What has GOOGLE become?

Hello people.

I'd be curious to hear some comments about current situation with google, from actual webmasters that are around for long enough to notice and experience the patterns and changes.

We're witnessing:
- search result pages STUFFED with ads above and below the fold
(some queries show as much as 5 ads above organic, 3 below, shopping thumb ads on the right - sometimes there is as much as FULL page of scrolling before organic results)
- search result pages STUFFED with google properties (widgets)
(graphs, recommendations, answer boxes, question boxes...)
- search result pages crowded with amazon results within organic
(multiple amazon results for any imaginable item that can be bought)

And at the same time....
- google is filtering good traffic for adwords
(depending on your query and behavior/clicks around search page, you will see different or less ads, and ads will vanish completely after algorithm determines you're a researcher, not a viable buyer)
- google is simplifying long tail query to the point it becomes unusable
(precise queries with many words returning results from big brand websites that partially cover the query, therefore making the smaller exact answer sites practically unreachable by normal search)
- google books are scattered across results for any and every kind of queries
(filler results, they are there for simply having the words from the searcher's query)
- google is blatantly disregarding the content origin and copyright
(exact textual content and original images appearing all over other, even spam and scrape websites, without original even being shown, and regardless if original content was indexed years ago)

I will not even mention the wild level of serp manipulation going on with PBNs, hacked links and pure spam tactics. That is a visible problem but it isn't the same category of an issue I'm talking about right now.

To summarize all I've written above - it means that WE as WEBMASTERS, now in 2019 (more than ever before), are efficiently competing for organic spots on "PAGE 2" of google, below all the ads and google widgets, and after google did everything possible to send the best converting traffic to its own properties or adwords partners.

This isn't anything new and it is going on and progressing for a long time, with google revenue going UP and UP with every quarterly report, made possible on top of our content and our websites.

Considering google is holding a total monopoly, what can we as webmasters do?
I'm not a fan of sitting idle.

 

Yea everybody wants to make more money inclusive google so paid traffic needs to be taked in consideration very serious

 

remember....Dont be evil bwahahahahah

 

True, I feel like I am used to it now. I'd rather the results be organic, but as mentioned, everyone wants the money

 

What searches are you referring to @StoneSolid ? I still can find anything I used to find on the first (sometimes second) page. I wonder if they serve more paid / their own ads on pages where they can offer better services and less paid / their own ads where the competition is low or better website links are available.

I am not arguing that it's different now, but it's still just as useful to me as it was 5-10 years ago. Now I've noticed that some sites that used to be on top are nowhere to be found, but one can almost expect that when it comes to search engines.

 

Personally I think it’s really hard trying to get a new website that’s targeting the internet and not a local audience without paying google.

Best Regards

 

Well I think it's important to keep in mind that there are large marketing companies that are working for big corporations who have teams and teams of people who are studying Google and find the best ways to rank. And of course they are finding the best ways to provide the content that people will want to consume. Or maybe they don't want to consume it but they have the ability to do what is needed to get you to click on it or people to click on it and general.

well I don't like feeling like I'm just one little ant in a Big Field of Corporations who rule the world, I have to recognize what the current reality is, and there is still opportunity even for someone like me. And I also recognize that the people who work for the corporations also have families to feed and employees at the corporation who have families to feed.

the internet has grown huge, there are trillions of pages. And how many pages of that content have you produced? And then you want to complain that you are one page at a trillions is not working like it should?

The best strategy is to find friends and people who are interested in what you do and show them what you do and try to produce things that they like so that they will come to your site and do what you want them to do like by things.

 

The problem is with paid ads. There are far too many and organic rank is becoming a thing of the past. The first search engine to have paid ads list on the right hand side and organic on the left will be the solution. Insurance RI

 

agree

 

To understand Google’s popularity you need to understand why search is such a hard thing to do well. Microsoft tried to the tune of losing $3 billion a year on search before it gave it up and focused on doing mostly US-centric results. No one else has come even close to unsettling Google since.

Here’s the rub: initially, as semantic search kicked in, Bing was better from a core programming point of view and a lot of the semantic search breakthroughs that Google had to take into account and find ways to replicate were first made at Microsoft Research. So why didn’t Microsoft win that battle?

Here are the reasons (and why Google holds such hegemony in search):

1. Data. A search engine is like a car. You can have the best car in the world but if all you can put in it is horse manure to run it, it will not run. Google was better at information retrieval, data capturing and storage at every level. We can think of this as their Index from which they serve the answers to search queries but it is really a multi-part animal with the Index being one part of it, the web crawling (using their Google bot) another, the programming that determines when crawling happens, why and how frequently, another and the computing cost yet one more. Google was innovative in ways no one else thought to be. They built their own servers, developed their own database and finally design, build and run their own data centers. Without all of these being resounding successes just having a smart search engine is not good enough.
2. Accuracy. Indexing is not just finding information and storing it. It also requires cataloging and that requires understanding it. Google has always been better at this than any other search engine. They turn all information in their index into structure data, creating a highly organized relational database out of what would ordinarily look like a library. They then link everything they do with it so search on mobile an desktop are linked through the end user account. YouTube and Waymo are added as is every other Google property that can contribute to Google’s core mission of “Indexing the World’s Information” - eventually all that data finds its way down to where it is used to improve search quality.
3. Relevance. As well as understanding the information it has indexed Google works on two other, related and crucial areas: understanding search queries through natural language processing (NLP) and understanding end use intent (because let’s face it, a lot of the times search queries are pretty poor).

All of this has a beautiful end result: it makes search which is a complicated, mathematics-based activity underpinned by complex algorithms, simple. We don’t have to think of machine language operators to look for something. We don’t even need to think of what it is we are looking for in terms of specialized terminology. And with products like Google Lens we can even search for things we don’t even know the name of.

All of this transforms search into a tool anyone can use to navigate the web. This is something Google actually gets at a fundamental level and it is reflected in its ease of use and the popularity it enjoys. The three things: Data, Accuracy and Relevance hide an incredible level of cost and complexity. Google makes it all look easy but its dominance in search remains unchallenged because it is unlikely any other competitor will have quite the same breadth and depth in reach which means they will not have the same quality data Google has to run their services.

 

Google certainly has a huge hold on the Internet and the results people see.

 

Superfluous on all ends!

 

What's happened is the company is now run by accountants rather than people with vision. It happens to them all in the end.

 

I make a lot of my connections with other people and businesses now on apps that are not available for Google to index, and word of mouth too. I think if google can't adequately make organic search results readily available without having to sift through ads, and other sponsored content right at the top of the organic serps, it will be an end to Google's growth. Already we are seeing in their last financial statement that they served more ads, but made less money per ad. Quality has now become less important that profit. It's unfortunate. It may be an issue with Google's site and inability to manage at the micro level.

 

I agree one hundred percent.
The last profitable business field, the desktop search, is being systematically plundered.
I would leave the "Coalition for Better Ads" if I were a member there, because the biggest problem for advertising on the Internet is Google itself.

Greetings Luisa

 

Google is continuously improving its algorithm to provide the best and the most related results for the target users. So make the best website for your target audience.

 

Do you work as a volunteer in the Mountain View canteen with the bs you write here.