Google Analytics For Ranking Purposes
Some time ago (2007), Google bought a enterprise level piece of software from Urchin. That piece of software is now known as Google Analytics (GA).
Now why would Google give this once expensive software away for free?
Sure, they care about webmasters and want to give them the tools they need to improve their websites (in their overall goal of making the Internet a better place)..
More importantly though, it is because Google actually wants the data for themselves! You know, so they can use it for ranking purposes – to determine where your website should rank in relation to your competitors that come up for the same keywords.
Think about it for a minute..
Google can see your website, and they can see how many people click on your site from their search engine results page (SERPs).
So say you do medical training in Ontario, Canada … someone does a Google search for “healthcare training”… you come up #9 on the first page – and your best competitor comes up #1.
If that person does NOT click on your competitors website, and instead clicks on YOUR website.. then Google can see (track) that, and they might turn around and move you up in the rankings.
But say that person DOES click on BOTH your competitor AND your website.. but assume YOUR website is much easier to use than your competitors, and so the user leaves the other website in 5 seconds and comes to yours and buys something…
Before 2005, Google could NOT see that the user left your competitor to come buy something from you.. BUT NOW!…
If you have Google Analytics installed on your site, they can track all of that data… everything from the users screen resolution, where they are geographically, which of your pages they viewed, how long they stayed on the site, what browser they used, and so on… SO MUCH DATA!
And what is Google going to do with all this data? – My theory is turn around and use it for ranking purposes.
Another factor that could go into where a website ranks is whether or not the website has Google Ads on it. Think about it, Google makes 90+% of their money from Internet Ads..
So if there is a career college in Toronto, Ontario that does NOT run Google ads (but they have the best time on page, goal completion rate, etc..) VERSES a website that reviews the health care training programs in Canada that has Google Ads on it, which one would you think Google would want to send more traffic to?
I’m not saying I KNOW Google’s algorithm, but I do know that decisions are made better with data… so Google buying Urchins website analytics software and releasing it to the world for free was a strategic move to collect more data from the web — just so they can turn around and use it for ranking purposes (to determine where to rank websites in relation to one another).
Do you agree?