Coincidentally, in the same week that Microsoft received a Search Patent that allows them to de-dupe Paid & Natural search results to show only one listing, we discovered what we believe is a new algorithm in Google which feeds of an almost contradictory belief (in a sense).
We ran a small campaign on a client’s website and marketed a very relevant page through Google Adwords on a certain set of highly relevant keywords, where that page was very low down in the listings (and arguably, not a very competitive keyword and due to the site structure, the page was hidden quite deeply in the website). For the past week, that keyword was receiving very high clickthrough rates (+50%) due to the fact that is was in position #1 on the paid listings and very relevant to the keyword being bid on. We have now discovered that in one week, that page has quickly risen to #1 on the natural listings.
So the big question:Â Is Google using Adwords CTR & Performance data to influence their natural listings? We believe so!
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Comments On This Post
March 2, 2007 at 4:57 pm
Vinny, this finding simply shows that by doing paid search professionally by one of the toppest PPC companies (e.g. Clicks2Customers) will eventually benefit a web page’s search engine optimization effort!
March 2, 2007 at 6:16 pm
Could have something to do with the algorythm: backlinks x page relevancy x user experience (which comes from paid listings). Yes Google are watching.
March 2, 2007 at 7:11 pm
Didnt know this was new, always thought that is the way they did it.
March 2, 2007 at 7:37 pm
Maybe it has something to do with the traffic that was generated by the PPC campaign?
Also, maybe it had to do with personalized search. Did you and your client remember to log out of any Google accounts before searching the keyword?
March 2, 2007 at 7:56 pm
I agree with John’s points. Chris, it’s definitely not personalized search – I checked on my PC and it wasn’t the one running the campaign, and the search volume was quite high on that keyword so I don’t think it was impacted. We did check links back and there were not any.
March 2, 2007 at 2:57 pm
Vinny, this finding simply shows that by doing paid search professionally by one of the toppest PPC companies (e.g. Clicks2Customers) will eventually benefit a web page's search engine optimization effort!
March 2, 2007 at 4:16 pm
Could have something to do with the algorythm: backlinks x page relevancy x user experience (which comes from paid listings). Yes Google are watching.
March 2, 2007 at 5:11 pm
Didnt know this was new, always thought that is the way they did it.
March 2, 2007 at 5:37 pm
Maybe it has something to do with the traffic that was generated by the PPC campaign?
Also, maybe it had to do with personalized search. Did you and your client remember to log out of any Google accounts before searching the keyword?
March 2, 2007 at 5:56 pm
I agree with John's points. Chris, it's definitely not personalized search – I checked on my PC and it wasn't the one running the campaign, and the search volume was quite high on that keyword so I don't think it was impacted. We did check links back and there were not any.
March 4, 2007 at 6:02 pm
Google has always maintained that purchasing PPC listings will not help your organic ranking, and as John and Vinny point out I think that what is going on is that they are not directly related. came across this that helps explain some of the factors:
http://www.seobook.com/archives/001939.shtml
March 4, 2007 at 4:02 pm
Google has always maintained that purchasing PPC listings will not help your organic ranking, and as John and Vinny point out I think that what is going on is that they are not directly related. came across this that helps explain some of the factors:
http://www.seobook.com/archives/001939.shtml
March 5, 2007 at 11:57 am
I have seen quite a lot of evidence to support Vinny’s theory over the last year in the UK search space.
In commercial areas the ability to attain a good CTR and maintain PPC expenditure is often an indicator that the web site / company has a compelling offering. As a result I think it makes perfect sense for Google to factor this in to the organic algo to some degree.
March 5, 2007 at 9:57 am
I have seen quite a lot of evidence to support Vinny's theory over the last year in the UK search space.
In commercial areas the ability to attain a good CTR and maintain PPC expenditure is often an indicator that the web site / company has a compelling offering. As a result I think it makes perfect sense for Google to factor this in to the organic algo to some degree.
March 22, 2007 at 9:40 am
Hi All,
Interested in this post and Vinnys findings. We have experimented with htis over a number of years and have not found paid search spend influencing organic rankings.
I’d be interested to know what sort of spend was placed on promoting this page as well as the competativeness of the phrase (maybe too much to ask
).
It would be great to have more examples. If it is true (which the Incubeta guys) believe, it has major consequences.
March 22, 2007 at 7:40 am
Hi All,
Interested in this post and Vinnys findings. We have experimented with htis over a number of years and have not found paid search spend influencing organic rankings.
I'd be interested to know what sort of spend was placed on promoting this page as well as the competativeness of the phrase (maybe too much to ask
).
It would be great to have more examples. If it is true (which the Incubeta guys) believe, it has major consequences.
August 16, 2009 at 11:54 pm
thank you for sharing
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