Without knowing what “RankBrain” means, someone new to SEO might think it refers to the technique Google uses to rank search results.
This assumption isn’t far off, but not every component of Google’s search algorithm is itself a ranking factor.
In this article, we investigate claims about RankBrain as a ranking factor and shed light on what RankBrain is and how to use it in search results.
Disclaimer: RankBrain is a ranking factor
RankBrain is a technology that is said to affect how Google returns search results.
RankBrain is often referred to as a ranking factor due to its relevance to search.
If you’re new to SEO, you may have heard and started to think that RankBrain is another signal that you must optimize.
But that’s not at all how it works.
The next section describes what RankBrain is designed for, and when Google asks it to help answer queries.
Evidence: Is RankBrain a ranking factor?
RankBrain is an artificial intelligence (AI) system launched in 2015 to help Google return results for queries it has never searched before.
That changed between spring 2015 and 2016, when an unannounced update to RankBrain was made to integrate AI into all queries.
This information was disclosed in a Wired article, which states that Google doesn’t know how RankBrain improves all queries, but it does Do affect ranking.
from wired:
“Google has a characteristic ambiguity about the specific ways in which search can be improved (related to the long tail? Better explain ambiguous requests?) but [Google engineer Jeff Dean] Indicates that RankBrain “participates in every query”, and affects actual ranking “probably not in every query, but in many queries”.
What sets RankBrain apart from other Google algorithms is its ability to learn how to answer more ambiguous queries.
as Google’s Gary Illyes explainswhich is achieved by making an educated guess about what a user might click to make a never-before-seen query.
“RankBrain is a PR-sexy machine learning ranking component that uses historical search data to predict what users are most likely to click on for previously unseen queries.”
RankBrain allows Google to solve problems it has had with traditional algorithms in the past.
Contrary to popular theories about how RankBrain works, it does not use data collected from users’ interactions with web pages.
RankBrain relies more on data collected from user interactions with search results.
Illyes provides further instructions:
“It’s a really cool piece of engineering, whenever traditional algorithms are like ‘oh, look at the ‘not’ in the query string! Let’s ignore it! “, but it usually just relies (sometimes) on data from (sometimes) months ago about what happened to the results page itself, not the landing page.
In short – RankBrain is a machine learning system that allows Google’s search algorithm to deliver more relevant results.
This is believed to be achieved by better understanding ambiguous queries and long tail keywords.
RankBrain uses data collected from user interactions with search results to predict which pages are likely to be clicked on for entirely new search queries.
RankBrain as a ranking factor: our verdict
Google has confirmed that RankBrain is used to rank search results and participate in all queries.
In 2016, Andrey Lipattsev, Senior Strategist for Search Quality at Google, Say RankBrain is one of the three most important ranking signals (with content and Link).
RankBrain continues to play a major role in search results today.
RankBrain differs from traditional ranking factors in that there is no obvious way to actively optimize them.
How do you optimize for ambiguous keywords or queries that you’ve never entered into Google before?
The only option is to give Google as much information about the page as possible, which should be done anyway if the site owner is creating the overall content for the user.
Illyes was once asked this question Reply There are similar emotions:
“You optimize content for users, which in turn optimizes content for RankBrain. That hasn’t changed.”
Search Engine Journal VIP Contributor Dave Davies offers more advanced techniques for communicating information to Google about different entities on a page The Complete Guide to the Google RankBrain Algorithm.
Featured image: Robin Biong/Search Engine Magazine
