Given Google’s recent algorithm updates, marketers might have worried their content marketing efforts would not be enough to avoid search penalties. However, comScore‘s May 2013 data for United States Searching Engine Rankings shows Google’s developments have only helped the company regain market share from competitors.
While Bing and Yahoo have also introduced new features to improve user experience, marketers should feel confident building search marketing strategies around Google’s ranking signals.
In May 2013, the engine processed 13.4 billion queries out of 20 billion core searches performed throughout the month. Fielding 66.7 percent of all searches throughout the month, Google experienced a slight uptick from April’s 66.5 percent.
Microsoft sites like Bing also saw search volume improve in May 2013, rising 0.01 percent over totals from April 2013 to 17.4 percent of the total market. Yet, it appears that sites earned these additional queries by cutting into Yahoo’s territory. Coming in third, Yahoo sites lost 0.1 percent of queries in May 2013, serving results for 2.4 billion searches.
Although it’s unlikely internet users are aware of Google’s efforts to block spammy online content from their search results, audiences might already be seeing results from Google’s updates.
In May 2013, the engine fielded 13.4 billion queries out of 2.0 billion core searches.
At the end of May 2013, Google introduced Penguin 2.0, an aggressive algorithm update that finds and punishes sites with high volumes of spam links. The search engine wasn’t finished – Brafton recently reported Google made two more major announcements.
One was revealed in a Tweet from Search Engineer Matt Cutts, who said the search engine launched a new spam-fighting search signal. Cutts also referenced a previous video that explains Google’s plans to remove content such as payday loans and pornography. The other – a mobile search update to combat smartphone misconfigurations – was announced in a Webmaster Central Blog post.
When marketers create content marketing strategies that follow best practices, such as focusing on end users, improving design and publishing original materials, they can win coveted SERP real estate and benefit from Google’s massive reach.
