Will Google ever begin penalising bad English/grammar in regards to rankings and SEO?
-
Considering Google seem to be on a great crusade with all their algorithm updates to raise the overall "quality" of content on the Internet, i'm a bit concerned with their seeming lack of action towards penalising sites that contain terrible English. I'm sure you've all noticed this when you attempt to do some proper research via Google and come across an article that "looks" to be what you're after, then you click through and realise it's obviously been either put together in a rush by someone not paying attention or putting much effort in, or been outsourced for cheap labour to another country whose workers aren't (close to being) native speakers.
It's getting really old trying to make sense of articles that have completely incorrect grammar, entirely missing words, verb tenses that don't make any sense, randomly over-extravagant adjectives thrown in just as padding, etc. etc.
No offense to all those from non-native speaking countries who are attempting to make a few bucks online, but this for me is becoming by far more of an issue in terms of "quality" of information online as opposed to some of the other search issues that are being given higher priority, and it just seems strange that Google have been so blasé about it up to this point - especially given so many of these articles and pages are nothing more than outsourced filler for cheap traffic. I understand it's probably hard to code in something so advanced, but it would go a long way towards making the web a better place in my opinion.
Anyone else feeling the same way? Thoughts?
-
I agree Michael, it's a stereotype sure but most of the stuff churned out for the sake of being churned out as "fresh content" that is written in poor English simply doesn't have a use or practical function on the Internet other than a desperate attempt to soak up whatever meagre traffic they can. It's especially glaring considering their continued mantra has been "write for the user instead of the search engines" when these pages/posts are doing exactly the opposite...
-
Yes, true. But let's not forget Google's changes do not all come from algorithm updates. For example, the company contracts a couple of companies with thousands of independent contractors who manually review search results. And generally speaking, a lot of the lower quality sites were also riddled with poor writing, as it tends to go hand in hand with other quality issues.
-
Hi Ben, I think that's a great question and something I've wondered about as well. I think that at some point, it's likely that Google will penalise bad grammar, excessive spelling errors etc. As you say, it's probably difficult to create an algorithm for this, but the Webmaster blog post on Panda would suggest that it's something they do think about.
It's hard to say if this will come in the form of a direct penalty or if they will rely on indirect methods. For instance, it could be argued that link authority already does this to some extent because people are less likely to link to poorly written content that they are to professionally written content.
-
God, I hope so. They have to be doing this already. I have no evidence of that but, it would seem to be an effective anti-spam measure.
If they aren't then we need to lobby for it. I bet the reality is that if they went on a grammer jihad (de-index me for that word) half the sites on the net would disappear overnight.
Guessing it's really hard to create a set of rules for this that doesn't drastically impact everything in the index.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Anyone use a white label SEO company?
I work on my own and beginning to get more clients than I can handle effectively so this is my first look into outsourcing some of the work. Does anyone have a good resource for white label SEO? Do you have any experience with the following? Others? Sky Diamond Media
Industry News | | Masbro
Webimax
Imprezzio (local)
Posirank
OrangeSoda
Profit By Search0 -
International pages - SEO - which metatags to use?
I'm trying to get my International pages set up correctly for SEO
Industry News | | MikeSEOTruven
Can you tell me which of the following meta-tags are the ones to use on the pages?
I've heard that some might be obsolete, so will it hurt if I throw on all 3 or just choose 1? Example: Italian language page0 -
Google Trusted Stores
Hello, So we sell millions of dollars a month in merchandise - most of that comes from eBay transactions. We do have a script that posts to eBay and we do download our transactions from eBay and process the orders from our admin. Now I feel we will do a lot better in the SERPs if we have the trusted stores quality signal. However; it comes down to this. The conversion pixel. Since the don't pay through the site - do you think we can get away of sending a email to a second conversion page for eBay transactions? Have any of you noticed a boost in SERPs once you were approved with the Trusted Stores? Any advise?
Industry News | | joseph.chambers0 -
Is Google Making Life Harder For Aggregators?
Theres been a bunch of updates recently which have hurt aggregators: Reducing the number of search results to 7 for branded search queries The DMCA update which penalises those with trademark related takedown requests against them. At least 2 'domain diversity' updates, the most recent last week, which seeks to reduce the ability of sites to dominate SERPS e.g. a site which may have 2 search results on page 1 now may have 1. Plus Its commonly believed that Google favours big brands over smaller brands e.g. Marriott over examplehotelaggregator.com. Is this a deliberate ploy against aggregators in favour of brands i.e. does Google believe a brand site is a better search result than an aggregator? A brand site returned above an aggregator for a branded term may be seen by Google as a better fit, a better search result that should be higher. But is that true? Consumers like to see unbiased reviews and lowest prices and that isnt always available at the brand site. Thoughts please.
Industry News | | AndyMacLean0 -
Help! I need to hire a SEO / SEM Specialist - Am I asking for too much?!
Hey all! I'm expanding my in-house marketing team and I need to add an SEO / SEM Specialist that will strategize, execute & manage the following: Organic SEO PPC across multiple channels (Google, Bing & also social sites like Facebook) Remarketing & Display marketing Banner ads Retargeting We're a lean company that's all about doing more with less. But not being very familiar with the SEO / SEM world I'm afraid I'm asking for too much! What do you guys think? What's your experience been? If you do think that this is potentially a single position, what would be the best title for attracting talent? SEO / SEM Specialist? Digital Marketing Manager? With the research I've done - jobs / titles have been totally across the board! I'm not able to find much consistency. Thank you all for your help 🙂 It's greatly appreciated!!!!!
Industry News | | RochelleRietow0 -
What is the best seo software?
This question is in relation to doing site audits and creating branded reports for clients. Do seo agencies create there own software or do you use one that is accessible for all? Also what do you think is the best general seo software?
Industry News | | paulbaguley0 -
Question on Google's Differentiation
Hi everyone, We have a short question that probably has a very long answer: What are all the ways that Google differentiates one search result from another? This is really important for us to know and, up until now, we can't find a really good and complete source that explains this. Thank you in advance.
Industry News | | jid0 -
SEO sites were blasted by Panda
Just noticed that lots of SEO sites were blasted by Panda... http://trends.google.com/websites?q=webmasterworld.com&geo=all&date=2011&sort=0 http://trends.google.com/websites?q=seomoz.org&geo=all&date=2011&sort=0 http://trends.google.com/websites?q=digitalpoint.com&geo=all&date=2011&sort=0 http://trends.google.com/websites?q=forums.seochat.com&geo=all&date=2011&sort=0
Industry News | | EGOL3