According to Compete PRO, 34.52% of the incoming traffic to mit.edu sites in July 2014 came from Google.com. That’s 1,403,774 out of the 4,065,881 visits to these sites from the U.S. that month. This presentation will explain how search works and give an overview of the more than 200 unique signals or “clues” that Google’s algorithms use today. It will also cover three major updates to Google’s algorithms, named Panda, Penguin and Hummingbird. And it will take a look at the algorithms of the second largest search engine, YouTube.

1. Google Updates: Panda, Penguin
and Hummingbird, Oh My!
Presentation by Greg Jarboe, President
and co-founder of SEO-PR, to the MIT
communications staff on Nov. 4, 2014

2. In addition, I’m the author of YouTube
and Video Marketing: An Hour a Day
• I’m also a contributor to:
– The Art of SEO,
– Strategic Digital Marketing,
– Enchantment,
– Complete B2B Online
Marketing.
• I’m profiled in Online
Marketing Heroes.
• I’m a writer for ReelSEO.
• I’m an instructor at the
Rutgers Business School and
the content marketing faculty
chair at Market Motive.
• I’m a frequent speaker at
industry conferences.
Source: Greg Jarboe, President and co-founder, SEO-PR, Nov. 4, 2014

3. 41% of incoming traffic to the MIT.edu
domain comes from Google.com
Source: Compete PRO, September 2014

4. So, the MIT communications staff
should understand how search works
• This presentation will give you
an overview of the more than
200 unique signals or “clues”
that Google’s algorithms use.
• It will also cover three of the
major updates to Google’s
algorithms, which are named
Panda, Penguin, and
Hummingbird.
• And it will take a look at the
algorithms of the second
largest search engine, YouTube
(not Bing).

5. Google crawls trillions of pages, but
doesn’t index every page on your sites
Source: Google. How Search Works infographic

6. As users type a query, they’ll start
seeing Google Instant predictions
Source: Google. How Search Works infographic

7. Google’s ranking algorithms use 200+
signals and change 500+ times a year
Source: Google. How Search Works infographic

8. There are billions of searches each day
on Google and 16% of them are new
Source: Google. How Search Works infographic

9. The major algorithmic changes that
have had the biggest impact on search
• Panda/Farmer — February 23, 2011
– A major algorithm update hit sites hard, affecting up
to 12% of search results (a number that came directly
from Google). Panda seemed to crack down on thin
content, content farms, sites with high ad-to-content
ratios, and a number of other quality issues.
• Panda 2.0 (#2) — April 11, 2011
– Google rolled out the Panda update to all English
queries worldwide (not limited to English-speaking
countries). New signals were also integrated, including
data about sites users blocked via the SERPs directly or
the Chrome browser.
• Panda 3.1 (#9) — November 18, 2011
– After Panda 2.5, Google entered a period of “Panda
Flux” where updates started to happen more
frequently and were relatively minor. Some industry
analysts called the 11/18 update 3.1, even though
there was no official 3.0.
• Penguin — April 24, 2012
– After weeks of speculation about an “Over-optimization
penalty”, Google finally rolled out the
“Webspam Update”, which was soon after dubbed
“Penguin.” Penguin adjusted a number of spam
factors, including keyword stuffing, and impacted an
estimated 3.1% of English queries.
• Penguin 2.0 (#4) — May 22, 2013
– After months of speculation, the 4th Penguin update
(dubbed “2.0” by Google) arrived with only moderate
impact. The exact nature of the changes were unclear,
but some evidence suggested that Penguin 2.0 was
more finely targeted to the page level.
• Hummingbird — August 20, 2013
– Announced on September 26th, Google suggested that
the “Hummingbird” update rolled out about a month
earlier. Hummingbird has been compared to Caffeine,
and seems to be a core algorithm update that may
power changes to semantic search and the Knowledge
Graph for months to come.
• Panda 4.0 (#26) — May 19, 2014
– Google confirmed a major Panda update that likely
included both an algorithm update and a data refresh.
Officially, about 7.5% of English-language queries were
affected.
• Penguin 3.0 — October 17, 2014
– More than a year after the previous Penguin update
(2.1), Google launched a Penguin refresh. This update
appeared to be smaller than expected (<1% of
US/English queries affected) and was probably data-only
(not a new Penguin algorithm).
Source: Moz, Google Algorithm Change History

10. So, how do Google’s Panda updates
impact the content that MIT creates?
• Google won’t disclose the
actual ranking signals used
in its algorithms because it
doesn’t want unethical
search engine optimizers to
game its search results.
• But, Google Fellow Amit
Singhal did share the kinds
of questions that engineers
ask themselves as they
write algorithms that
attempt to assess the
quality of articles and pages
as well as content and sites.
Source: Amit Singhal, Google Fellow, “More guidance on building high-quality sites,” May 6, 2011

11. Below are some questions Google uses
to assess the “quality” of an article
• Would you trust the information presented in this article?
• Is this article written by an expert or enthusiast who knows the topic well, or is it
more shallow in nature?
• Does this article have spelling, stylistic, or factual errors?
• Does the article provide original content or information, original reporting,
original research, or original analysis?
• Does the article describe both sides of a story?
• Was the article edited well, or does it appear sloppy or hastily produced?
• Does this article provide a complete or comprehensive description of the topic?
• Does this article contain insightful analysis or interesting information that is
beyond obvious?
• Would you expect to see this article in a printed magazine, encyclopedia or book?
• Are the articles short, unsubstantial, or otherwise lacking in helpful specifics?
Source: Amit Singhal, Google Fellow, “More guidance on building high-quality sites,” May 6, 2011

12. “So, how many Google engineers does
it take to change your style guide?”
A. The number one followed
by one hundred zeros.
B. Six. One to change it, two
to write the blog post, and
three to come up with the
code name for the project.
C. Three. Two to hold the
ladder, and one to organize
the world’s information
and make it universally
accessible and useful.
Source: Greg Jarboe, President and co-founder, SEO-PR, June 30, 2011

13. So, how do Google’s Penguin updates
impact the content that MIT creates?
• Any links intended to manipulate PageRank or a site’s ranking
in Google search results may be considered part of a link
scheme and a violation of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines:
– Excessive link exchanges (“Link to me and I'll link to you”) or
partner pages exclusively for the sake of cross-linking.
– Large-scale article marketing or guest posting campaigns with
keyword-rich anchor text links.
• Creating links that weren’t editorially placed or vouched for
by the site’s owner on a page, otherwise known as unnatural
links, can be considered a violation of Google’s guidelines:
– Advertorials or native advertising where payment is received for
articles that include links that pass PageRank.
– Links with optimized anchor text in articles or press releases
distributed on other sites.
Source: Google, Quality Guidelines, Link Schemes

14. Creating good content pays off and the
MIT communications staff creates that
• The best way to get other sites
to create high-quality, relevant
links to yours is to create
unique, relevant content that
can naturally gain popularity in
the Internet community.
• Links are usually editorial
votes given by choice, and the
more useful content you have,
the greater the chances
someone else will find that
content valuable to their
readers and link to it.
Source: Google, Quality Guidelines, Link Schemes

15. Matt Cutts, head of Google Webspam
team, says ‘linkbait’ can be white-hat
• “I think of ‘linkbait’ as
something interesting
enough to catch people’s
attention, and that doesn’t
have to be a bad thing.”
• “Especially if it’s interesting
information or fun, it
doesn’t have to have
negative connotations.”
• “Content can be both white-hat
and yet still be
wonderful ‘bait’ for links.”
Source: Matt Cutts, Head of Google Webspam Team, “SEO Advice: linkbait and linkbating,” Jan. 24, 2006

16. So, how does Google’s Hummingbird
impact the content that MIT creates?
• Google started using
Hummingbird about August
30, 2013, but no one noticed
until Google announced the
change on September 26.
• “Hummingbird is paying more
attention to each word in a
query, ensuring that the whole
query – the whole sentence or
conversation or meaning – is
taken into account,” says
Danny Sullivan, the editor-in-chief
of Search Engine Land.
Source: Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Land, “FAQ: All About the New Hummingbird Algorithm,” Sept. 26, 2013

17. Ok Google, “Who is the president of
MIT?” and “How old is he?”
Source: Google Voice Search results, Oct. 31, 2014

18. This obliges us to think about great
content, and not just about “content”
• The fact that Hummingbird and
100% (not provided) were rolled
out at almost the same time
seems to be more than just a
coincidence.
• If Hummingbird is more about
search entities, better
information retrieval, and query
expansion – an update where
keywords by themselves have lost
part of the omnipresent value
they had – then relying on
keyword data alone is not enough
anymore.
Source: Gianluca Fiorelli, Moz, “Hummingbird Unleashed,” Oct. 24, 2013

19. Now, let’s look at the algorithms of the
second largest search engine, YouTube
U.S. Search Queries
(Millions)
3.475
0 5 10 15
Google
YouTube
Microsoft
Yahoo
1.845
12.501
3.955
• YouTube became the
second most-used platform
for searching in August
2008.
• Here’s the U.S. data from
comScore qSearch for May
2014:
– Google had 12.5 billion
explicit core searches,
– YouTube had 4.0 billion
search queries,
– Microsoft had 3.5 billion
searches,
– Yahoo! had 1.8 billion
searches.
Source: comScore Expanded Search Query Report, May 2014

20. 54% of the videos in Google universal
search results come from YouTube
• Videos appear in 65% of
Google searches in the U.S.
• 54% of these video results
come from YouTube, about
5% from Vimeo, about 5%
from Dailymotion, and no
other video provider gets
more than about 1%.
• In addition, the average first
video integration from
YouTube was about two
positions ahead of the
average first position of any
other provider’s video.
Source: Searchmetrics, “Universal Search,: 2013 Analysis for Google US,” June 18, 2014

21. Here are my top 10 YouTube video SEO
tips (freshness date: Nov. 4, 2014)
• Conduct keyword research.
• Optimize your content’s
metadata.
• Optimize your video’s watch time.
• Create custom thumbnails for
your videos.
• Use annotations on your videos.
• Use captions on your videos.
• Create and optimize playlists.
• Optimize your channel name,
icon and description.
• Promote your content with paid
media.
Source: Greg Jarboe, The SEM Post, “Top 10 YouTube Video SEO Tips,” Aug. 18, 2014

22. Hopefully, I’ve just explained the funny
feeling that you’re being Googled