Computer Act!ve - UK (2022-05-25)

52 25 May – 7 June 2022 • Issue 632

Google’s SEO Starter Guide explains how to get a site indexed by its search engine

Google’s search results have

deteriorated

It used to be the case that, even if you had

reservations about Google’s business

practices, the high quality of its search

results was beyond question. It was free,

fast and accurate, and far superior to rival

search engines, so why would you want

to use anything else? But we’re sure we’re

not the only web users to notice that

Google results aren’t as reliable as they

used to be, and its complex algorithms no

longer guarantee that the page you’re

looking for will be near the top of the list.

Partly this is because Google now

prioritises new and ‘trending’ content

over older articles from less popular sites

that may nevertheless be more relevant to

your query. Aside from the inevitable ads

and ‘sponsored’ links at the top of search

results, you also need to wade through

low-quality pages that only rank highly

because their creators have mastered the

art of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

Anyone who runs or works for a

website will tell you the importance of

SEO in driving web traffic to their pages

through Google, and sites that don’t

follow SEO rules are penalised in its

results. Many of these rules are sensible

and beneficial to internet users, such as

keeping articles focused and easy to read,

using strong keywords to identify the

topics covered and linking to relevant

internal and external pages – see Google’s

SEO Starter Guide at http://www.snipca.

com/41840 (pictured above right)

But now these techniques are well

established, some websites use SEO

tactics to cheat the system, solely to make

money through affiliate links and

advertising. Provided a site ticks all the

SEO boxes, its pages will be added to

Google’s index and search results,

regardless of the quality of its content.

Devious spammers even copy text

directly from other sites just to rise up the

rankings. By stressing the value of SEO

over everything else, Google has allowed

lots of useless clickbait and copycat

content to infiltrate its results.

Google traps you in a search

‘filter bubble’

The information Google collects about

you isn’t only intended to target you with

adverts, but also to make your search

results more relevant. However, by

shaping the content you see to match

your perceived interests and preferred

sources, Google also places you in a ‘filter

bubble’. This means you miss out on sites

that its algorithms deem less suitable for

you, and your results will differ from –

and potentially be less useful than – those

of other people who are searching for the

same thing.

There are ways to break out of your

filter bubble, such as regularly deleting

data from your Google account, clearing

cookies stored in your browser (especially

if you use Chrome and Sync is enabled)

and switching to private (incognito)

mode to search the web. But even these

actions won’t completely de-personalise

your search results, and Google will

continue to suggest “relevant results and

recommendations” based on your past

searches and the sites you visit.

To stop this happening in your

browser’s private mode, click the

Customise button that appears in the

‘Before you continue to Google Search’

overlay, switch off ‘Search customization’

(see screenshot below), ‘YouTube history’

and ‘Ad personalization’, and click

Confirm. Try performing a search in both

private and standard mode, and compare

how your search results differ.

Google limits your number

of search results

Ever notice that when you search for

something on Google, the number of

results it claims to have found bears little

resemblance to how many you actually

get? For example, when we searched for

“Windows 11”, Google retrieved more

than 500 million matches, but told us

there were only nine pages of results to

explore (see screenshots below). On

clicking to the last page of these, the

number of matches was significantly

reduced to 81. We tried again with a more

specific query – Windows 11 system

requirements – which initially found

43,500 matches, before slashing the

number to 149 across 15 pages of results.

The explanations for this discrepancy

include that people rarely click past the

first few pages of results, that the initial

number is merely an estimate and that it

would take a massive amount of power to

display all matching web pages to every

Google user. But it’s still frustrating for

those of us who want to dive deeper into

search results, especially because – for

the reasons we’ve mentioned – many

useful pages are now displaced by ads,

spam sites, AMP links and filtered content.

Turn off ‘Search customization’ to stop Google

personalising your results in private mode

Google found half a billion matches for Windows

11, but only offered nine pages of results