Are we in the loop?

Does Google work more with user related data?

[pontifex]

Some postings here (and elsewhere) speculate or just postulate out of the blue, that Google is taking click-thru rates (like discussed years ago already) into the ranking algo.

Some seem to be sure, that pages, which produce high pageview figures, but low domain visit follow-ups are specifically measured an punished later on.

Others state the mails they got from the AdWords folks, regarding their landing pages and the low quality - a reason to get kicked with a campaign.

All in all, if you browse thru the postings of the last weeks, it seems that there is a certain "mood" for a Google measurement of "user behaviour" on pages and domains and that this factor is gaining momentum for your ranking.

Honestly, I can not believe that. It would make sense for Google to do that, but it would also draw the attention away from the content to the user - and human minds fail and they do that all the time.

If you put the formular to cure cancer in a 9px font at the bottom of you page, hidden in a DIV drop down layer: Perfectly legal, but quite hidden in your layout, does it mean, that the cure to cancer shall not rank high, only because nobody clicks it? Hard to believe!

If Google is taking user behaviour into ranking considerations, the ranking algo is wrong - conceptually speaking...

If Google is rejecting AdWords landing pages, it is pure marketing for their shares price and to stand behind their "do not evil" mantra... why should I not, with all the millions I could have, rent an Adword "white" and lead you to a blank white page to make you think about the vast empty space in human life?

There are artists out there, who spent more Millions on less impressive work!

P!

[hutcheson]

>... it seems that there is a certain "mood" for a Google measurement of "user behaviour" on pages and domains and that this factor is gaining momentum for your ranking.

>Honestly, I can not believe that. It would make sense for Google to do that, but it would also draw the attention away from the content to the user - and human minds fail and they do that all the time.

Google may not share your epistemology. After all, page rank is a way of taking into account human minds as expressed on web pages. And it's obvious that THEY fail all the time. But it should also be obvious that a sufficiently large group of minds don't fail in the same way as a single mind.

>If you put the formular to cure cancer in a 9px font at the bottom of you page, hidden in a DIV drop down layer: Perfectly legal, but quite hidden in your layout, does it mean, that the cure to cancer shall not rank high, only because nobody clicks it? Hard to believe!

Google may not share your ontology. Whose fault is it that the person in the best position to know the value of this formula, presented it in such an insignicant way? After all, if by your own choice you so denigrate your own knowledge on your own website, can you reasonably expect anyone else to give more credit than you do?

>If Google is taking user behaviour into ranking considerations, the ranking algo is wrong - conceptually speaking...

I'm not sure what concept you have in mind when you say "wrong". It's a tautology that no finite algorithm will ever rank things exactly as a human would, and no finite human will ever rank things correctly (humans are fallible, as someone once said!) It's nearly a tautology that with more information available, one can make better choices.

>If Google is rejecting AdWords landing pages, it is pure marketing for their shares price and to stand behind their "do not evil" mantra... why should I not, with all the millions I could have, rent an Adword "white" and lead you to a blank white page to make you think about the vast empty space in human life?

If Google is rejecting AdWords landing pages, it's because they have empirical evidence that (in their opinion) would improve the quality of search results.

Imagine the searchers' delight if Google gave every website (whole site) a choice of one, and only one, of these representations in Google: (1) show adwords pages, (2) receive adwords links (3) appear in search results. Well, it's unproductive to make rules like this, because Google knows it wouldn't take more than a few minutes for malicious spammers to find a way around them. But one can dream.

[123rank]

There is an even bigger issue than this...if your are a page offering information, on an obscure topic, that each individual is likely to need only once for example - how to arrange a funeral

(something that I hope no-one other than an undertaker would need to know more than a couple of times in a lifetime, and I would hope the undertaker knew already)

- then Google would, according to the theories stated here, penalise that site because people didn't come back!

Also by that same theory, millions of sites with useless content that people use to while away the working day, would list at number one for everything!

[texasville]

A lot of this should not apply simply because the Great Web is more than an informational highway. It is now the single most important commercial concept in the world. You can find more about products for sale on the web, than you ever will in a 30 second TV ad. And most of these products will only be purchased once in a several year period.
Examples: cars, refrigerators, boats, office printers, ad nauseum.
The great failing is the search engines are controlled by college kids that think it is a giant encyclopedia. In other words if it doesn't contain social or academic information then it is just a huckster site not worthy of attention anyway.
So, yes, there is a great chance of group intelligence failure.
This is also a great page rank failure. How is a mom and pop store with a brick and mortar store, supposed to establish a web presence? Can you really expect them to achieve a pr 5 or 6? Rubbish. Not organically. Maybe with purchased links. Google has established a faux cottage industry for sale of pr with their ranking system, because they did not take into account the diverse types of web sites.