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SERP Crowding & Shrinkage: It's Not Your Imagination

Posted: 19 Aug 2012 08:00 PM PDT

Back in June, I wrote about what I called the “Bigfoot” Update, a major Google ranking fluctuation that seemed to be tied to SERP crowding. Put simply, fewer domains were getting more real estate in the Top 10. Since June, this trend only seems to be continuing. This is a graph of domain diversity from April 4, 2012 through last Thursday (August 16):

Domain Diversity (4/4 - 8/16)

The percentage represents the density of unique subdomains across the entire data set (Top 10 rankings for 1,000 keywords) – the lower the domain diversity, the more crowding in the SERPs. The large drops are: (1) the original Penguin update and (2) the “Bigfoot” update. Crowding continued to worsen until (3), when a slight improvement occurred around 8/14.

The Incredible Shrinking SERPs

As I was digging into (3), I noticed that something else happened around that same time. There was a burst of chatter that people were seeing only 7 results on some SERPs. One of the benefits of the Mozcast data set is that I can go back and run new stats over historical Page 1 rankings. So, I set out to determine if this 7-result phenomenon was real, and if so, if it was new. This is a graph of Top 10 SERPs with less than 10 results since April 4:

SERPS with <10 Results

While, historically, it seems there have been some SERPs with less than 10 results for a while, they ranged from 1-4% of the data set. In just two days, from about August 12-14, that number jumped to over 18%. Mozcast shows Page 1 SERPs with between 7-10 results, but almost the entire spike occurred in the 7-result pages. This is a graph of just the 7-result data:

SERPs with Exactly 7 Results

SERPs with 7 results were an anomaly prior to 8/13, with the system tracking a maximum of one (0. 1%) on any given day. On 8/13, that number jumped to 10.7% and then, the following day, to 18.3%. Almost one-fifth of SERPs tracked by our data now have 7 results.

“George Is Getting Upset!”

Nobody likes shrinkage, and we naturally get upset when someone messes around with our familiar, 10-result page. So, what’s happening here? Here’s a sample SERP, for “pc tools”, with numbered results (1-7):

7-result SERP ("PC Tools")

You’ll notice two things right away: (1) “PC Tools” is a brand, and (2) the #1 result has expanded site-links. Not every SERP affected appears to be branded, though – a search for “krill” (the #1 result is a Wikipedia entry for the crustacean) also returns 7 results, for example.

To maintain the integrity of the Mozcast crawl, I can’t do a public data dump of all of the affected keywords we measured, but spot-checking them reveals expanded site-links in almost all observable cases. While not all keyword phrases were branded, site-links and branded queries are naturally correlated.

“No! Not Six! I Said Seven!”

Sorry, I just wanted an excuse to use this movie clip. While the vast majority of the shrunken SERPs have 7 results, a couple of 6-result pages snuck into the mix. This is a screenshot from a Google result for “pictures of cats”:

6-result SERP ("pictures of cats")

Here, the standard, organic results are preceded by a mega-block of image results. Like the expanded site-links, I can only guess that these are being treated as multiple pieces of SERP “real estate”. In every case, the first result or result-block appears to be counting as more than one position.

What’s the Crowding Connection?

It’s tough to say if the slight decrease in crowding (increase in diversity) is directly related to the explosion in 7-result SERPs. My best guess is that, since many of the 7-result SERPs are branded and branded results seem to have more crowding (anecdotally, at least), cutting them short of a full 10 improved overall diversity slightly. In other words if a 10-result SERP was crowded and three got lopped off, then the remaining 10-result SERPs are counting more and pushing diversity back up a bit. It’s impossible to say if this was intentional or just a side-effect.

Why Was “Flux” Relatively Normal?

If you follow the Google weather on Mozcast, you may be wondering why temperatures were just slightly above average on the two days when SERP shrinkage rolled out. Digging into the data, it appears that the baseline flux for those two days was relatively low. Without the 7-result shift, temperatures on 8/13 would've been closer to 62°F. Combined with the two-day roll-out (split almost evenly across the two days), the introduction of the 7-result pages snuck just below the radar. It's hard to say whether the two-day roll-out was intentional or simply an artifact of our 24-hour data collection.

What Can You Do About It?

In a word: nothing. This isn't an SEO-related change, where an on-page or link-profile tweak might change your SERP back to 10 results. This is an algorithmic volume knob Google can turn and we can't, right or wrong. My best advice is to spot-check the SERPs for your main keywords. Don't just rely on rank-tracking tools - they may tell you that you're in the #8-#10 spot, but they won't tell you whether your SERP cut off after #7. If you're sitting on a lot of #8 keywords, you may find yourself suddenly on Page 2. If that's the case, it could be worth the effort to get back up into the Top 7, especially if the cost of getting from #8 to #7 is relatively low. Of course, this is a recent development, and it's likely Google is testing the waters (and could make a course-correction). My best advice is to pay attention - as part of your regular reporting process, make sure you look at SERPs in the wild, and see what you're up against.

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Photo: A Sunday Stroll

Your Daily Snapshot for
Monday, August 20, 2012

Photo: A Sunday Stroll

President Barack Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, and daughters Malia, left, and Sasha walk through Lafayette Park from the White House to St. John's Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C., Aug. 19, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

Seth's Blog : The race to the bottom

The race to the bottom

Let's not race to the bottom.

We know that industrialists seek to squeeze every penny out of every market. We know that competitors want to drive their costs to zero so that they will be the obvious commodity choice. And we know that many that seek to unearth natural resources want all of it, fast and cheap and now.

We can eliminate rules protecting clean water or consumer safety. We can extort workers to show up and work harder for less, in order to underbid a competitor. We can take advantage of less sophisticated consumers and trick them into consuming items for short-term satisfaction and long-term pain. These might be painful outcomes, but they're an direct path to follow. We know how to do this.

In our connected world, commodity producers are under intense pressure. The price of anything that's made to a spec, or that responds to an RFP, is instantly known by all buyers. That means that there's an argument made by big corporations for each country to charge corporations the lowest possible tax rate, to loosen environmental regulations down to zero, and to eliminate employee protections. All so that a country's commodity producers can be the cheapest ones.

I know we can do that. There's always the opportunity to cut a corner, sacrifice lifestyle quality and suck it up as we race to grab a little more market share.

But the problem with the race to the bottom is that you might win.

You might make a few more bucks for now, but not for long and not with pride. Someone will always find a way to be cheaper or more brutal than you.

The race to the top makes more sense to me. The race to the top is focused on design and respect and dignity and guts and innovation and sustainability and yes, generosity when it might be easier to be selfish. It's also risky, filled with difficult technical and emotional hurdles, and requires patience and effort and insight. The race to the top is the long-term path with the desirable outcome.

Sign me up.

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duminică, 19 august 2012

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

ECB Considers Interest Rate Caps; Can Such a Scheme Possibly Work?

Posted: 19 Aug 2012 08:49 AM PDT

Economic Times reports European Central Bank mulls caps on borrowing costs

The European Central Bank is considering buying the bonds of crisis-wracked eurozone countries to ensure borrowing costs do not rise beyond a pre-determined level, German newsweekly Der Spiegel said Sunday.

The bank will define an upper limit for borrowing costs in countries such as Spain and Italy and intervene in the markets to ensure it is not breached, Spiegel said, without citing its sources.

At the end of trade on Friday, Spain was paying 6.39 per cent to borrow for 10 years and Italy 5.76 per cent. In contrast, Germany was paying 1.49 per cent, as investors trust Europe's top economy to repay them.

The so-called spread, or difference, between benchmark German bonds and the debt-wracked countries would be decisive for the proposed rate cap, Spiegel said.

ECB President Mario Draghi announced earlier in August that his institution "may" buy bonds of struggling countries if they first apply for EU bailout funds and accept tough conditions in return.

He said the details would be worked out before the next meeting of the ECB, scheduled for September 6. Spiegel said that ECB governors would decide then whether to implement the proposed borrowing cost cap.

Here is a link to a translated article in Der Spiegel: ECB is planning to challenge interest rate speculation

The European Central Bank (ECB) is considering to establish in its future bond purchases interest rate levels for each country. Thus, they would state papers of the crisis countries always buy when interest rates exceed a certain impact on their yields German Bunds. Sun investors would get a signal that interest rates, the ECB considers appropriate.

Because the Fed has unlimited funds - they can even print the money eventually - it would not succeed even more speculators to drive the returns of the targeted rate also. Thus, the ECB wants to keep not only the financial costs of ailing countries in check, but also to ensure that the general level of interest rates in the euro zone is not too much drifting apart.

At its next meeting in early September, the Governing Council will decide whether the interest rate target is actually installed. One thing is certain, that the ECB will continue to practice their bond purchases more transparent. In the future, they will announce each country, in which capacity she has taken the bonds from the market. This information should be released immediately after the purchases. So far, the ECB had only ever made known Monday how much money she spent on purchases in the previous week as a whole.

Can This Work?

It depends on the definition of "work". In general, if central planners (and it is important to understand that is what we are talking about here) set prices too high there will be unlimited supply.

Likewise, if central planners set prices too low, there will be shortages.

When it comes to money, recall that Switzerland capped the rate of the Swiss Franc vs. the euro. To defend that cap the Swiss National Bank has to offer unlimited money at the target exchange rate.

When it comes to interest rates, the ECB must be willing to buy an unlimited number of bonds (up to the total supply of all bonds).

Theory vs. Practice

So yes, the ECB can "in theory" defend a price target on bonds, but only at the risk of owning every bond.

What about an exit mechanism? How will the ECB get rid of all those bonds down the road? To who, at what price?

Will Germany go along with this ridiculous scheme? For how long?

As is always the case, interference in the free market by central planning fools always fails in the long run.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

luni, 20 august 2012

Damn Cool Pics

SERP Crowding & Shrinkage: It's Not Your Imagination

SERP Crowding & Shrinkage: It's Not Your Imagination

The Incredible Shrinking SERPs

“George Is Getting Upset!”

“No! Not Six! I Said Seven!”

What’s the Crowding Connection?

Why Was “Flux” Relatively Normal?

Photo: A Sunday Stroll

Seth's Blog : The race to the bottom

The race to the bottom

More Recent Articles

duminică, 19 august 2012

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

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luni, 20 august 2012

The Incredible Shrinking SERPs

“George Is Getting Upset!”

“No! Not Six! I Said Seven!”

What’s the Crowding Connection?

Why Was “Flux” Relatively Normal?

More Recent Articles

duminică, 19 august 2012

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