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Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

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Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#11

Post by tannhaeuser »

Yeah, just what've been saying for some time now. As Google is struggling for growth, it'll squeeze ad revenue off the extant web, turning it into a piece of shit even more than it is already. The same thing happened with eg. free PHPbb forum providers in early 2000s which were plastered with banner ads more and more (many mobile sites are like this already). I don't see a way that Google can win this race to the bottom, and neither do I see any reason for content creators to even bother with Google Search and Google Analytics; they will just direct your visitor's precious profile data to your competitor spending more on AdWord bids than you.

FYI: see also [1] and [2] as additional upcoming measures by Google

[1]: https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2020/03/announcing-mobile-...

[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCLxiN_dpjU

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#12

Post by BoorishBears »

mc32 wrote: post #9

While keeping people on their platform is concerning and contrary to their prior position of getting out of the way of people’s information, I appreciate the snippets for one reason, I don’t have to worry about malware. Going to unknown sites is risky and even if not you may never the less get a clickjack telling people they are infected and need to click to clean up their system. It’s a no-win state.

If you don't trust them to not infect your system why do you trust their content?

You don't trust their content but you trust their content?

(And before people start pointing fingers at ad providers, reminder Google is one of the largest?)

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#13

Post by godzillabrennus »

mattkevan wrote: post #7

For all the tiny violins that could be played about how life is getting harder for SEO practitioners, this marks a fundamental and very unwelcome change in the Web. Google have decided that it’s more profitable to keep people on its own site than redirecting them elsewhere, a big change in its contract. Before, it was ‘structure your site well and we’ll send you traffic’. Now it’s becoming, ‘structure your site well…

Pointed this out to my elderly father last week. Showed him how much cleaner Duck.com is for search results. He said he’d give it a try.

There is still hope if switching lay people over to more consumer friendly products. Just like any transition it’ll take time and effort.

Hopefully more people continue to switch.

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#14

Post by roenxi »

It'll be fascinating to watch if Google eventually falls. They have really interesting strategic weaknesses.

Advertisers will go where the people go, but Google's balance sheets suggest there is enormous scope for a middleman to go and negotiate with the Apples/Mozillas/Microsofts of the world to give them a better cut of the search revenue.

I can imagine a key based system where I register a token with, say, "Hoogle" and then also register it with the browser doing the searching. Then get paid a tiny amount if enough searches get made with it.

If it works at all that'd be a brutal model for Google to compete with. Suddenly all the casual IT types would be directing all their friends and family to Hoogle because they make money off it. Corporations would ban Google en-mass. It'd squeeze all the revenue out of the search middleman and back to whoever controlled the computers.

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#15

Post by wef2323tg23 »

I stopped all of my ads on Google and only use alternative advertisers. I also frequently use other search engines. For example, Yandex is much better for searching illegal/gray area stuff. I don't use google's cloud and cancelled my Google for business subscription. I will also stop using their browser and will switch to Firefox or Edge (the latest version uses Blink engine and has almost 100% compatibility with Chrome).

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#16

Post by criddell »

mattkevan wrote: post #7

For all the tiny violins that could be played about how life is getting harder for SEO practitioners, this marks a fundamental and very unwelcome change in the Web. Google have decided that it’s more profitable to keep people on its own site than redirecting them elsewhere, a big change in its contract. Before, it was ‘structure your site well and we’ll send you traffic’. Now it’s becoming, ‘structure your site well…

What kinds of searches are you thinking about?

I like that I can google for the weather or Dr. Fauci's age and get an answer directly. The results page always has links if I care to dig deeper but 99% of the time I'd rather get the answer and move on.

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#17

Post by 1f60c »

mattmanser wrote: post #10
SirHound wrote: post #8

I would pay money for an ad-free version of Google with the quality of results from a few years ago. I use DuckDuckGo and I find myself typing !g enough that I might change back completely.

Ad blockers work fine with Google, seem to be one of the few companies that simply don't worry about the arms race and let you block ads. You use DDG for privacy, not ad free.

Although DuckDuckGo does provide the option to turn off ads right in the settings.

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#18

Post by 9HZZRfNlpR »

OneGuy123 wrote: post #5

If your core business income depends on stuff that you have absolutely no control over then you are living based on hopes and dreams and it's entirely your fault.

You describe life and every business out there, it's a net of trust and complicated relationships.

Re: Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

#20

Post by lvice »

BoorishBears wrote: post #12
mc32 wrote: post #9

While keeping people on their platform is concerning and contrary to their prior position of getting out of the way of people’s information, I appreciate the snippets for one reason, I don’t have to worry about malware. Going to unknown sites is risky and even if not you may never the less get a clickjack telling people they are infected and need to click to clean up their system. It’s a no-win state.

If you don't trust them to not infect your system why do you trust their content? You don't trust their content but you trust their content? (And before people start pointing fingers at ad providers, reminder Google is one of the largest?)

I think the idea is: I trust the content of the website (ex. the actual weather forecast) but I don't trust/like the way it is served on their website (intrusive ads, cookie acceptance, heavy pages, etc). The fact that the core of the content is displayed directly through Google bypasses the problems above.
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