Google's Gary Illyes admitted at a recent search marketing conference that Google needs very few links, acknowledging a growing body of evidence that publishers need to focus on other factors. Ta. Gary confirmed in a tweet that he did indeed say those words.
Ranking link background
It was discovered in the late 1990s that links are a good signal that search engines use to verify a website's credibility, and soon thereafter Google used anchor text to provide semantic information about the content of a web page. I discovered that it can be used to provide signals.
One of the most important research papers is Authoritative sources in a hyperlink environment Written by John M. Kleinberg, published circa 1998 (link to research paper at end of article). The main finding of this research paper was that there were so many web pages that there was no objective way to filter the quality of search results in order to rank his web pages based on a subjective idea of relevance. about it.
The authors of the research paper found that links can be used as an objective filter of authority.
Kleinberg writes:
“Providing an effective search strategy under these conditions requires a way to filter a small set of the most 'authoritative' or 'definitive' pages from a vast collection of related pages.” is. ”
This is the most influential research paper on links, as it initiated further research into how links can be used not as indicators of authority, but as subjective indicators of relevance.
Objectivity is based on facts. Subjectivity is more like an opinion. Google's founders discovered a way to use the internet's subjective opinions as an indicator of relevance for ranking in search results.
What Larry Page and Sergey Brin discovered and shared in their research paper (The Structure of Large-Scale Hypertext Web Search Engines – link at the end of this article) is to harness the power of anchor text to express subjective opinions. It was possible to decide. Relevance to real people. This was essentially crowdsourcing the opinions of millions of his websites expressed through the link structure between each web page.
What does Gary Illies say about the 2024 rink?
At a recent search conference in Bulgaria, Google's Gary Illyes commented on how Google doesn't actually need that many links, and how Google has made links less important.
Patrick Stocks tweeted this about what he heard at the search conference:
“Very few links are needed to rank a page…Over the years, we have made links less important.” @Method #serpconf2024″
Google's Gary Illyes tweeted confirming this statement.
“I shouldn't have said that…I never should have said that.”
Why links aren't that important
When Google first used links for ranking purposes, the initial state of anchor text wasn't spammy at all, which is why it was so useful. Hyperlinks were primarily used as a way to send traffic from one website to another.
But by 2004 or 2005, Google used statistical analysis to detect manipulated links, and then around 2004, “powered-by” links in website footers stopped passing an anchor text value, and in 2006 By 2013, links close to the word “advertisement” no longer passed link value. The passing of ranking values from directories was stopped, and by 2012 Google introduced a massive linking algorithm called Penguin, which destroyed the rankings of probably millions of his websites. Many of them used guest posting.
Eventually the link signal got so bad that Google decided to selectively use nofollow links for ranking purposes in 2019. Google's Gary Illyes confirmed that the change to nofollow was caused by link signaling.
Google explicitly acknowledges that links are less important
In 2023, Google's Gary Illyes said at PubCon in Austin that links aren't even in the top three ranking factors. Then, coinciding with the core algorithm update in March 2024, Google updated its spam policy documentation to downplay the importance of links for ranking purposes.
Google March 2024 Core Update: Four changes to link signals
The documentation previously said:
“Google uses links as an important factor in determining the relevance of a web page.”
The documentation update that mentioned the link has been updated to remove the word important.
Links are not listed as just another element.
“Google uses links as a factor in determining the relevance of a web page.”
In early April, Google's John Mueller advised that there are more useful SEO activities to engage in than links.
Muller explained:
“There are more important things on websites today, and if you focus too much on links, you often waste time on things that don't improve the website as a whole.”
Finally, Gary Illyes clarified and acknowledged that Google needs very few links to rank a web page.
I shouldn't have said that… I never should have said that.
— Gary Illyes/경리 Illyes (It's official so please believe it) (@methode) April 19, 2024
Why Google doesn't need links
The reason Google doesn't require as many links is likely due to the degree of AI and natural language understanding it uses in its algorithms. For Google to be able to say unequivocally that it doesn't need an algorithm, it must have great confidence in its own algorithm.
A long time ago, when Google implemented nofollow into its algorithm, there were many link builders who sold comment spam links and continued to lie that comment spam still worked. Now, as someone who started link building in the very early days of SEO (I was a link building forum moderator on his number one SEO forum at the time), links no longer play much of a role in rankings. I can say this with confidence. I started it a few years ago, so I stopped doing it five or six years ago.
read research papers
Trusted Sources in a Hyperlinked Environment – John M. Kleinberg (PDF)
Structure of a large hypertext web search engine
Featured image by Shutterstock/RYO Alexandre