| Language, synonyms and the Google algorithm (and how it affects your SEO) | |
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The question how Google exactly handles language is at the heart of much of what goes on in optimization and form an SEO point of view it is of vital importance to your efforts to successfully optimize your website. Needless to say the task of handling language correctly, something humans do instinctively, is enormously complex for computer systems and it is found at the heart of Artificial Intelligence (AI) science itself. The issue is made clearer when we look at synonyms. While a five-year-old can understand that the words ‘picture’ and ‘photograph’ are the same a computer looking at them is, usually, completely stumped. Synonyms have the ability to combine practical knowledge, common use and usage rules, cultural context, nuances plus language used inappropriately but practically and as a result represent a challenge which has not yet been completely solved. It has, however, been tackled and solutions have been produced. If we take, for example, the search query ‘how to optimize my website for the first page of Google’ we will see that although the words ‘optimize’ are not part of a blog post I put up over a year ago titled I want to get my website to the first page of Google the search has got it on Google’s first page.  As the picture below shows it also has bolded the words ‘my website’ and ‘first page of Google’ present on the title which suggests that the Google algorithm is sensitive enough to understand that the search term ‘how to optimize my website for the first page of Google’ is about getting your website to Google’s first page and the words ‘optimize’ and ‘getting’ are, in this case, contextual synonyms and therefore mean the same thing.  While this is cool from a purely theoretical point of view it has the practical bias that the moment you understand this you also realize just how to work smart so that the work you do adds constant weight to your site in terms of thematic linking and keywords and search terms without running into the trap of repeating yourself all the time which may bore your online visitors and make them leave your site and might get you penalized for keyword stuffing. The fact that the Google algorithm is capable of such sensitivity is entirely down to complex programming which takes into account in the milliseconds before the search term results are served, contextual occurrences, language-related synonyms, the content of your website, the incidence of similar search terms in similar combinations elsewhere and the keywords present in your entire website. It the serves up what it thinks works and, as this case proves, it generally gets it right. This allows you the freedom to play with synonyms in your website content and take into account the expanded search capabilities presented by such sensitivity to language displayed by search engines to make sure your website is found on Google’s first page for far more search terms than any of your competitors.
David Amerland is the author of the Search Engine Optimization book: SEO Help: 20 steps to get your website to Google's #1 page published by New Line Publishing and available to buy from Amazon.com and any quality bookshop. The ebook version of the book is available for Amazon Kindle as well as Mobipocket, smartphone and Sony eBook Reader formats and available to purchase from any quality ebook retailer. You can also purchase it directly from this website. He masterminds winning SEO strategies for complex online business and helps the average webmaster get their site to the position it deserves. David has been instrumental in taking websites to the top of Google's first page in a way that has kept them there year after year. If you would like David to work on one of your SEO projects drop us a line with your request.
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