Do CTR manipulation services actually work to improve rankings?
-
I've seen a variety of services on the fringe of the SEO world that send a flow of (fake) traffic to your website via Google, to drive up your SERP CTR and site engagement. Seems gray hat, but I'm curious as to whether it actually works.
The latest data I've seen from trustworthy sources (example and example 2) seems mixed on whether CTR has a direct impact on search rankings. Google claims it doesn't. I think it's possible it directly impacts rankings, or its possible Google is using some other metric to reward high engagement pages and CTR correlates with that.
Any insight on whether CTR manipulation services actually work?
-
No problem, hope it helps!
-
I can't figure out if they are really that ignorant of the rules or if they are just lying.
Probably both! And, they say anything that makes the best story to gain a client, hold a client or make themselves look innocent when things go wrong.
-
Also Googlers a) have to fight pretty much only with algorithms and b) have to minimize collateral damage. That gives black hatters an advantage, and makes it impossible for Google to completely win. What annoys me is the fact that almost every single SEO company claims to be 100% white hat and Google-approved, while many are buying links, doing link networks, etc. I can't figure out if they are really that ignorant of the rules or if they are just lying.
-
**We have competitors who are using very shady SEO tactics and winning with them. **
I think that it is more Google being slow to identify problems and conservative about what they penalize. When SEOs go into the manuipulative zone they are taking their chances that Google will not find them or penalize them. SEOs who do this often do not fully inform the client that risks are being taken and that they could be slapped with a penalty that will permanently ban them from google, or in the case of Penguin, have their site demoted in the SERPs for nearly two years.
-
Good info, thanks!
-
I've definitely heard of this working with people using crowd-sourcing websites (such as Crowdflower) to pay next to nothing for thousands of people to Google a keyword and click on a specified listing.
Whilst the effects of CTR manipulation are pretty instant and it definitely works, it's often short lived and Google is quick to pick this up as an anomaly, rather than data of statistical significance.
In short, it works and it works pretty quickly but if you can't sustain the CTR metrics, you're going to fall back down the rankings.
-
I think you over-estimate how smart Googlers are and how dumb shady SEOs are. I've seen blatant tricks that have been working for years. I don't use such tricks because they are very risky, but I don't think we should dismiss them as useless - I think it's worth understanding which work and which don't, especially if our competitors are using them. We have competitors who are using very shady SEO tactics and winning with them. Understanding what they are doing and what is working helps us determine which white hat tactics to deploy against them. That's why I'm asking for data on CTR manipulation.
-
Google is really smart about manipulation. They have teams of PhD engineers looking out for it and racks of servers watching for it. These guys are so into it that they don't go home at night. And, the guys who offer these clicking services are not very smart. If they were smart they would be making big bucks in cushy jobs like Google Engineer and riding hoverboards around their offices. The intersection between really smart people and really dumb people isn't a good place to get involved.
-
Yeh, I think this is a good topic to be aware of, even if we wouldn't use it. That way we can respond correctly if our competitors use it, figure out white-hat ways to combat it, have a better understanding of Google's algorithms, etc. All else failing, it wouldn't be expensive to test them out.
-
I generally agree with you that Google is getting better at detecting tricks, but Google is far from perfect and there are a lot of tricks that still work. I'm looking for specific results/data specifically on the CTR manipulation services...
Have you done any tests with CTR manipulation services work?
This is not a tactic white hat SEOs would use, but it's still good for us to know whether it works, so we can respond correctly if our competitors use it, to figure out white hat ways to combat it, to answer client questions, to have a better understanding of Google's algorithms, etc.
-
Generally speaking, these types of schemes don't work, as Google is quite aware of people trying to do this. With the latest Google algorithm updates in the past few years, we've seen it become tougher and tougher for black hat SEO or gray hat SEO to be successful by trying to manipulate clicks, etc. and faking traffic.
We are aware of other techniques that have been manipulating Google suggest, though, and while that doesn't specifically influence rankings, it can lead to people searching for keywords that they wouldn't normally search for.
-
Hi there
No idea if it works or doesn't, but I'd be interested in hearing about it from a curiosity standpoint. My thought is if someone has thought to make a service / try it, Google is five steps ahead in preventing it from working in their algorithm. But yeah, would love to hear thoughts if someone has used it as well!
Thanks for starting what could be a really interesting discussion dude!
P
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How to Improve DA and PA of my Blog?
Greetings, Please help me how i can improve DA and PA of my new blog. I am new in this field.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Umer36700 -
Content change and variations in ranking
Hello, I have create a new webpage and asked google in the webmaster tool to crawl it. Within minutes it is ranked at a certain spot. I did make changes to it to increase the ranking and right away I could see variations in ranking either up or down ? I have done the same same thing for a page that has been existing on my website for many years. I changed the content, asked the webmaster tool to re-crawl it. It got the new content within minutes but the ranking doesn't seem to change. Maybe my content isn't good enough but I doubt. Could it be that on old pages it takes a couple weeks to see ranking changes whereas on new page it is instantaneous. Has anyone experienced something similar ? Thank you,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoanalytics1 -
Google Rank 0 - Best way?
We are trying to create tables or bullet points on each of our pages summarising the content of the page and get it to rank on position 0 on Google. This technique worked for some searches but not all so we were wondering: Is it beneficial to add links or not ? Is there a keyword limit? We are on Magento 2 if that helps. Thanks James
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JamesDavison0 -
Ranking fluctuation
Has anybody got any ideas? I have a website that ranks quite well for an industry keyword, the site has a reasonable amount of authority. But the term is fluctuating between position 3 and position 9! It is on a beefy stable server. It is reasonably well optimised from both SEO and speed point of view. It is tracked using Moz RankTracker. I do realise that rankings fluctuate, but this is ridiculous!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoman101 -
Duplicate content. Competing for rank.
Scenario: An automotive dealer lists cars for sale on their website. The descriptions are very good and in depth at 1,200 words per car. However chunks of the copy are copied from car review websites and weaved into their original copy. Q1: This is flagged in copyscape - how much of an issue is this for Google? Q2: The same stock with the same copy is fed into a popular car listing website - the dealer's website and the classifieds website often rank in the top two positions (sometimes the dealer on top other times the classifieds site). Is this a good or a bad thing? Are you risking being seen as duplicating/scraping content? Thank you.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Bee1590 -
Help! The website ranks fine but one of my web pages simply won't rank on Google!!!
One of our web pages will not rank on Google. The website as a whole ranks fine except just one section...We have tested and it looks fine...Google can crawl the page no problem. There are no spurious redirects in place. The content is fine. There is no duplicate page content issue. The page has a dozen product images (photos) but the load time of the page is absolutely fine. We have the submitted the page via webmaster and its fine. It gets listed but then a few hours later disappears!!! The site has not been penalised as we get good rankings with other pages. Can anyone help? Know about this problem?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CayenneRed890 -
Local Results For Additional Service Categories
Hi Mozzers, My client is prominent in local search for their primary activity, but I would also like them to appear for other service categories they offer. Assuming I add these other service categories in +Local and build corresponding service pages on the site, will this be enough to cause them to appear for these other services? The additional pre set service categories offered in +Local don't match those offered in local citations, so I can't really support these that way.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | waynekolenchuk0 -
Rankings Issue
Hey guys, and gals, So our site http://www.motorcyclecenter.com/ is having the hardest time ranking in the big G. We've built links, optimized, and all the other basics. If you guys have a chance, could you take a glance, and tell us what you think, as to why this site is having such a hard time. Much appreciated!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | leatherupseo0