Earlier this week, Bing Webmaster Guidelines were updated. Bing is a drop in the search engine ocean dominated by Google. Despite seeming unimportant then, insights abound…
Most of the new guidelines Google has also mentioned, with the big exception of user engagement. Bing states that how users interact with their search results, like clickthrough rate (CTR) and how long they stayed on a result, are ranking factors.
Google has officially been secretive here.
Nonetheless, Udi Manber, ex-head of Google search quality, testified to the FTC that click data affects rankings.
Gary Illyes, Google’s Webmaster Trends Analyst, eluded to #UX as a ranking factor in a Reddit AMA.
Thought leaders within SEO like Rand Fishkin long suspected this; Rand conducted a test with his Twitter following to seemingly prove CTR matters.
So implied is that Google uses a similar algorithm as Bing. If you want to improve your Google rankings then, study the Bing Webmaster Guidelines!