Google Search Volume Experiment

Can Queries (and Clicks) Influence Rankings?
Visual results from a Google experiment
Rand Fishkin, CEO + Co-founder, SEOmoz
August 2011

I Ran an Experiment
http:/googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/06/our-new-search-index-caffeine.html
Original post here: https://plus.google.com/u/1/111294201325870406922/posts/2FmCppTwREj?hl=en

Trying to Change These SERPs:
Note everywhereist.com ranks #4 in the original (taken August 3rd at 1:40pm Pacific)
Original screenshot here: http://minus.com/ljwYzm

Also Promoted on Twitter
Tweet post: http://twitter.com/#!/randfish/status/98857476040040450

Results After 2 Hours
At 3:40pm (2 hours later), the site is now ranking #3 and #4.
Screenshot with that timestamp: http://minus.com/llEnnQ

Total Clicks on the URLs
Twitter URL
Google Plus URL
Bit.ly stats for each can be seen here: https://bitly.com/twtrblev+ and here: https://bitly.com/gptrblev+

Google Analytics Data
Note the higher bounce rate and shorter time on site due to the nature of the traffic
Bit.ly stats for each can be seen here: https://bitly.com/twtrblev+ and here: https://bitly.com/gptrblev+

This Change Only Lasted ~18 Hours
Back down to ranking #4 by 9:28am on August 4th.
Screenshot of 1 day later here: http://minus.com/ll2NDQ

But then… It Changed Again?!
Whoa! Suddenly ranking #1 and #2 (~48 hours after falling back to position #4)
Screenshot of this result (from Monday) here: http://min.us/mcLZeu6

Maybe it was just on-page changes?
Note use of words “travel” and “blog” in this post’s intro.
And their conspicuous lack of existence in this post (which was at the top when the experiment began)
Screenshot of this result (from Monday) here: http://min.us/mcLZeu6

Others Have Shown Sustained Volume Creates Sustained Rankings
Martin MacDonald of OMD explains here: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whoa-can-query-volume-directly-influence-rankings

At no time before, during or after the experiment has the site ranked in the top 1,000 results (first 100 pages) for “travel blog”
If search volume can influence queries the way Martin suggested, it clearly takes a higher quantity, more diversity or perhaps other factors than what I could trigger in my experiment.

Conclusions?
Still mostly TBD, in my opinion
Google doesn’t seem to be easily manipulated by a few hundred queries
CTR may have impacted rankings here, but it could just have been the new blog post containing the keywords in a prominent position.
Google+ Wow! Drove more than 50% of the volume that Twitter did. That’s remarkable in and of itself, given that I have <1/3rd the “followers” on GG+ as Twitter.

http://www.seomoz.org	6377
http://actu.abondance.com	1809
http://www.my.epokhe.com	637
http://seoinsoul.ru	555
http://www.conseilsmarketing.fr	257
http://feeds.feedburner.com	229
http://www.seopazari.com	164
http://www.mediabase.at	85
http://feeds2.feedburner.com	62
http://news.ms1.ru	57
http://twitter.com	47
http://sighedes-socialmedianewsroom.com	32
http://blogging.collected.info	18
http://www.andreascamain.com	16
http://petermusu.blogspot.com	16
http://www.stonepower.fr	16
http://blog.technetsource.com	15
http://itsalltechnology.collected.info	14
http://ayudamutuapadresenprocesodeduelo.blogspot.com	12
http://translate.googleusercontent.com	10
http://www.seodirect.org	10
http://sayemislam.com	10
http://www.ig.gmodules.com	8
http://translate.google.com	8
http://www.conseilsmarketing.com	6
http://www.paperblog.fr	6
http://www.slideshare.net	6
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com	5
http://www.infobiz.cc	5
http://internetwebsitedesign.biz	5
http://internetmarketing.collected.info	5
http://www.abondance.com	4
http://blogbrainz.collected.info	3
http://webyield.net	3
http://voyelle.tumblr.com	3
http://thierry.conseilsmarketing.fr	3
http://itknowledgehub.com	3
http://a0.twimg.com	3
http://www.hostmds.com	3
http://anispo.com	3
http://www.petermusu.com	3
http://www.twylah.com	2
http://codingtutor.info	2
http://mundo-powerpoints.blogspot.com	2
http://nuevospowerpoints.blogspot.com	2
http://www.ottawacharityevents.ca	2
http://localhost	2
http://ouriran.in	2
http://pigeindexeroff	2
https://twitter.com	2
http://www.novopt.com	2

Google Search Volume Experiment

by Rand Fishkin on Aug 10, 2011

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Google Search Volume Experiment — Presentation Transcript