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Search behaviour is not what you have been told

15th February 2012 | 4 Comments

Search ResultsSearch engine specialists like to remind us constantly that people almost never look beyond the first three or four items on a search results page. Indeed, the whole notion of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is to get your site to “Number One” for your keywords or, at the very least, to get you into the top five. The mantra from search specialists is that 95% of people stick to the top handful of results, never looking beyond them or scrolling down a page.

So, there are a couple of questions you need to ask about this so-called “fact” of search behaviour. Firstly, where do the “search experts” get their data from? And secondly, if it were really true why would search engines provide us with more than one page of results? Indeed, why would they give us ten on a page if most of us never went beyond the top five? Perhaps the search engines know something that the search experts do not. Perhaps the search engines know that people DO go further than the top five results and that they do turn over the page.

The notion that the vast majority of people never look beyond the top five results comes mostly from eye-tracking research demonstrating where people look on a search results page. The maps of eye movements show quite clearly that no-one in those studies looks down the page. Their eyes are focused on the top five results, with most of that activity on the top three.

But here’s the problem with making snap judgements on eye-tracking studies like this. The research on Google search results pages show that no eyes ever look at the sponsored links. The adverts which Google helpfully places on the right hand side of each results page get virtually zero attention. Well, how come then Google earned $28 billion last year as a result of us clicking on them…? If we did not see them, how come we clicked on them? What eye-tracking studies do is show where our pupils are pointed – they do not show where our brain was looking, nor do they show what our peripheral vision sees. In other words, don’t rely on eye-tracking to tell you what we do online – it is only part of the story.

Another factor in the myth of the “top five” search results being important is the information companies see on their analytics data. When a firm drills down into this data they frequently find that people are visiting pages from search engines when those pages do not even appear on the front page of the results, let alone in the top five. If people never went beyond the top five, how come so many people visit sites from search engine links when those links are not on the first page?

It all suggests that the behaviour that “search specialists” claim that people are making is not entirely based on all the facts. Yes, there is a “tendency” for people to concentrate on the top five search results but they are not the be-all and end-all for you.

This is all revealed in a recent survey which shows that 95% of people go BEYOND the top five results on a search page. In fact 70% of people go further than the first page, with 15% of people going through the FIRST FIVE PAGES of the results. Now, I admit, this is not a completely scientific study – but then the claims that we ONLY look at the top five results are not based on exact science either.

The lack of scientific rigour on the SEO claims of needing to be in the top five, the analytics data from several businesses and this new survey show that focusing on being high up in the search results may not be as important as we once thought.

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Increase search accuracy by using longer words

20th January 2012 |

Search EnginesHow many times have you searched for something, only to find that you are presented with results that don’t quite match what you wanted? It is a daily occurrence for many people. Search engines like Google, Yahoo! and Bing do a fantastic job, but ultimately they are only as good as the words typed in by their users. Type in something that is somewhat ambiguous and you can be presented with all sorts of sites you didn’t want…!

The problem is that many words have multiple meaning. Search engines have to try to work out the exact meaning of what users type in. But unlike human conversation, typing frequently does not present any real context. For example, when you use a word that has several different meanings someone listening to you instantly knows which meaning you are inferring because of the tone of your voice, your body language and the overall context of the conversation. Search engines don’t have those benefits to rely on. All they have is typing.

The mathematical algorithms which search engines use do have some ability to work out roughly what people are searching for, depending on the other words that are also typed in. This is an attempt to establish the context of the word. As an example, consider the word “script”. It has several possible meanings – a drama script, a computer programmers script, an academic examination paper, and a medical script or prescription. If you are two doctors chatting away about a script you know what you mean is a prescription, not the text of the latest movie. Equally, if you are in a meeting about computers, you infer that anyone talking about a script is focusing on programming, not discussing academic exams.

However, if you are a search engine and someone types in “script” what do you present as the result…? This is a problem which all the search engines have to tackle and they are not helped by their users – us…!

Ambiguous words help people not search engines

Linguists have discovered that ambiguous words with multiple meanings actually increase the accuracy of our communication. Past theories have suggested that linguistic ambiguities have arisen because language was never supposed to be something we used to communicate with each other, but as an internal thinking system. We would know what we meant; it never mattered that no-one else would…! However, the new findings from linguists show that ambiguous words help us communicate better. It turns out that it is more efficient to use a short word with several meanings and let the listener work out the meaning as a result of context, body language and vocal tone, for instance. Otherwise we would have to use very long words, conversations would take longer as would thinking, making the production of speech a cumbersome and slow process. Ambiguity actually speeds up communication.

Unless you are a search engine….!

So, how can you help yourself – and your website visitors – to get the results wanted in a search engine? The answer is to focus on long words, which the linguists demonstrate are much less ambiguous. So, if you are a medic, don’t go for your first instinct of searching for information on a “script”, write the word you almost never use “prescription”. If you are a computer programmer use the old-fashioned  “batch language file” instead of “script”, for instance. In other words, go for complex when searching, rather than simple; go against your normal communication instincts.

For website owners it means you are more likely to get that coveted “number one” position on a search engine if you focus on the less popular, longer and less ambiguous words.

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Search engines are less valuable than we think

18th January 2012 |

Every second of every minute of every hour of every day there are 23,148 searches on Google; that’s a whole lot of searching…! Search is one of the most popular online activities, making Google the “number one” website in terms of traffic, brand recognition and financial success. Whatever you spend most of your time doing online, there is little doubt that search is massive.

So it is no surprise that businesses want to be found. They want to be on the front page of those Google results at the very least, preferably in the top three items listed and ideally, “number one”. After all, with all those searches happening every second, you’d want to be in front of all those eyeballs; it makes business sense.

Except for one thing – the data released by the Google Analytics team recently. Google Analytics anonymously collects information about visitors to many websites where the owners have allowed the search company to get basic data on, for instance, where the visitor came from, what pages they looked at and so on. Google has been quietly collecting all this data for a long time and so has a bank of information which clearly reflects how we behave online. The data demonstrates that searching for stuff is only a relatively minor reason people end up on particular websites.

Search Engine Marketing

Indeed, the vast amount of data in Google Analytics shows that only 27% of visits to websites arise via search. The biggest reason people end up on a website is the “direct” route – either people typed in the domain name into the browser address bar, or they have previously stored the site as a bookmark. Either way, the “direct” route is chosen by almost four out of every ten people who end up on a website. According to the Google data, a further 21% of visitors land on a website as a result of a link from another site, or from a social network. The remainder of visitors end up on a website from “other” sources, such as email marketing campaigns, display advertising or affiliate promotions. In total it means that, on average, around three quarters of people visiting websites get to them WITHOUT using search engines.

If a business focuses its online attention in “getting to number one on Google”, for instance, it is only really targeting a quarter of its potential. Relying solely on search marketing means you are missing out on traffic. Indeed, Google’s own data suggests you should be putting most of your effort into getting links, social media mentions and using email marketing more. In fact, if you did those three things INSTEAD of search engine marketing, you would end up with more visitors.

The data is in Google’s Newsletter Archive.

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Google changes signal the end of objective search

11th January 2012 |

Search EnginesWhen Google came to prominence 14 years ago it was a breath of fresh air compared with the main search engine at the time – Yahoo! The problem for Yahoo! was that it was subjective. Based on human editors who could not keep up with the pace of the growth of the web, it also meant that if they did not like a website it did not appear on the search results. Searchers were effectively prevented from finding much of what was available online. Google was a “game changer” because it used a mathematical algorithm to find web pages. No longer was there any subjectivity – if your website contained a word, Google would present your website in the list of results when someone searched for that word.

This is why Google became so popular. We could find everything on the web, no matter whether it was good, bad, or indifferent. Whatever you search for, you’ll be presented with all of the web pages which exist for that word – sometimes tens of millions of them…! That’s why we love Google – it finds everything.

However, over the years Google has made changes – seemingly to improve the results we get. The main problem for Google was that because it is based on objective mathematics it means that anyone can fiddle the results easily. Search phrases were “hijacked” by spammers and “black hat” search marketing specialists. They could get to the top of the list easily using their optimization techniques; meanwhile legitimate and more useful sites were pushed down the search results listings.

Google knew it had to act – otherwise people would desert the search engine in favour of one that presented more useful and more reliable results. After all, they did that once by leaving Yahoo!  So, Google introduced quality controls and systems which meant that the rubbish content would still be in a search results listing, but relegated to page 100 or some such results page no-one looks at. The changes meant Google retained its objectivity and presented us with more accurate and useful results.

But Google is changing – and for the worse. The company is focused on the ever burgeoning world of social. Currently it is exploiting its fifth attempt at a social networking system, Google Plus. Previous Google social networks, like Buzz and Wave have bit the dust. The company has high hopes for Plus – so much so that it has now started to use data from  the social network to influence the search results it presents to you.

And that could be the undoing of Google. It means that search results will no longer be objective – but subjective. The results you get will no longer be based objectively upon two factors – your search history and the mathematical algorithm. Now the results will be influenced by what you do on Google Plus.

According to Google this will personalise your results – but at the same time it could remove from your visibility objectively presented results which might be more useful to you and which do not rely on the chit-chat between you and your mates.  According to the search engine expert Danny Sullivan these changes are “very un-Google-like“. He says the changes are “unfair”.

Whether or not they are fair is something which the American legal system is currently testing, as is the European Commission. But whatever their decisions, ultimately it is people who will decide, voting with their feet by walking away from subjective results. Google seems to have forgotten that what got it into the search business was the need for objective search results. The company’s clear desire to gain traction in the social media world is taking its eye off the ball; it is replacing objectivity with subjectivity – and that could be a fatal blow.

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Google is forcing you to update your website more frequently

6th January 2012 |

Being “number one” on a Google search results page is a much-wanted position for most businesses. Indeed, it has spawned a whole new industry – search engine optimization – and has led to hundreds of books on the topic, training courses, webinars and a seemingly endless array of blogs on the subject. Experts explain that the statistics show that unless you are in the “top 3″ you may as well not bother because few people venture further down the page of results and almost no-one goes on to the second page. But that is all about to change.

For a while, Google has inserted “publication dates” into the beginning of a search listing. Now, the company has announced that it has improved this system, meaning that the dates will be more accurate and that we will see more of them. This is going to have a profound effect on the way people engage with a search results page – no longer will the “number one” slot necessarily be seen as “the best” shot.

Search results for blogging advice

Consider a recent search for “blogging advice”. The first result on the page had no date associated with it. The second result is undated too, as is the third. But the fourth result shows 23 Mar 2011, while the fifth result is dated 11 Aug 2009. Now, if you want blogging advice what would you prefer? Advice from a web page which is relatively recent? Advice from a web page that is over two years old? Or advice from pages which could be from so far back Google can’t even find their date? The chances are for this search results page, the Number Four entry – the most recent – is the one that is going to get the biggest share of traffic.

The reason is simple – human beings want the most up-to-date information. Anything seen as old, or out-of-date, is considered as less trustworthy than the most recent information on the same subject. Our early history has programmed our brains to believe that newest is best. Our ancestors quickly learned that old food went bad and poisoned us. Only the new, fresh, stuff was life-giving. So our brains focus on “new” as being a positive attribute.

Not only is Google’s publication date system going to make us be more selective when we search, it also means a dramatic change for website owners. In order to become more visible than your competitors it means you need to be more up-to-date. Essentially, Google’s little “tweak” to its search results actually means that website owners need to update their pages much more often than ever before, simply to stay ahead of the competition. Whatever your website is about, being “Number One” on Google may not matter as much nowadays as being able to show that your website is the “newest” on the subject.

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