A few weeks ago, we saw a minor uproar when a Google employee accidentally released a copy of their official guidelines for quality raters. According to several SEO-focused sites that analyzed the document, there are no big surprises. What was included were several pointers for how Google thinks and some great tips that can help you produce better SEO copywriting.
The document was basically a 125-page user’s guide for Google’s quality raters. Instructions on what to look for, how to qualify sites and other tidbits were included. But, as I read a post on the SEOMoz website, I also noted 4 things particular to SEO copywriting that I wanted to point out to you.
1) Google’s Interpretation Takes Priority
When it comes to very general queries, Google may apply a dominant interpretation of the term. The examples mentioned in the SEOMoz post include “apple” and “kayak” which Google interprets as the companies, not the fruit and boat.
If Google rankings are your goal, before you choose keyphrases to include in your SEO copywriting, you may well want to check the terms by doing a Google search. See what types of web pages Google is ranking for the terms you hope to do well with. If you find that most of the sites on the search results page are not related to yours, you might want to change your strategy.
I’ve recommended this approach for many years now because I’ve seen the trend building. But this confirms what I’ve suspected.
2) User Intent for Keywords is Important
Here’s something else I’ve preached for quite some time. The user intent behind keywords is very helpful from a sales/usability aspect. But now Google is saying that they, too, look at the “query intent” (what a person really wants when they type a particular keyphrase into Google’s query/search field).
Google places intent into one of three categories: Action (“Do”), Information (“Know”) or Navigation (“Go). SEOMoz explains this very well by saying:
This Do/Know/Go model comes up a lot in the document and is a pretty useful structure for understanding search in general. Relevance is determined by intent – if a query is clearly action-oriented (e.g. “buy computer”), then only an Action (”Do”) result can be highly relevant.
In other words, if the keyphrase your customer searched Google for was “buy Toshiba computer” then your page must clearly deal with purchasing a Toshiba computer or it will not be considered relevant.
3) Landing Pages Should be Ultra-Relevant
If the search term happens to be “buy Toshiba model ABC123 laptop” then a detailed ecommerce product page will most likely come up high in the rankings. However, just the opposite also holds true. If a broad search for “Toshiba laptop” is conducted, then a very broad web page will be a more relevant fit.
4) Duplicate Content Isn’t Always Bad
If you think duplicate content is the cardinal sin of the Google gods, get ready for a shock. The official document explains to raters that copied content shouldn’t necessarily receive an automatic reduction in rankings. The catch here (which it seems is left to human review) is the intent behind the copied content.
For instance, if you have some copied content on a high-value page along with other content, you’re most likely OK. If you only have copied content surrounded by ads with no other information that would keep the page from being a complete duplicate; your page/site is probably going to be flagged as spam. (Can you say, “Panda?”)
A lot of what is being reported about this document seems to deal with intent. With Google getting more sophisticated over the years, I believe they are looking beyond page value (so to speak) and reaching for the ability to incorporate into their search results page what the searcher is thinking as well as what s/he is typing.
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I find it hard to keep up with the changes in the SEO industry but these seems totally reasonable. Thanks for the summary!
You’re welcome. Thanks for stopping by!
This is a great post with some really useful information. It can be difficult to keep track of changes in the SEO industry but this is content worth sharing around. Thankyou.
As always, a great bunch of info, Karon. We’re so blessed to have you stay on top of this stuff and break it down for us!
Thanks Ladies. So glad you found it helpful.
I was wondering about the duplicate content penalty. One site I know of have their content repeated among 3 to 15 urls in the domain and their traffic and search results remain strong.
This explains why they’re doing so well.
Hi Mike… might be. Keep in mind none of this stuff happens in a vacuum so the copied content plus many other factors might all combine to give them good rankings. Thanks for stopping by.
Karon, You are awesome. Thank you.
Awww shucks. Thanks Gina!
Hi Karon,
I couldn’t catch your Copywriting for SEO & Conversion last week. Did you put a recorded version up online by change?
Thanks,
Suzanne