, like you said, makes a big psychological difference if you turn up in the #1 spot for a lot of searches.

My site's turning up on the first page on a lot of reptile related searches now, and I'm getting around 8,000 unique page views per day.

I'm currently in the process of implementing some changes on the site to get up there to the #1 spot, which should hopefully boost traffic even more.

I find the top spot brings in the most hits, but #2 and #3 positions bring in a better conversion rate for sales and leads. I am thinking this is because usually people look at more than one site when purchasing products or services.

Hmmm... I never thought about all that!

However, I never had to worry about being on number 1, 2, or 3 on the search results... I'd be happy to be ANYWHERE on the first page!

Yes, just being on the first page is good. I wouldnt try to focus on 1 of the top 3 spots. Im just giving you data I have observed.

Number one is always good however as someone who shops on the internet i will look at a number of links on the 1st and 2nd page in my search for something in particular.

I think #'s 2 & 3 often get more sales is because #1 is often way OT or doesn't have what you want, but just happens to accidentally come up top for that search.

I've noticed in Google that on many of the reptile & medical related searches I do, the #1 result isn't actually giving me any of the information I wanted, but the other 9 on the page often are.

I agree with moderator Axe.

Also, I think that when people choose #2 or #3, it's because the top few sites present comparable products or services. In contrast, if you KNOW that your product or service is superior, then it's best to be at slot #1. This gives you a chance to present your wares before a customer is wowwed by the competition's glitz and splashy effects.

Remember that consumers don't simply make reasoned decisions based on the comparative strengths of the merchants. Other factors come into play, such as positioning, advertising, marketing glitz, catchy slogans and name recognition.

This is why I suspect that being in the #1 slot provides a helpful psychological advantage. I know that I'd like our customers to think of us as the leader in our field. Now maybe I'm wrong, but I think that being listed first in a Google search would help reinforce that perception.

Thoughts? Ideas?

Oh, and also... I disagree that merely being on the first page is enough. It certainly helps, but I suspect that the top five will do better than the ones below them. They're certainly the first ones which will catch the prospective customer's eye.

Again, do remember that customers don't just dispassionately evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the products they're shopping for. They doubtlessly strive to do so, but for all of us, human psychology still comes into play.

Just curious - does Froogle rank sites the same way as Google? That is, if you're on the top when someone searches for a keword in Google, will you also be on the top when someone searches on Froogle?

No, Froogle does not work in the same way. I really wish it did, because I would probably have more sales then. You send a feed to Froogle with the Product Title, Description and Price. I might be missing something there though. Froogle does take into play your Pagerank though.

I am also not sure it really matters as with Froogle you want the cheapest price. Froogle and other shopping portals are great because they allow you to range the products by price. So have the cheapest price for an item and your on top. That is the only reason I use them at least.

Probably have a glitch in my thinking... lol, but I'd prefer to be in #2 - #5 spot. My logic for this is sub-consciously people think "this computer doesn't know exactly what I want!" and therefor they skip over the 1st site pulled up on a search engine, and choose to click on #2 - #?. They'd rather make the "choice" rather than automatically follow what the search engine thinks is best.

Interesting. How many people actually do such a thing? I know that I usually start with the very first search engine result, unless it is clearly not something that I'm interested in.

You can also see this kind of thing in paid listings. When I do pppc advertising, I get a much better ROI in position 2 and 3 than Id ever get in position 1.

I agree that increasement of traffic loweres your conversion rate, but it mainly depends on quality of your content in order to the keyphrases you're ranking on as #1. Our site is ranking #1 on main SEs for the main keyphrases - we're getting good traffic and amount of leads increased dramatically lately, but I also added good quality content and very useful tool to our site which makes people to stay with us and come back. Also, after I added quality content, I noticed that the leads we're getting now have more detailed inquiries than they were before. So, it all depends. Think about it, you don't spend more money to be #1 than #2 or #3 and you don't limit yourself with lower traffic, so what you gonna lose? But, being #2 or #3 makes huge difference in traffic. I have 3 sites on the same market and working for the same company, but look different and have differently written content - the main site is #1, the other two geting in top 5 - traffic difference from 50 to 70% less.... so.. I'm for #1