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Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

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21–30 of 103 posts

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#21
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have more than 90% of the market. The fact that alternatives exist doesn't make them not a monopoly when hardly anyone is using those alternatives. See windows in the late '90s.

Actually, by definition, you are wrong. And you are wrong about 90% of the market as well. http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2289560/Googles-Search-...

[deleted]

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#22

Just trying to decide the politest way to debunk the idea that more Google +1s lead to higher Google web rankings. Let's start with correlation != causation: http://xkcd.com/552/ But it would probably be better to point to this 2011 post (also from SEOMoz/Moz) from two years ago in which a similar claim was made about Facebook shares: http://moz.com/blog/does-google-use-facebook-shares-to-influ... . From that blog po…

Pointing out that Facebook likes don't increasing rankings doesn't debunk Google +1s. Obviously you know if they do or do not affect rankings. I'm not sure you would tell us if they actually were used as a signal in rankings because that would lead SEO's to focus on +1's in a way similar to what happened with pagerank. It could also lead to +1 spamming/exploiting.

Not that I'm going to believe you anyway, but I just want to clear this up. Are you, Matt Cutts, saying that +1s make no difference in Google rankings?

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#23
post #19

1. the correlation is 0.3. that's not a high number. 2. the correlation for facebook likes is 0.27. that's lower, but not by much. 3. its possible the causality runs the other direction: high quality results get more +1s

Yup, I love that the correlation for "Facebook shares, like, comments" (though those are three different things) is listed as 0.03 less, even though I've pointed out multiple times that Facebook doesn't exactly make it easy for Google to crawl Facebook to see that data.

Your point #3 is critical: high quality things get more +1s (and tweets, and Facebook likes or comments or shares).

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#24

Just trying to decide the politest way to debunk the idea that more Google +1s lead to higher Google web rankings. Let's start with correlation != causation: http://xkcd.com/552/ But it would probably be better to point to this 2011 post (also from SEOMoz/Moz) from two years ago in which a similar claim was made about Facebook shares: http://moz.com/blog/does-google-use-facebook-shares-to-influ... . From that blog po…

>> Let's start with correlation != causation: http://xkcd.com/552/

I like this one better: http://gizmodo.com/5977989/internet-explorer-vs-murder-rate-...

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#25

Just trying to decide the politest way to debunk the idea that more Google +1s lead to higher Google web rankings. Let's start with correlation != causation: http://xkcd.com/552/ But it would probably be better to point to this 2011 post (also from SEOMoz/Moz) from two years ago in which a similar claim was made about Facebook shares: http://moz.com/blog/does-google-use-facebook-shares-to-influ... . From that blog po…

Actually, they quoted that point in this article:

> Back in 2011, folks may remember the controversy that erupted when Moz found a similar correlation between higher rankings and Facebook activity. At the time, Google claimed they didn't use Facebook shares for ranking websites. Dr. Peters concluded that the relationship between Facebook activity and higher rankings was likely not directly related, but probably caused by overlapping factors such as links and high-quality content.

> Now in 2013, there's strong reason to suspect it's different with Google+, and that the relationship between +1s and higher rankings goes beyond correlation into the territory of actual causation.

While Facebook / twitter are lagging signals from google's access perspective, G+ is contemporaneous: "Posts are crawled and indexed almost immediately"

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#26

Just trying to decide the politest way to debunk the idea that more Google +1s lead to higher Google web rankings. Let's start with correlation != causation: http://xkcd.com/552/ But it would probably be better to point to this 2011 post (also from SEOMoz/Moz) from two years ago in which a similar claim was made about Facebook shares: http://moz.com/blog/does-google-use-facebook-shares-to-influ... . From that blog po…

Pointing out that Facebook likes don't increasing rankings doesn't debunk Google +1s. Obviously you know if they do or do not affect rankings. I'm not sure you would tell us if they actually were used as a signal in rankings because that would lead SEO's to focus on +1's in a way similar to what happened with pagerank. It could also lead to +1 spamming/exploiting. Not that I'm going to believe you anyway, but I just…

johnward, I know of at least one other SEO that has been doing a more rigorous study of whether more +1s lead to a higher ranking. I suspect that study might come out in the next month or two.

Suffice it to say that I would be very skeptical of anyone who claimed that more +1s led to a higher search ranking in Google's web results.

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#27

Just trying to decide the politest way to debunk the idea that more Google +1s lead to higher Google web rankings. Let's start with correlation != causation: http://xkcd.com/552/ But it would probably be better to point to this 2011 post (also from SEOMoz/Moz) from two years ago in which a similar claim was made about Facebook shares: http://moz.com/blog/does-google-use-facebook-shares-to-influ... . From that blog po…

So, why not? Has it been experimentally shown that +1-based ranking performs worse?

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#28
post #6

2 things: 1) I think most people suspected this, and it's not amazing. 2) Is this not an abuse of their monopoly position in search? In that, to obtain a better placement or even just retain existing placement, you would have to participate in Google+

Google has plausible deniability here: "Unlike Facebook, which hides data from Google, or Twitter, which directs Google not to follow most of its links, Google+ data is immediately and fully accessible to the company that built it." Neither can turn around and argue about monopolistic practices because google can say that twitter and facebook refused to give them data (and they would use those sources if permitted)

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#29

Isn't this obvious? Google _made_ +1s (and Google+).

Well, no. Unless Google is shooting itself in the foot, then either the research is wrong or pages that attract +1's are hosted and linked to in more SEO friendly ways.

Google is really unlikely to be blatantly and obviously fixing its rankings. That is the golden goose. everything goes away when that is shown to be true in public.

Re: Google +1's Correlation with Higher Search Rankings

#30

Just trying to decide the politest way to debunk the idea that more Google +1s lead to higher Google web rankings. Let's start with correlation != causation: http://xkcd.com/552/ But it would probably be better to point to this 2011 post (also from SEOMoz/Moz) from two years ago in which a similar claim was made about Facebook shares: http://moz.com/blog/does-google-use-facebook-shares-to-influ... . From that blog po…

Which is why all of those points were addressed in the article! In fact, that's why the article didn't make the claim that Google is doing anything unusual in handling G+ links and shares - just that G+ is laid out in a way that makes it more relevant to existing SEO techniques.
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