Index of The Chapter
- Unit 1: Search Algorithms
- Topic 1: Google’s Algorithms – From PageRank to BERT & beyond
- Topic 2: Bing, Yahoo, & Other Search Engines’ Algorithms
- Unit 2: Crawling & Indexing
- Topic 1: Role of Bots in Crawling & Indexing
- Topic 2: XML Sitemaps & Robots.txt
- Topic 3: Factors Affecting Crawling & Indexing
After completing this chapter, you will be able to:
- Explain how search engines work & how they rank web pages.
- Identify the key factors that influence search engine algorithms & their updates.
- Compare & contrast the algorithms of different search engines such as Google, Bing, & Yahoo.
- Understand the role of bots in crawling & indexing web pages.
- Implement best practices for creating & submitting XML sitemaps & robots.txt files.
- Troubleshoot common issues that affect crawling & indexing.
Overview of the chapter
Ah, “Understanding Search Engines,” the bedrock upon which the towering edifice of SEO is built. You can’t master the art of SEO without first understanding the canvas you’re painting on, and that canvas, my friends, is the search engine.
What are Search Engines?
A search engine is a web-based tool that allows users to find information on the internet. They use algorithms to gather data from billions of pages & provide the most relevant results to a user’s query.1 The information they retrieve is ranked based on relevance & quality.
Some of the most popular search engines include Google, Bing, Yahoo, & Baidu.
How Do Search Engines Work?
Search engines operate in three fundamental steps: crawling, indexing, & ranking.
Crawling
Crawling is the process where search engines send out a team of robots (known as spiders or crawlers) to find new & updated content on the web.
The content can vary from a webpage, an image, a video, to a PDF, & more. The spiders start by fetching a few web pages & then they follow the links on those pages to new URLs.
By hopping along this path of links, the crawler is able to find new content & add it to their index, which is like a giant catalog of URLs.2
Indexing
Once a spider has crawled a webpage, the search engine processes & catalogs the content into a massive index.
This index includes a copy of every webpage the search engine has found during its crawling process.
Whenever a webpage is indexed, it’s available for retrieval when a user makes a relevant search query.2
Ranking
When a user types a query into a search engine, the engine’s algorithms sift through the index to provide the most relevant & useful web pages. This is known as ranking.
The search engine uses complex algorithms, which take into account various factors like the keywords in the search query, the relevance & quality of pages, the location & settings of the user, & the credibility of websites, to deliver the most suitable results.3
The Importance of Algorithms in Search Engines
Algorithms are sets of rules that search engines use to deliver the best results for a given search query4. These algorithms consider various ranking signals to sift through indexed information & find what a user is looking for.
Google’s algorithm, for instance, has evolved significantly over the years, with updates like Panda, Penguin, Hummingbird, RankBrain, & BERT, each refining how Google understands & ranks content.
Search engines continually refine their algorithms to improve the quality of search results.
For instance, earlier versions of Google’s algorithm used factors like keyword density & backlinks as primary ranking signals. However, recent updates place more emphasis on the relevance & context of content, the user’s search intent, & the overall user experience on a webpage.
The Impact of Search Engines on Digital Presence
The pervasive use of search engines in the modern digital landscape underlines the importance of understanding how they work.
A better understanding can help individuals & businesses optimize their online content to align with these systems’ functioning, ensuring visibility & accessibility to their intended audiences.
This understanding forms the foundation of search engine optimization (SEO), a crucial component of any digital marketing strategy.
