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Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

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Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#201

Post by alisonkisk »

ganstyles wrote: post #81
krainboltgreene wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Isn't this exactly the kind of black-hat SEO that they are usually downranking or banning sites for? How is it blackhat to do exactly what Google wants?

Using tricks at the detriment of the user to the benefit of the service is blackhat. Pinterest is doing these tricks to their benefit at the extreme detriment to everyone but themselves.

It's weird to blame Pinterest for Google's choice to promote the site. Sure Pinterest wants to rank highly, but they aren't tricking Google. Google knows how popular they choose to make Pinterest results, and how much most users like those results.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#202

Post by [deleted] »

Chirael wrote: post #155
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few times I've landed on Pinterest and they lock user copied (contrary to copyright law in my country AFAICT) content behind a registration-wall. They never show enough utility for new to register, they just tease on Google and then don't show what they teased. Google results would be better for me with all Pinterest results removed.

Wasn’t there an option at one time to tell Google to hide results from a certain domain? I feel like I haven’t seen that in years though

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#203

Post by alisonkisk »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #190
hayksaakian wrote: post #3

There's no intentional or manual effort at Google to promote pinterest. Pinterest shows up because they understand how the Google algorithm works and built their website to display all the signals that Google looks for in relevant image content. They understand user intent and generate URLs that present content in a way that google expects to see. Examples of how they do this from their engineering team: https://medi…

"There's no intentional or manual effort at Google to promote pinterest." But there is an effort at Pinterest to promote itself via Google. Pinterest pays Google for online ad aservices. Pinterest is a Google customer. The user is not. The bottom line at Google is not driven by showing users the "best" results for users. The bottom line is driven by customers such as Pinterest who pay Google to assist them with onlin…

Had anyone ever presented evidence that advertisers manipulate organic results? Former employees blow all sorts of whistles. Why has this one never blown?

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#204

Post by not2b »

alisonkisk wrote: post #195
texasbigdata wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure the search team can, erm,google for the ad revenue figures in the earnings release. After reading the anti trust filing it’s hard to argue Google is anything else but evil and a lot of what it does is to hide its monopoly.

You think the search team runs an experiment once per 3 months to test how their algorithm ideas impact earnings?

The company isn't a charity. If a search change demonstrably has a negative effect on company earnings (even if users like it) it will almost certainly be reversed. I don't think they run an experiment once every three months, I think they are testing continuously, including A/B testing (some users get the change, others don't,).

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#205

Post by moultano »

not2b wrote: post #204
alisonkisk wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think the search team runs an experiment once per 3 months to test how their algorithm ideas impact earnings?

The company isn't a charity. If a search change demonstrably has a negative effect on company earnings (even if users like it) it will almost certainly be reversed. I don't think they run an experiment once every three months, I think they are testing continuously, including A/B testing (some users get the change, others don't,).

> If a search change demonstrably has a negative effect on company earnings (even if users like it) it will almost certainly be reversed.

This is completely false. I've personally been involved in launching ranking changes that negatively impacted revenue substantially. I didn't find out until months later through the grapevine, and only in vague terms like "ads had to scramble." Versions of them remain in production today. Revenue projections were never considered as part of the launch decision, nor have they they been consulted as part of evaluating subsequent versions.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#206

Post by comeonseriously »

blunte wrote: post #13
hayksaakian wrote: post #3

There's no intentional or manual effort at Google to promote pinterest. Pinterest shows up because they understand how the Google algorithm works and built their website to display all the signals that Google looks for in relevant image content. They understand user intent and generate URLs that present content in a way that google expects to see. Examples of how they do this from their engineering team: https://medi…

Google should be asking from a product perspective if they are providing the search results the user is most likely seeking. I seriously doubt that most pinterest results are what users are seeking. As such, Google probably should consider changes to their algorithm to compensate (cat and mouse) for pinterest's gaming. That is assuming how pinterest does it is not against any google rules... because if it were agains…

> Google should be asking from a product perspective if they are providing the search results the user is most likely seeking.

I never want Pinterest. I don't have an account. I don't want one. I will never want one.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#207

Post by abc-xyz »

alisonkisk wrote: post #198
abc-xyz wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s no way that’s true. I’d be surprised if even 1% of the Google users paid attention to the source site underneath the image. And you’d think people with a Pinterest account would opt to search on their website/app rather than going through Google (thus making it even more unlikely that the Google user has a Pinterest account).

Pinterest has a huge user base. They don't need to look at the source if they have an account; the link will work fine. And, no, most people don't bother picking a site before searching. Why would they artificially limit their results? People don't even visit amazon before searching for Amazon products.

Pinterest’s user-base is surely minuscule compared to the amount of users using Google Image Search.

I’m not saying that 100% of all users with a Pinterest account use their website/app, but many of them will of course opt to use Pinterest’s website/app for their image searches, which means an even smaller percentage of the Google Image Search users will have a Pinterest account.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#208

Post by xg15 »

jedberg wrote: post #177
xg15 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people want to have a full result page of nothing but login walls when searching for any kind of image?

Most people who click on Pinterest links are already logged into Pinterest...

But not most people doing a Google search. Anyone who is not on Pinterest has its result page spammed with useless links.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#209

Post by stelonix »

blunte wrote: post #13
hayksaakian wrote: post #3

There's no intentional or manual effort at Google to promote pinterest. Pinterest shows up because they understand how the Google algorithm works and built their website to display all the signals that Google looks for in relevant image content. They understand user intent and generate URLs that present content in a way that google expects to see. Examples of how they do this from their engineering team: https://medi…

Google should be asking from a product perspective if they are providing the search results the user is most likely seeking. I seriously doubt that most pinterest results are what users are seeking. As such, Google probably should consider changes to their algorithm to compensate (cat and mouse) for pinterest's gaming. That is assuming how pinterest does it is not against any google rules... because if it were agains…

At least for image search, I use a Firefox extension called Unpinterested. I'm very happy with my search results now. Note: I had to toggle an option to make it work only for image search, because it borked other Google results.

I remember when Google added a functionality to block domains entirely from your results. They removed it soon after though; I'm guessing some big advertiser was blacklisted many times.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Pinterest dominate Google text search results?

#210

Post by pinterestsucks »

I heard there was some incestual stuff at medium-high levels of relevant google org/teams and pinterest in terms of people moving between the companies and being friends/favors. Also that these specific teams at google are mediocre at best now and all the good engineers and product focused people have moved on to greener pastures. Probably why google image search has stagnated hard (I find bing and yandex out perform it easily depending on your searches).

The explanation that Pinterest is just "good at SEO" never made sense to me because at their scale someone at google obviously would notice and could decide to counter their SEO tricks etc (google has never had problem with doing this before).

Not to sound conspiratorial but from what I know I find it more plasubile that mid level decision makers at google can block any change that would nuke pinterest because they or their social circle have personal interest in keeping pinterest up while issue is not close to big enough or impacting larger revenue to attract attention from above.

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