Last night, Google's Sean O'Keefe shared some data on the Think With Google blog about how their SEO strategy leads to good results for the 7,000+ websites they manage. But then Google's search team had to come out and clarify that Google's SEO team doesn't get any preferential treatment because they work at Google.
In short, Google said their success came from doing three things:
(1) Making small changes that have big impacts.
(2) Not being afraid to make changes to their sites.
(3) Consolidating content and sites to focus better.
I wrote these up in detail at Search Engine Land.
After this came out, both Danny Sullivan and John Mueller from Google had to clarify that Google doesn't give their internal SEO teams any preferential treatment.
Danny said on Twitter "they do it just like any other SEO, reading external guidelines and advice. They have no special access to or insight from the Google search team." John Mueller said on Twitter, "I suspect Google in-house SEOs have a harder time getting answers than random people on Twitter, given our strong push to avoid giving preferential advice." "The separation covers it all, is on purpose & harder than it might seem :). Our SEOs use the same sources for information as all of you do," he added.
Google's SEOs share about doing SEO for Google. And they do it just like any other SEO, reading external guidelines and advice. They have no special access to or insight from the Google search team. Nice to see their post out there. https://t.co/04icZqEVjN
— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) January 10, 2019
I suspect Google in-house SEOs have a harder time getting answers than random people on Twitter, given our strong push to avoid giving preferential advice. Sorry, not sorry, Sean. :-)
— 🍌 John 🍌 (@JohnMu) January 10, 2019
The separation covers it all, is on purpose & harder than it might seem :). Our SEOs use the same sources for information as all of you do.
— 🍌 John 🍌 (@JohnMu) January 10, 2019
Forum discussion at Twitter.
