Bold faced lie by Google?

Does this sound honest to you?

https://www.seroundtable.com/google-user-actions-not-ranking-factor-20741.html

Seems like they want us to believe that once a visitor hits out site, and doesn't bounce that they have NO IDEA what they are doing on a site or where within it they are going. And that they aren't using that non-existent info to affect rank. What about Chrome? What about all the toolbars installed? You telling me they can't tell how many pages on site X.com that Joe Chrome User views? Why WOULDN'T they be using that? If they aren't lying they are idiots for not leveraging Chrome.

I doubt they'd want to say "we spy on everything you do to make more $".
Just corporate moves.

I trust Google blindly.

Why would they use that information to influence the SERP-s? It doesn't make sense. All Google cares about is if a visitor bounces back to the result pages, which means they didn't find what they were looking for. And even this can be manipulated with bots (although it's not that easy). Now imagine if they put those other factors in the algorithm - it would be a mess. I can send thousands of visitors to stay at my site forever browsing through all my pages via my bots to artificially manipulate the algorithm. So, they might be right - they aren't interested in tracking people like that to influence rankings, because that would make the algorithm even more of a mess than it already is. However, having said that, this kind of data mining is valuable for advertising purposes and I am sure they track people through ALL their products. But for SEO? Forget it.

They do spy and do a research on users browsing patterns and behavior in order to optimize the results that helps user to get info he needs. If user spends more time and visit more pages then placement of that site for that keyword improves with time.

Its not important that google throws off everything to us

So many assumptions in this thread presented as facts. This is not news. They've said this before.

ThopHayt said:

Does this sound honest to you?

You telling me they can't tell how many pages on site X.com that Joe Chrome User views? Why WOULDN'T they be using that? If they aren't lying they are idiots for not leveraging Chrome.

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Why not, any data from Chrome users is inconclusive when it comes to ranking factor as not everyone is using it, more than 50% of my visitors are using Safari. Their behavior may be completely different. I have no doubts that google one way or the other uses data from Chrome users but not as ranking factor.

Sounds honest to me!

Pretty sure that this part is a lie:
"I don't think we even see what people are doing on your web site."
That's exactly what Google Analytics does - there is definitely a box (checked by default on GA) that gives Google detailed data on visitors for overlays, etc. And they can use the data, and that's why it will always be "free"
(notwithstanding the fact that they don't let you identify users like real analytics platforms which makes GA a fun toy for me, but not a solution)

Back in the day, Google used to aggregate user data using creative/correlative means, IP address, browser sessions, logins, cookies.
Now, everyone either has chrome logged in, an always on gmail (and attachments), static(mostly) ip, Geo location, shit, they're even mining your phone's photos for keywords now. All they need is one login from that phone or device.

I think what this Goog guy probably means is, 'the adwords/adsense/GA teams are absolutely using user interaction data to squeeze pennies out of your users/visitors by selling them more stuff they don't need... We over on the SERP side, could give a crap because we're basically a monopoly, and our focus is on punishing fake/spun sites by keeping them out of SERs, not rewarding sites that actually have good engagement - because we wouldn't want to damage relationships with ad buyers.'

bahus said:

more than 50% of my visitors are using Safari.

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Very interesting - 50% safari is certainly the exception, not the rule. I think our users are 70% chrome 14 FF, 10 IE, 6 other (including safari)

Is it not always the way around?

Google rarely announces the real facts. Maybe we should rely more on the results of our SEO experiments rather than believing in those words.

ttmpeople said:

Very interesting - 50% safari is certainly the exception, not the rule. I think our users are 70% chrome 14 FF, 10 IE, 6 other (including safari)

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I think that it will depend on a market and to some degree gender and age.

ttmpeople said:

That's exactly what Google Analytics does - there is definitely a box (checked by default on GA) that gives Google detailed data on visitors for overlays, etc. And they can use the data,

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There was similar article a month or two ago, and they said that they don't use data from GA for ranking.

godspeed007 said:

Maybe we should rely more on the results of our SEO experiments rather than believing in those words.

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Makes sense to me

bahus said:

I think that it will depend on a market and to some degree gender and age.

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For sure.. I would think Safari users are money

bahus said:

There was similar article a month or two ago, and they said that they don't use data from GA for ranking.

Click to expand...

It's surprising if they don't. Maybe they use "derivative works" not the data itself. Lots of ways to work around it as well. They definitely (and Apple) use usage stats including time in app, engagement, for rankings on Google Play and App Store.

I'll admit, I'm usually pretty quick to hate on Goog