Google Grasps "Machine Intelligence": Rewriting the Rules of Search Engines
Introduction: Last Sunday, the American tech blog TechCrunch published a commentary article titled "In Mastering Machine Intelligence, Google Rewrites Search Engine Rules". The article claims that due to mastering machine intelligence technology, Google now has the ability to combat "black hat" SEO experts, thereby further enhancing users' search experience.
The following is the full text of the article:
Google has developed self-driving cars and the Android operating system with top-tier language recognition capabilities. There is no doubt that Google has gradually mastered machine intelligence. Therefore, we should not be surprised that Google has finally found a way to prevent violators from profiting from its search engine, which is also known as Google's "crown jewel."
We emphasize "finally" because Google has been discussing this issue for a long time, but it was only recently that it truly gained the ability to combat such behavior. As the functionality of the search engine gradually improves, SEO (search engine optimization) experts must learn new "SEO rules" if they wish to continue participating in this "game."
"The SEO War"
In January 2011, a user named Vivek Wadwa complained that the quality of Google search results was inferior to its peers, as they were being exploited by large numbers of "black hat" SEO experts—people who use controversial techniques to improve their own search results. Subsequently, a large number of users joined the criticism. Due to exploiting loopholes in Google's search algorithm, "black hat" SEO experts reduced the practicality of searches for ordinary users.
We have been tracking and investigating this issue for some time. As early as 2007, we wrote an article discussing the "search fatigue syndrome" Americans were experiencing because advertisers had found ways to profit from the "Google system," with their content always appearing at the top of search results. In 2009, we again discussed Google's transformation into an "answer provider," such as map and weather search results appearing at the top.
Even so, this policy shift did not end the "war" between Google and SEO experts. At the beginning of 2012, we wrote an article on CNET pointing out that compared to advertising, search results proved to be an easier way to monetize. For this reason, Google gradually shifted towards links designed for social functions.
In recent years, Google has made a series of updates to its search algorithms, including Panda, Panda 2, and Penguin, as well as updating existing mechanisms like Quality Deserved Freshness. Additionally, it has become increasingly difficult to determine which keywords users might use during searches.
For many black hat SEO techniques, such as duplicative content and keyword stuffing, Google's continuous algorithm updates have made them less effective. However, this does not mean these SEO techniques are completely useless. When we input keywords such as "payday loan" or "viagra," we still see their impact.
However, black hat SEO techniques now rely more on search rankings, meaning that Google is essentially treated as a vertical site, which is naturally more susceptible to spam software. For most people, using "SEO magic" to build content sites is no longer an effective long-term strategy.
New SEO Rules
Does this mean the era of SEO is over? That is not the case. SEO remains as important as ever. Understanding Google's relevant policies and ensuring compliance with them is crucial to maintaining rankings in Google search results.
Given Google's latest adjustments to its algorithms, SEO experts now need to deeply understand various reasons why a website may be penalized by Google, while finding the best solutions or completely avoiding these issues.
The following are things SEO experts must focus on:
A clean and well-structured website architecture. Websites should be easy to use and navigate, adopting a simple URL structure, highlighting hierarchy, and ensuring all pages, sections, and categories have appropriate labels.
Practical pages. Pages should be concise and clear, providing unique value and meeting the needs of ordinary users. Google wants search results to satisfy user intent. But Google doesn't want to present meaningless results that only make users visit a site, click the "back" button, or choose the next search result.
Engaging content. Besides direct facts that can be answered, Google pages must also have other interesting content. Therefore, they need to display more than just weather and sports scores.
No hidden content. Sometimes, Google considers hidden content as an attempt to profit from its system. Therefore, SEO experts must be cautious about hidden items that users can switch and turn off creative pagination.
Good mobile experience. Now, if a website lacks a clean, fast, and appropriate mobile experience, Google will penalize it. Thus, websites should no longer simply copy the desktop web experience to mobile devices.
Duplicate content. When mentioning duplicate content, people may think of copying content from one webpage or website to another, but this is not the only form of content duplication. Issues like URLs, repeated parameter usage, and printable pages can often create harmful duplicate content problems for websites.
Markups. Rich snippets and structured data markups will help Google better understand content while helping users better understand page content and the reasons for search relevance, ultimately leading to higher click-through rates for websites.
Google's crackdown and elimination of violators' content presents a rare opportunity for web content creators. From the creation phase to maintenance, creating content and collaborating with SEO professionals could yield many unexpected results. In the past 12 months, some of our websites have even doubled their traffic on Google.
Therefore, do not view Google's adjustments as another offensive in the "SEO war." In fact, as long as they are used appropriately, everyone can benefit from these changes.
