The Important Thing We All Forget About Google

I see a lot of people getting really crazy and "conspirified" about google these days because the serps are more wild.

Theories about google trying to "force" people into ads.

This is really crazy..

Think for a minute about all the social networks out there..

Facebook, pinterest, twitter, whatsapp, snapchat..

Their primary goal for a long long time has been one thing.

Engagement.

That's it. Users are not their customers. They are the commodity. Social networks sell users.

Google is the same. Users are the commodity. It's what google sells.

It's quite dark.

They want to make you addicted. The social networks are the worst and they do all sorts of things that mess with the brain badly.

Google is successful for one reason. People keep "googling".

The day that stops, they're out of business.

So, with that in mind..

Google wants to serve the best possible content to users.

But, wait!

Here's the mistake most of you make.

The best possible content for the users is NOT the best possible content.

It's the type of content the users want to see. The content that will satisfy thing.

If people search for google and don't get satisfying results, they will use google less and less.

So you might write your 10,000 word super guide and get lots of great backlinks and think it's the best thing since sliced bread, but it might not be what the users want, and the google AI is getting better and better at determing that.

More than ever, your focus for your pages needs to be on matching the user intent rather than just producing content.

Sometimes google likes to show a few different types of pages.

Here's an easy example

Google "followers".

You've got the netflix page with the tv show.

2 articles with tips on getting more real followers.

neilpatel's article on getting 300 followers per day(Interesting that it's a different style than the other 2)

Then you have an app on apple

videos

stories

Then an article on how to gain your first 1000 instagram followers

then finally an article on getting more followers on your business instagram.

See how diverse that is? The serps did not look like that in the past.

And you'll notice that keywords like that will change RAPIDLY, because depending on the time, people want different things.

Right now, google has determined most people want to know about the tv show

A few people, but less want to know about how to get more followers for their business instagram.

Maybe business is more popular in 12 months and that one moves up to position 5..

You know how they know?

If there's nothing on page 1/2 about business, then they search for something else like "followers for my business instagram" or "followers the tv show" or "followers news stories"

So when you're writing your articles, check page 1 and see what's ranking to get an idea for what the real searcher intent is and try to match it as closely as possible, and if there's a couple of different user intents, pick the most common. For followers for example, I doubt the business one will ever go beyond position 9 or 10 even if it got every relevant backlink on the planet.

Unfortunately, I see the pattern many companies are wild to scrape profits right now. Everyone wants to be rich or richer forgetting about product quality - also covid hit hard so ads are everywhere. Everyone wants to sell me something. This is not a good sign really. The economy will be extremely difficult.

Google is a great example. They don't hit their level of profitability so pushing and forcing to spend money on Adwords and other channels.

I totally agree.

Google always says that you should be as user-friendly as possible, because it aligns with their goals. We can be happy that we're doing SEO in a time where we can still manipulate google a bit with guest posts etc. I think that'll get a lot harder in the future.

SEOREAPER said:

Unfortunately, I see the pattern many companies are wild to scrape profits right now. Everyone wants to be rich or richer forgetting about product quality - also covid hit hard so ads are everywhere. Everyone wants to sell me something. This is not a good sign really. The economy will be extremely difficult.

Google is a great example. They don't hit their level of profitability so pushing and forcing to spend money on Adwords and other channels.

Click to expand...

They don't push to spend on adwords. This is a crazy tactic.

All they do is keep users engaged in their product and match those users with advertisers.

That's it!

It would not make sense to fuck up the serps in order to force advertisers to do something, when in the process you're going to alienate your users!

splishsplash said:

They don't push to spend on adwords. This is a crazy tactic.

All they do is keep users engaged in their product and match those users with advertisers.

That's it!

It would not make sense to fuck up the serps in order to force advertisers to do something, when in the process you're going to alienate your users!

Click to expand...

There is a problem also with staff working in offices - they have a lot of vacancies (covid-19) and people work from home having difficulty with work ethic and creativity. There is no working power as used to be. For me, this is just messed uptime. That's it. Quality just goes down as a lot of companies has bankrupt and don't meet with profitability. It should goes back 1-2 years from now.

SEOREAPER said:

There is a problem also with staff working in offices - they have a lot of vacancies (covid-19) and people work from home having difficulty with work ethic and creativity. There is no working power as used to be. For me, this is just messed uptime. That's it. Quality just goes down as a lot of companies has bankrupt and don't meet with profitability. It should goes back 1-2 years from now.

Click to expand...

https://ycharts.com/companies/GOOG/revenues
They aren't struggling.

They spend billions every year on crazy research projects.

Why even bother doing that?

Why not just look at all their advertisers, penalize their sites and voila, force them to spend more?

Because that wouldn't work. Serps would be junk. Users would go to other search engines and they'd go out of business.

I agree. Google is the biggest content giants. From their perspective you are just working for them.
If for some reason you will not follow up with their guidelines eg: Provide their clients with bad content / manipulate their search engine your site will be punished. Play by their rules, and you will be okay as long as you don't cause any damage.

they can't control all of the web, once upon a time there is a big wave who wipe out websites from the top of the SERPs including the ones which are 100% legit. it's just like a rain to clean the SERP results

once it's done. the real websites get their positions back while the other ones who manipulated left behind

Agreed, Google needs a balance of happy users, content creators and companies using ads with a positive ROI. An everyone wins eco system.

The problem is most marketers are trying to recreate the success of their competitors. Content, links and social media can be replicated, but very few will succeed with this approach.

Content is my main focus at the moment, and condensing information in to "peripheral keyword" sections seems a more logical long term game to play. Rather than targeting one head term, write the article (as mentioned) that slowly gets picked up for longtails that cover the main topic as a whole.

Ranking #1 for several "0" ms keywords, over time builds the relevance for more competitive terms.

splishsplash said:

They want to make you addicted. The social networks are the worst and they do all sorts of things that mess with the brain badly.

So you might write your 10,000 word super guide and get lots of great backlinks and think it's the best thing since sliced bread, but it might not be what the users want, and the google AI is getting better and better at determing that.

Click to expand...

Google already accomplished the "addicted" part long time ago.

But i agree with you about Google AI getting better and better at determing what users want.

I've a pretty good looking site on a niche with around 35k words and good backlink profile ranking in page one. The top five positions are taken by sites that look like pure spam with posts 100-200 words or less, but indeed they are more focused on what users are looking for. While i was focused more on creating long posts thinking that google will like it, but really no one want to read those posts.

This pairs with people saying more and more that "content is not king". It may not bring you the best results at the moment but Google's goal will always be to serve the best content because as you said, this is their business. While a certain type of backlink may be very effective at the moment, what's to say it's not within a month's time? Improving content is imperative over figuring out what the absolutely most effective method is right now.

You know one of Google's long term strategies is always to serve the best content.

splishsplash said:

Facebook, pinterest, twitter, whatsapp, snapchat..

Their primary goal for a long long time has been one thing.

Engagement.

That's it. Users are not their customers. They are the commodity. Social networks sell users.

Google is the same. Users are the commodity. It's what google sells.

It's quite dark.

They want to make you addicted. The social networks are the worst and they do all sorts of things that mess with the brain badly.

Click to expand...

Yep. Dark, but true.

I highly suggest to watch the 'The social dilemma' on Netflix. It perfectly captures this topic in grueling detail.

Thank you lol.

Was bashed the other day for saying the same thing.

You can use black hat tactics to rank, but for real staying power you need good content that your users engage with.

One of these posts @splishsplash I disagree on.

I don't think you can compare google search to social media. It's two different things IF google was addictive in that sense I'm sure we all still be using g+

It has the returning factor because it provides the user what they are looking for. It's also a convince factor that people an use them for different things and they don't need to go anywhere else a bit like Amazon.

Googles entire search position is to keep you on the page as long as possible that's featured snippets are all about if you get the "answer" without leaving google then there is no need to click the link and they done the job.

As for ads. I'm not saying 100% they are all about ad revenue but the recent changes in how SERPs feature and ads placements over organic of course it's about the money and ad spend. Without people clicking it or using them they have no business. There is now more options and placement than ever to be listed or featured on page 1 without having the max PPC budget as you can focus on a shop listing over an ad listing...

Those who need to rank and have the budget to do so over a sustained time and need the sales they are forced into ads.

The bit I do agree with:

In regards to providing results on user intent I agree with that - I've shared my url with you that's how I've been trying to rank for the past year or so and it "works" for me.


Had no coffee so maybe I've nit picked and turned my reply into something different but I think from a blurred eye perspective I think it's OK

This chart has nothing to do with google search performance, it just shows a struggling economy and it should be bad news for everybody.

Just wanted to point out that Alphabet is not doing that well. This might impact the way G is trying to squeeze money out of its cash cow (the search, obviously) and in the end, it might impact us. Not saying they are trying to mess up the serps, that would be dumb. But they will surely try to increase the revenue. How? I have no idea.

Content plus intent that’s something int to work on

I agree to you buddy!

I've thought that one day, maybe not soon, the homepage will be redesigned, and instead of 10 links, and 3 ads per page (roughly) it will look like a mind map with thumbnail hover over previews.

I don't know about anyone else, but I have 100 results turned on, and couldn't browse any more for just the top 10, now that I can get the top 30! So much more info....yum yum

This is especially true for blog post. Google now treatment them like social media posts. It's definitely has engagement as ranking factor. If you blog is new and it's not getting engagement it starts to deindex them after indexing.

IG Professor said:

I agree. Google is the biggest content giants. From their perspective you are just working for them.
If for some reason you will not follow up with their guidelines eg: Provide their clients with bad content / manipulate their search engine your site will be punished. Play by their rules, and you will be okay as long as you don't cause any damage.

they can't control all of the web, once upon a time there is a big wave who wipe out websites from the top of the SERPs including the ones which are 100% legit. it's just like a rain to clean the SERP results

once it's done. the real websites get their positions back while the other ones who manipulated left behind

Click to expand...

That's the thing. It's not you working for them and the searchers are the clients. The searchers are no more the clients than a plate of sausage and beans is the client for a breakfast cafe.

The clients are the businesses who buy the ads.

The product are the users who search google.

admiralkunka said:

Google already accomplished the "addicted" part long time ago.

But i agree with you about Google AI getting better and better at determing what users want.

I've a pretty good looking site on a niche with around 35k words and good backlink profile ranking in page one. The top five positions are taken by sites that look like pure spam with posts 100-200 words or less, but indeed they are more focused on what users are looking for. While i was focused more on creating long posts thinking that google will like it, but really no one want to read those posts.

Click to expand...

This is the thing you're seeing more and more on bhw. People are complaining about their high quality site being overtaken by what they call spam.

But google isn't looking for what you consider "good content". It's got an AI running that's serving the users what the want.

And since when do people want what's good for them? People on the Internet are like animals looking for dopamine hits. Not high quality content and education.

Jammy0308 said:

This pairs with people saying more and more that "content is not king". It may not bring you the best results at the moment but Google's goal will always be to serve the best content because as you said, this is their business. While a certain type of backlink may be very effective at the moment, what's to say it's not within a month's time? Improving content is imperative over figuring out what the absolutely most effective method is right now.

You know one of Google's long term strategies is always to serve the best content.

Click to expand...

The statement "Content is king" is false.

The statement "Content is not king" is false.

They are BOTH false.

"What the users wants is king"


Nothing else. Google doesn't want to serve good content. It wants to serve exactly what the user is looking for. As long as they do that better than anyone else, they will remain the dominant search engine. This is just simple business. People forget google is just a business.

t2van said:

One of these posts @splishsplash I disagree on.

I don't think you can compare google search to social media. It's two different things IF google was addictive in that sense I'm sure we all still be using g+

It has the returning factor because it provides the user what they are looking for. It's also a convince factor that people an use them for different things and they don't need to go anywhere else a bit like Amazon.

Googles entire search position is to keep you on the page as long as possible that's featured snippets are all about if you get the "answer" without leaving google then there is no need to click the link and they done the job.

As for ads. I'm not saying 100% they are all about ad revenue but the recent changes in how SERPs feature and ads placements over organic of course it's about the money and ad spend. Without people clicking it or using them they have no business. There is now more options and placement than ever to be listed or featured on page 1 without having the max PPC budget as you can focus on a shop listing over an ad listing...

Those who need to rank and have the budget to do so over a sustained time and need the sales they are forced into ads.

The bit I do agree with:

In regards to providing results on user intent I agree with that - I've shared my url with you that's how I've been trying to rank for the past year or so and it "works" for me.


Had no coffee so maybe I've nit picked and turned my reply into something different but I think from a blurred eye perspective I think it's OK

Click to expand...

I like your small print disclaimer ;-)

You're definitely nit-picking, but that's ok! Nothing wrong with hashing out a point and clarifying things.

I completely agree google is very different to social media. They're much darker when it comes to just pure engagement.

Google is a lot cleaner, but, the point was that their *goal* is the same as the social media sites. Their execution is different.

Their goal is and always should be to keep users coming back to the search engine. That's literally it. That's the ONLY thing they need to do.

If they have people searching then they have clicks to serve to ad buyers. Facebook also needs more advanced features for their ads to help advertisers because it's a social network. Google doesn't even really need this because you're literally just bidding on keywords. Even the display network, you're choosing niches/sites. It's not like trying to find your audience on a social network.

rdlzr77 said:

View attachment 149666

This chart has nothing to do with google search performance, it just shows a struggling economy and it should be bad news for everybody.

Just wanted to point out that Alphabet is not doing that well. This might impact the way G is trying to squeeze money out of its cash cow (the search, obviously) and in the end, it might impact us. Not saying they are trying to mess up the serps, that would be dumb. But they will surely try to increase the revenue. How? I have no idea.

Click to expand...

I don't think you are reading the chart correctly.

Q4 is always a big jump up. They had the highest growth curve in the past 5 years in Q4 '19. There's ALWAYS a drop from Q4 to Q1. It was a little more than past years, but Q1 '20 is still above Q3 '19. As expected they had a drop from Q1 '20 to Q2 '20.

I wouldn't call a drop from 41 billion to 37 billion "struggling" unless I'm missing something?

Q2 '20 is also about the same as Q2 '19. in a pandemic they've managed to come out on par with last year. That really doesn't strike me as struggling.

And calling search their cash cow is. I don't even know what word to use.

It's just not appropriate. It's not their "cash cow". It's their core business and has been from the start.

It truly boggles my mind that people would believe a company of this level would be so short sighted and stupid as to try and squeeze money out of advertisers by going into their core algorithm they've spent 20 years developing and manually adding tweaks to force people to buy ads, while, at the same time, they invest in AI reserach and allow deep mind to rack up £1 billion in debt.

In this 'squeeze' for the cash cow would it not make sense to just get rid of the AI research? Why do we even need it if we're just going to fuck with the algorithm to force people to buy more ads.

I worry for business owners when this level of thinking pervades.

These are the tactics of small, stupid companies who will sacrifice their entire business for a short term squeeze.

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/GOOGL/alphabet/cash-on-hand
Google have $121 BILLION cash on hand.

This is cash in the bank and investments that can be liquidised within 90 days.

Google's revenue in 2019 was $166b, with a cost of revenue $76b and operating expenses of $57b.

$26 billion of that is research.

So that means, they have so much cash on hand that even if all their revenue stopped, they would have operating expenses of $57b, minus $26b research, so $31b. They could effectively stay open for 3 years without any sale ,and they still make a few billion from non-core activities so even longer.

It's extremely healthy.

It's the equivalent of you having a business that costs you about $30k per year to run and makes you about $50k per year in pure profit afer those $30k expenses. You have $120k in the bank. So your monthly business expenses are about $2.5k/mo. You're making about $4k/mo in profit, about $6.5k/mo all in. You have $120k in the bank.

Now, given this, would you be trying to squeeze cash out your business and be in a panic during a pandemic? Or would you just keep working on growing your business and reinvesting?

I'd be pretty damn comfortable in that situation.

Magmaspace said:

This is especially true for blog post. Google now treatment them like social media posts. It's definitely has engagement as ranking factor. If you blog is new and it's not getting engagement it starts to deindex them after indexing.

Click to expand...

Engagement actually isn't a ranking factor.

Engagement is more of input to the AI as to whether the algorithm is currently providing results the users want.

It alters what should rank for keywords based on engagement and other things.

Oct 2019

https://www.searchenginejournal.com...ch-rankings-affecting-1-in-10-queries/332135/
10% of queries.

October 15th 2020

https://searchengineland.com/google-bert-used-on-almost-every-english-query-342193
Google bert now on almost all queries.

This is why the serps dance like crazy now. It'll get cleaner and better over time, but it's still going to change based on the mood of the masses.