Search Algorithms
Search engines have complex search algorithms which are used to ensure they are able to display the most relevant and useful results to their users. While algorithm changes are common and won’t usually affect a site’s ranking, search engines such as Google will occasionally introduce a major update which may impact search results. Our Hangout Notes cover insights from Google around these algorithms with best practice advice.
Google Doesn’t Distinguish Between Blogs and Websites
There is no fundamental difference between a blog and a website from Google’s perspective. They both have webpages with content, but the important thing is that Google are easily crawlable.
Blog Content Helps Establish Focus and Context of a Business
Blogs can help businesses have better presence online giving users and search engines more context about what they do and a better understanding of its focus.
Page Speed Update Will Use Scale to Assess Speed
The Page Speed update will be on a scale where: the faster pages are, the more Google can take this into account. This approach is opposed to Google’s previous speed update, which only differentiated between very slow pages and all other pages.
Google Understands Language Variations of Words as Synonyms
Google tends not to show results in a different language from the one the query is written in. For languages with different dialects, like Spanish, Google will try to understand differences as synonyms.
Search Teams Creating New Algorithms to Provide More Relevant Results
John says that Google’s search algorithms are still too keyword focused and their teams are creating new algorithms to better understand queries and return pages that make sense. 15% of search queries entered each day have never been seen by Google before.
Google Quicker to Understand Pages on Existing Sites Compared to New Sites
It is easier for Google to understand new pages to an existing website compared to new pages on a new site because Google already understands the context of that site on the web.
Google Will Determine Page Speed Based On User Experience
Google’s mobile speed update will use a number of different factors to determine speed, including some metrics from Chrome that provide information about actual user experience. This means that you should optimise your site to be faster for users and not just Googlebot.
Search Result Formats Are Determined by Algorithms & Change with Every Query
Algorithms will decide the type of format of search results depending on the query and its intent. Particular queries aren’t assigned video one boxes or Top Stories results, for example.
Symbols in Queries Can be Treated as Special Characters or Separators
In some cases Google does take symbols in queries as having a separate meaning and in others they see them as separators between words. There are some instances where Google isn’t sure whether a symbols a special character or a separator.
Google Doesn’t Do Any Manual SEO Reviews
Google doesn’t perform manual SEO reviews, that’s what the algorithms are for. Sites will be judged as a whole as they stand now, rather than looking at which site implemented which change first, for example.