Unveiling the Mysteries of Google Search: A Deep Dive into the Recent Leak

The most significant revelation from the leaked documents is the suggestion that Google representatives may have previously misled the public about how the internet’s biggest gatekeeper assesses and ranks content for its search engine. This has sparked a wave of discussions and debates among SEO marketers and industry insiders.

Google’s ranking process has always been a black box. Websites depend on search traffic for survival, and many go to great lengths, often at great expense, to outperform competitors and climb to the top of search results. Over the years, Google spokespeople have repeatedly denied that user clicks factor into website rankings. However, the leaked documents indicate that various types of user clicks do indeed feed into the ranking of pages in search.

Veteran SEO expert Rand Fishkin notes, “The larger, meta takeaway is that even more of Google’s public statements about what they collect and how their search engine works have strong evidence against them.”

The leaked documents first came to light when SEO experts Fishkin and Mike King published some of their contents, along with accompanying analyses. These documents contain repositories filled with information about and definitions of data Google collects, some of which may inform how webpages are ranked in search.

Google initially dodged questions about the authenticity of the leaked documents before confirming their veracity. However, Google spokesperson Davis Thompson cautioned against making assumptions about Search based on “out-of-context, outdated, or incomplete information.”

The documents do not indicate how different attributes are weighted, and it’s possible that some of the attributes named in the documents might have been deployed at some point but have since been phased out. They also may have never been used for ranking sites at all.

Another major point highlighted by Fishkin and King relates to how Google may use Chrome data in its search rankings. Google Search representatives have said that they don’t use anything from Chrome for ranking, but the leaked documents suggest that may not be true.

The documents mention over 14,000 attributes, and researchers will be digging for weeks looking for hints contained within the pages. There’s mention of “Twiddlers,” or ranking tweaks deployed outside of major system updates, that boost or demote content according to certain criteria.

So, what does this all mean for everyone other than the SEO industry? Anyone who operates a website will likely be reading about this leak and trying to make sense of it. As they design various experiments to test some of what’s suggested in the documents, websites might start to look, feel, or read a little differently.

Fishkin advises, “Journalists and publishers of information about SEO and Google Search need to stop uncritically repeating Google’s public statements, and take a much harsher, more adversarial view of the search giant’s representatives.” He warns that uncritical repetition of Google’s claims helps the company spin a story that’s only useful to the company and not to practitioners, users, or the public.