Noogler: SEO is spam, ads help you rank

In 2012, a Googler made headlines when he said “SEO isn’t good for users or the Internet at large,” and “It’s a bug that you could rank highly in Google without buying ads, and Google is trying to fix the bug.”

Was it Matt Cutts, John Mueller, or another prominent Googler who said this? No. It was actually a Noogler (or new Googler).

So did this this new employee slip up and reveal what Google really thinks? No. Far more likely, he simply didn’t know what he was talking about.

Google didn’t view SEO as spam. As for ads, Google said: “As always, Google search rankings are completely unrelated to Google’s paid advertising services and other partnerships, and there is absolutely no way for a webmaster to pay money to increase search rankings.”

Read all about it in Google Clarifies: No, Ads Shouldn’t Help Rankings & No, SEO Isn’t Bad.

And yet, more than a decade later, these SEO myths persist.

Also on this day

Google says Shopify sites are in a good crawling state after reports of stalled crawling

2022: Google’s John Mueller said the issue was related to a “temporary drop in how we calculate how much we can crawl,” implying there was no issue with the Shopify sites.

Google tests Buying Guides in mobile search results

2022: It presented users with various drop-down menu options to learn more about the product they were searching for.

Google Search Console performance reports data issue may impact analytics

2022: It impacted Google Search, Google Discover, and Google News data.

Google Posts being rejected because of non-compliance with image guidelines

2020: It seemed like maybe Google didn’t want users to use stock photos.

Google adds Siri Shortcuts to its iOS apps

2020: Users could take actions within the corresponding Google app through Siri by saying trigger phrases, such as “search with Google.”

Clicks plummet when images, article info stripped from news results in SERP

2019: Google sought to show potential ‘unintended consequences’ of new copyright rules that require fees when content is shown in search results.

Google Search Console goes live with new consolidated view

2019: Google made a preview of the consolidated data view live early.

Bing to publishers: Start using new Bing URL submission process for indexing now

2019: Bing wanted to reduce the effort and resources put into crawling the web.

Google begins enforcing certification process for event ticket resellers on AdWords

2018: Ticket resellers were now included among the list of restricted advertisers on AdWords and had to be certified by Google before they could advertise.

Google now wants larger images for AMP articles

2018: The new minimum requirement was 1,200 pixels wide and 800,000 pixels in total.

AdWords Express launches notifications for calls from search ads

2018: Advertisers could rate calls and be notified of missed calls.

Google adds new features & improves navigation for mobile hotel & flight searches

2018: Google rolled out tabs that let users switch between hotel, flight and trip details.

Bing rejected 130M ads in 2016, including 17M tech support scam ads

2017: Advertisers attempting Phishing attacks and pushing counterfeit goods continued to try to evade detection.

Suspected Paid-Link Penalty Hasn’t Hit Expedia Bottom Line — Yet

2014: Said Expedia: “Our traffic from Google, both on a paid and an organic basis, continues to increase on a year-on-year basis.”

Google Now Adds Google Now “Launcher,” Video On Demand Providers, Airbnb Reservations & More

2014: Google rolled out several enhancements to Google search app for Android, bolstering Google Now features on the Nexus 5 and some other devices.

YP Wants To Compete Directly With Google And Yelp In Local

2014: New CMO planned to focus on personalization, more content depth and multi-platform experiences.

Google Now Ranks No. 2 Behind Apple As The 2nd Most Valuable Company In America

2014: As the world’s largest online advertiser, Google’s rise was a reflection of the technology industry taking a larger role globally.

Bing Teams Up With The Hollywood Reporter In Anticipation Of The Oscars

2014: To create the “ultimate Oscars resource guide.”

Search In Pics: Golden Tate With Glass At Super Bowl, Google Indoor Clouds & Android Socks

2014: The latest images showing what people eat at the search engine companies, how they play, who they meet, where they speak, what toys they have, and more.

Google’s Enhanced Campaigns Inspire Love, Hate And Hope For The Next Version

2013: Thoughts from marketers about what they liked, what they didn’t like, what needed to be done, and what they wanted to see in future releases.

Sudden Change In The Number Of Links Reporting In Google Webmaster? Don’t Panic.

2013: It was a bug. Google said it was working on it.

Twitter Search Lets You Once Again Find Old Tweets

2013: Twitter said that some older tweets were going to be available.

Google Still #1 Traffic Source For Most Of Top 30 Websites — Report

2012: Google ranked as the number one source of traffic for 23 of the top 30 websites. 

Did Super Bowl Advertisers Take Advantage of Search Interest?

2012: Brands did a much better job of keeping things simple and driving viewers to interesting, relevant pages that engaged them.

Google: 41 Percent Of Super Bowl Ad Searches Were Mobile

2012: Super Bowl ad-related searches in the US rose 200% on desktop, 970% on tablets and 2,700% on smartphones.

New: Google Sitelinks With Small Arrows

2012: Google confirmed rolling out a new look for their one-line sitelinks.

Wolfram|Alpha Goes Pro With Powerful Data Analysis & Presentation Tools

2012: It included the ability to analyze your own datasets.

Google Webmaster Tools and Google Analytics: The Beginning Of A Useful Integration?

2011: The verification page of Google Webmaster Tools included a link to Google Analytics option for all verified sites.

Google Instant Now On Product Search

2011: Google added Google Instant to Google Shopping Search view within the web results.

Google To EU: We’re Always Open To Algorithm Suggestions

2011: Google CEO Eric Schmidt said that “Google could be willing to change some of its algorithm methodology in search,” to avoid potential fines or other penalties.

Scoring the 2011 Super Bowl Commercials For Search Visibility and Visitor Engagement

2011: 100% of brands had at least some search visibility. But many brands didn’t include mention the Super Bowl ads at all on their home pages.

Instant Replay: Where To Find The Super Bowl Ads

2011: Four good sites that made it easy to find and watch them.

PSAs To Be Phased Out Of AdSense

2011: Publishers running AdSense would see fewer public service announcement banners on their sites.

Google I/O Conference 2011 Sells Out In 59 Minutes

2011: It took 90 days and 50 days in 2009 and 2010, respectively, for the event to sellout.

Google’s Egypt Executive, Wael Ghonim, Should Be Released From Egyptian Custody Now

2011: He had been detained by the Egyptian government during protests.

Blekko: Actually We Have A Million Slashtags

2011: If Facebook-generated “/likes” were included the “slashtag count” rose to over a million.

Twitter Study: Mainstream News Are Carbs, Blogs Are Protein For Your Marketing

2011: Bloggers had more influence than mainstream publications in areas such as technology and entertainment.

Google Airs TV Ad During Super Bowl – But Why?

2010: The “Parisian Love” commercial had 1.2 million views on YouTube before it ran during the Super Bowl. 

Searching for the Superbowl Start Time: How Are The Engines, the NFL, and CBS Doing?

2010: The NFL, CBS, and the search engines didn’t do a great job at connecting with searchers who wanted to know what time the game started.

Google News’ New Local Angle

2008: New capabilities allowed users to “create a local section for any city, state or country in the world.”

Microsoft Live Search Core Relevance Program Management Director Eytan Seidman Moves On

2008: The core relevance team that Eytan managed included crawling, indexing, and ranking for Live Search.

Microsoft Acquires 3-D Modeling Software Company Caligari

2008: The group would be a part of the Virtual Earth team, but the software equally used for gaming and game development.

If You Like Digg, You’ll Love Ask’s Big News

2008: Ask embraced the social media tenet that you need others to tell you how important a news story is, with its new “BigFactor” ratings.

January 2008: Search Engine Land’s Most Popular Stories

2008: Search Engine Land’s 10 most popular stories from January 2008.

Rand Fishkin’s Belated SuperBowl Proposal Gets A Yes

2007: Instead of a Super Bowl ad, he popped the question during a “Veronica Mars” commercial.

Google Maps Australia Turns 30 Second Walk Into 18 Minutes Drive

2007: Searching for directions from Shelbourne Hotel to Google’s own Sydney office across the street took you over a toll bridge and back.

Gmail Now Public Beta, Open To All

2007: You no longer needed an invite or SMS code to gain access to your own Gmail account.

Google To Roll Out Fee-Based Google Apps?

2007: Once it was free for companies to adopt Google’s office applications.

Google Sends Mr. Schmidt To Washington

2007: Schmidt lobbied for many things in his talk, including a bill to remove taxes on internet access and e-commerce, net neutrality and government initiatives to help small businesses with technology. 

Live Search SOAP API Out Of Beta

2007: They also added some new features including more languages, increased search results, enhanced search tags, more local options, improved phone results and more coding samples.

Yahoo Adds Featured Search Builder Sites Box

2007: Yahoo added a box to the home page in order to promote user-generated search sites. 

Kudos To National Pork Board For Apologies & Fundraising Efforts

2007: A search marketer and breastfeeding activist received two letters of apology, plus the National Pork Board backed a fundraising campaign for the Mother’s Milk Bank Of Ohio.

Searching For “The Next Google”

2007: A look at search-related demonstrations from the DEMO conference.

Searchforvideo Upgrades Design, Capabilities

2007: Viewers were presented with brand name content channels and hundreds of video partners were added to its search index.

SideStep Raises $15 Million

2007: SideStep had its eye on more acquisitions.

From Search Marketing Expo (SMX)

Past contributions from Search Engine Land’s Subject Matter Experts (SMEs)

These columns are a snapshot in time and have not been updated since publishing, unless noted. Opinions expressed in these articles are those of the author and not necessarily Search Engine Land.

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