Your thoughts on Google's "quality factors"?

Lately I've been thinking about what constitutes "website quality" in the eyes of Google... and I thought this would make a good discussion topic here on the forum.

It's obvious that they exist and that Google have a very complex system in place to determine a website's quality score, whether "overall" quality or "topic specific", there are things that G looks for when making the determination.

What do you think they are? On page and off page factors?

In my observations (small sample size) Panda seems to be:
- devaluing links that are not 100% on topic
- devaluing links from borderline spammy websites (like auto blogs and similar sites with fluff for content)
- devaluing small articles and partially duplicate content
- values larger articles (above 500 words)
- values social media mention
- values media content (like videos and photos)

What are your thoughts?

 

you are missing number of active members

 

Hi deohaivan. Yes I totally agree with "de-valuing links". In the last 2 weeks (in Webmaster Central) the majority of sites been penalized are sites with unnatural links, sites engaging in link exchange schemes simply for the sake of cross-linking, disregarding the quality of the links and the neighborhood. spam links, excessive reciprocal links, auto generated links and specifically forum and directory posts that are non relevant. An example been, "you have a beautiful website". Directories and forums that participate and allow this are not only been penalized but they are been de-indexed. Another recent clamp down are sites with low quality, copy issues, and spamming. I'd say they getting stricter, specifically with link building.

 

Content update and social media for me is the most important nowadays, especially satisfying with info and better interaction with customers are well appreciated by Google.

 

That works. Especially now that Google are creeping into the social world. I presume they sick of Facebook kicking there butts and been the underdogs in the social world.

 

I think there is (or will be soon enough) a lot of attention being put on the social network sites and social bookmarking sites. The problem is that they are relatively easy to manipulate, so I'm not sure how heavily the search engines will rely on them as an indication of a website's buzz or quality; yet.

However, it makes a lot of sense to consider social media mention (fb, twitter, reddit, etc.) in the same way they used to look at simple back links. A "vote" of sorts... if lots of people are spreading the links around their profiles and blogs, there must be some value there. Another thing to consider is how quickly that buzz and link building dies off.

As far as on-page factors are concerned, I think that content is going to have to get more significant both in size and depth. I'm sure that Google is very capable of filtering articles and page content in a way that they can determine the overall "completeness" of an article. The question is do they, or will they anytime soon?

For example, an in depth article about laptop computers is sure to make mention of several keywords OTHER than just "laptop", such as:
- operating system
- battery life
- display
- RAM memory
- etc...

So when a 300 word article is posted that contains the main keyword, but only 2 of 10 auxiliary keywords, it's likely to be a fluff article with no real depth. In order to satisfactorily cover a topic, you will likely have to write content in the 500+ words range.

??? Yes/No ???

 

In my view Quality of the content and backlinks are the most important factors which should be considered.