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Late last year, we ran a poll asking Webmaster and SEOs if they think Google lies to them and now we have over 735 responses. I figured I share the results with you now.
Truth is, I am a bit surprised by the results. We have only 10% saying Google never lies to us. We have a whopping 57% saying Google does lie to us. We have only 33% saying Google sometimes lies to us.
I figured the number would be more like 60% sometimes, 20% yes and 20% no. But it was more like 60% thinks Google always lies to us and then add on that, 30% of sometimes and only 10% of us think Google is always telling the truth.
That can't be good for Google's webmaster communication efforts.
Here are the results:
Disclaimer: Please see my poll disclaimer post before coming to any conclusions on these results.
Forum discussion continued at WebmasterWorld.
Note: I am offline today and this post was pre-scheduled to be automatically posted. So if I am delayed in responding to issues or comments, I apologize in advance.
Comments:
LikeItIs
04/15/2014 01:09 pm
Interesting to know that 90% of your audience are paranoid egotists :D
studiumcirclus
04/15/2014 01:15 pm
Google is made up of many individuals. I think things like this come down more to inconsistency than outright lying. Any volume of minds won't always agree on one point, and you also get rogues within any organisation. I'm sure that any business has the capacity to lie, just like any individual within that business. Things aren't so black and white as this.
Ashish Ahuja
04/15/2014 01:23 pm
this tend to happen when organisational image become more important than the principals on which the organisation was founded
Durant Imboden
04/15/2014 02:22 pm
Coming soon: A poll that asks, "Do you think Google hates you?" :-)
F1 Steve
04/15/2014 03:55 pm
Did Durant make up the whole 10% who said google doesn't lie to us per chance?
James
04/15/2014 04:25 pm
Anyone who voted "yes" or "sometimes": please post an example here.
Douche-Inspector
04/15/2014 04:28 pm
Or....Do you think googles turds stink? Answers on a postcard to: 3rd Crapper on the Left, GooglePlex, USA.
Truthseeker
04/15/2014 04:40 pm
I didn't vote yes but 2013 q1 Matt Cutts said "If you go back to Google quarterly statements, they actually mentioned that Panda decreases our revenue…” Then you go look at that quarterly statement, says otherwise!
Mark Warner
04/15/2014 06:23 pm
There are interstate commerce implications of Google lying to webmasters through any official channel so it doesn't seem likely.
Jake
04/15/2014 09:24 pm
Is the 10% made up of Google Employees? lololol
Kristina Roy
04/16/2014 06:53 am
Barry, always try to spread rumor.
Player
04/16/2014 07:53 am
Well if your asking that you dont know SEO, get learning
somebody
04/16/2014 09:27 am
it mean what all that google updates is not for good, and it make google totally corrupt and not transparent organization. All their claims what they "working hard" to "improve search quality" is crap. They working only to destroy competition and only to increase amount of the money in their pockets. All other is lie.
bob
04/16/2014 09:28 am
anything him tell is or lie or only half of truth/lie. So it easy to recognize as lie.
yes
04/16/2014 09:30 am
It truth, google hates webmasters! They love only money.
Jitendra Vaswani
04/16/2014 09:41 am
She is pathetic, Barry block her. Her links are pretty much useless. Continuous spammer
Jitendra Vaswani
04/16/2014 09:42 am
Google sometimes lie I do agree on that :P
Organic iQ
04/16/2014 09:55 am
not entirely sure that 735 provides a resolute sample number. However, is there any other industry that we openly tap in what we want to spend our money on and then rely on the very same databases not to extract trend to spew back to our competition.
Patti Paz
04/16/2014 12:30 pm
Yet ANOTHER one of those spammy comments. Oh, WHEN will it end??? Number 2 post today.
Patti Paz
04/16/2014 12:31 pm
This is simply amazing. Of course Google lies to webmasters and anyone else and on any other occasion that will further their cause.
Vishal
04/16/2014 01:53 pm
Barry wont block her..as she looks hot :P
Barry Schwartz
04/17/2014 01:06 am
I was offline, removing her spam now.
Vishal
04/17/2014 07:30 am
Yet she continuous to comment on all the threads ...arghhhhh...
Mark Wilston
04/21/2014 12:47 pm
He is just doing his job. We should not go against. They are only hitting spammers for low quality links.
Gracious Store
04/28/2014 02:21 am
Google has a lot of work to do to restore the trust and confidence people have on him as the main provider of searches