Would you instinctively mistrust a company that has the top 5 or more search listings?
-
I have seen a few "lucky"(?) companies dominate spots 1-5 of search results. When I see that, I generally go to #6, 7, or even 10 before clicking. My gut reaction is that the company with 1-5 has manipulated content just to pull me in - much like the guys on the streets of NYC or Vegas shoving handbills at you.
Is there any evidence/research/poll about the consumer/user reaction when this occurs?
-
Oh erm..me neither
cough
-
I tend to have serious trust issues in general.
However, I don't normally suspect any problems with sites that the top of the SERPs.
I might have trust issues in the SERPs if I was looking for something like "cheap airline tickets" or "escort services" but I am not looking for either of those.
-
I hope you're right Tom! I'd hate to have to go and start de-optimising
-
As an SEO professional? Yes, absolutely.
As a general searcher or consumer? Well, it's been a long time, but I think you could make a case in saying the opposite is true. "These guys have the top 5 results, they must be legit".
Might be a CS case on this, will see what I can find.
-
One of mine does that for a particular search term...I haven't manipulated anything just followed the best practises of SEO across each piece of content. If I had done any sort of dodgy manipulation, I would have been picked up by panda and penguin.
I hope they are not mistrusted because of it. If it were me experiencing it, I'd definitely remember them and probably look.
Let's face it, all SEO is manipulation of search results! Anybody who follows the best practises is hoping that their competitor is not and will therefore rank below them.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Search console new property not added!
hi, i have 25 properties already added in the console, since this afternoon , i am trying to add a new property (sites.google.com/mywebsite) , i have added a tracking code and i can see it in the source code, but console is saying we didnot find any tracking code.
Search Behavior | | alan-shultis0 -
Why are brand, company name queries not showing up on Google SERP1?
I'm a bit confused today at Google's SERPs for a number of queries I've done. The first one that sparked my interest is when I searched for 'pinterest' (no quotes) and pinterest.com was NOT on the first page. In fact, the first pinterest.com result was on page 3 and was the page for somebody named Bil Chamberlain, who himself must be more related to the search term pinterest than pinterest.com itself. I've done this for a variety of search terms, signed out of google, signed in, and some companies' home page, or website in general comes up, and some do not. search for facebook, facebook.com is #1 search for united airlines, united.com's "Club and Lounges" page is on SERP 5. Am I missing something in google's search result methodology? I'd love to be directed to some article or discussion related to this because the last time I checked, most brand name or company name queries turned out company or brand home pages as reesult #1. I very well may just be behind the times. CCpjw
Search Behavior | | Buildings0 -
How to target local searches?
How do I start to target a national audiences? I currently get most of my hits from The US and Australia? But I see no reason why I don't get vies in Canada and The UK.
Search Behavior | | Stefan-Thorpe0 -
How is this Dr. Getting a Ranking on a National Site in a Local Listing?
Please follow the link for a visual. Any help would be appreciated. The query I used was "phoenix plastic surgeons". I have never seen a large national site like PlasticSurgery.org Rank in local for a specific Dr. Thoughts? Thanks! 7O1oK
Search Behavior | | Red_Spot_Interactive0 -
Website coming up in omitted results for search term?
Hi, My website is coming up in omitted results for search term. Now I have heard before if this is the case then its mainly due to a duplicate content penalty. But the content I used is unique and produced by a copywriter so its good. Its a new site and was in the results for about 2 weeks, I changed the non www to www in webmaster tools 1 day ago and now its sitting in omitted results. In webmaster tools I had to add the domain twice one non www and one www. Both accounts I hooked up a sitemap. Is it just because the site is new and its just working out where to rank me? Just so you know the non www was indexed for the 2 weeks changed it in webmaster tools so I wanted the www one indexed and now gone into omitted results. Cheers
Search Behavior | | activitysuper0 -
"If a company has multiple practice areas, are there any advantages to having specialized local listings for each specific practice area?"
Hello Staff of SEOMoz! I just had a question regarding specialized local listings. Are there any advantages to having specialized local listings? (An example would be if we were a medical company, having a listing for family practice, one listing for women's health) If there are advantages, what are those advantages compared to having general medical listings? Thanks!
Search Behavior | | sixspokemedia0 -
.com Doman and off-shore host for an Australia company, does this hurt ratings?
We have a site based in Australia that has been using the .com domain. Recently the .com.au became available and we purchased it and use a 301 redirect. Does having a site hosted off-shore and a .com rather than .com.au for a company affect the ratings in google.com.au for Australian traffic?
Search Behavior | | oznappies0