Have you heard of a service called "Autocomplete Engagement?"
-
One of our clients was approached by a company selling a service they're calling "autocomplete engagement," which they're claiming has the ability to manipulate the auto-suggest feature of Google. They are not selling content, or technical SEO, and claim that the average "SEO guy" cannot garner the results they can.
My questions are: a) has anyone heard of this tactic, and b) can it really be done? c) if it can be done, what can a company do to manipulate that information beyond a strong technical SEO and content strategy?
-
No worries and good idea to toss the question of concern out to the Moz community. In the future, if it's anything having to do with Google or any new "up and coming" solution or search criteria change, then check with Google first, then check the Blogs here at Moz or elsewhere because I'm sure content writers would LOVE to be the first to hit on a new idea for how to rank in Google.
Hopefully you can put your clients at ease
- Patrick
-
Thanks Patrick - I had tested it myself in Google and saw the same results you did. I assumed this was some crazy gimmick, but wanted to make sure I wasn't missing something that's "up-and-coming," you know? Plus, of course, the client was all pumped about being FIRST ON GOOGLE FOR EVERYTHING and I wanted definite answers to talk them off the ledge with
-
Rachel,
The gimmicks I've heard are countless. The clients feared into buying a product/service are countless. Yet, this is a new one I haven't heard about. I'll put it this way, if you are promoting a service which is "KILLER" and "WILL GET RESULTS" then you had better just show up for the service name in Google, at the very least, right? I wouldn't worry about this "company" and/or "service" and be upfront with your clients about how these types of solicitations will be frequent and annoying.
I'm sure you already did this, but I wanted to do it also and share with the community. First, begin typing in "Autocomplete Engagement" into Google. You can clearly see you have to type out the whole phrase and yet you don't get one single "Instant" result in the drop down menu. Unfortunately, I already entered and searched the whole phrase, so that's why you see it in my search history AND also this post in my screenshot. No results for their SUPERIOR SEO TRICK
Second, when you do search the entire phrase, you get nothing about any mention of an SEO service. Hell, this question is already ranked on 1st page for that term. Scratching my head. Show this to your clients and then let them know it's just another scare tactic to get them to spend some money... I mean waste money.
Hope this was a helpful response! - Patrick
-
"Autocomplete engagement" sounds like a terrible name for a reality TV show.
Haven't heard of it. Considering that it's Google's best guess as to what you're typing, and it's based on what other users have searched, I wouldn't say it's impossible. But the catch is you need to know exactly what your users are typing in. Let's say you sell dialysis equipment. You would need to know if your users are searching "dialysis machine", vs "how do dialysis machines work" (and those represent two very different searches). You then need to rank well for that term.
The only thing I can assume is they're going to somehow flood Google with clicks on a term. Done hundreds, or even thousands of times, I could see it working to some extent. But any successes would be transient (this is the reason why mechanisms like Panda, Penguin and Hummingbird exist in the first place). As such, I place little stock in it.
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
-
Opinion on Gotch SEO methods & services
I would love to get you all's take on Gotch SEO. I am gearing up to link build for a site in the next several months, and have been reading up from sources other than Moz, in preparation. (Need to re-read Moz's guide, too, but I have already read it last year) I'm reading Gotch SEO's main link building method articles right now, and am wondering what you all think. Do you think they have a good approach and are generally reliable? Likewise, has anyone used their service for getting a link? What was your experience? Or if you haven't used the service, any quick takes on it?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | scienceisrad0 -
Penguin: Is there a "safe threshold" for commercial links?
Hello everyone, Here I am with a question about Penguin. I am asking to all Penguin experts on these forums to help me understand if there is a "safe" threshold of unnatural links under which we can have peace of mind. I really have no idea about that, I am not an expert on Penguin nor an expert of unnatural back link profiles. I have a website with about 84% natural links and 16% affiliate/commercial links. Should I be concerned about possibly being penalized by an upcoming Penguin update? So far, I have never been hit by any previous Penguin released, but... just in case, you experts, do you know what's the "threshold" of unnatural links that shouldn't be exceeded? Or, in your experience, what's the classic threshold over which Google can penalize a website for unnatural back link profile? Thank you in advance to anyone helping me on this research!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | fablau0 -
Looking for service like one load
Hi,
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | corn2015
I used to utilize the One Load service and noticed that it no longer exists. Can you please make some recommendations on video marketing platforms that are similar?0 -
Subtle line of asking links for money/service/benefits
Hello here, I am putting down a link building strategy according to the latest "good practices" and Google recommendations, but I find myself often confused. For example, I'd like to implement the technique suggested by Rand on his article below: https://moz.com/blog/headsmacking-tip-1-link-requests-in-order-confirmation-emails But if you look at the comments, a user suggests to "ask for links in exchange of discounts", and everyone there applaud him for the idea (Rand included). But, wait a second... am I the only one realizing that now days Google discourage to ask for links for "money, services, or any other kind of 'offered' benefit"? So.. where to draw the line here? Here are other examples that I am not sure are "safe" in link building: 1. Ask for links in exchange of a free Membership on a site (where usually a Membership is sold for a price) 2. Ask for links in exchange of exposure (isn't this a sort of "link exchange"?) 3. Ask for link in exchange of "anything else you can think of", even if necessarily doesn't involve money (i.e. for a "certified site badge", for a free e-book, or anything else) I'd really like to know your thoughts on this very sensitive issue. Thank you in advance to anyone for helping me to understand.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | fablau1 -
Are links on a press page considered "reciprocal linking"?
Hi, We have a press page with a list of links to the articles that have mentioned us (most of which also have a link to our website). Is there any SEO impact with this approach? Does Google consider these reciprocal links? And if so, would making the links on the press page 'nofollow' solve the issue?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mikekeeper0 -
Website "A Record" in DNS - Geotargetting
Hi, Our online shop is hosted with a French IP address. It is available in English and Spanish. I have noticed, as to be expected, that we get quite a few french visitors, probably related to our IP address Google must think its geo related. We don't want to particularly target any specific country, but more so english and spanish speakers. Can you have various A records around the world to help with this? Any suggestions or things I could look into?? thanks
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | bjs20100 -
Is there any value in "starting from scratch" on a new domain?
Hi, Our ecommerce store - we have had some duplicate content issues and they have been corrected, but of course, Google takes time to pick up on these. Our link profile is very poor, so we wont lose a lot by going to a new domain in that sense. My question is, in what instances is it worthwhile starting under a new domain? And in which not? Presumably you can also 301 the whole site - when is it worth doing this or not? Thanks, Ben
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | bjs20100 -
Can a "Trusted Retailer" badge scheme affect us in the SERPs?
Hi Guys, In the last week our website saw a drop on some of our biggest and best converting keywords and we think it might be down to us rolling out a “Trusted Retailer” badge scheme. We sell our products directly to consumers via our website, but we also sell our products to other online resellers. We think badges are a good to show the consumer that we trust a site. On the 17th September we sent out badges to about 39 of our best retailers, two of whom have already put them on their sites. Instead of sending them a flat jpeg, we sent them HTML files containing code that pulled in the image from our servers. We wanted to host the image to make sure that we always had some leverage. So if a company stopped selling our products, or the quality of their site went down, we could just remove the badge. Whilst at it, we stuck a link in there pointing to an FAQ on our website all about trusted retailers and what people need to look out for. We chose the anchor text “(brand name) Trusted Retailer”, because that seemed to be the most relevant. The code looks like this: (our brand) Trusted Retailer You might notice that there is a div just before the link. This is there to stop the user from clicking on the top 65% of the badge (because this contains the shop name and ID number), and we also used a negative text-indent to move the anchor text out of the way. But right underneath this is our Logo, so it’s almost a hidden link, but you can still click it. So far the badge has been put in on two sites, one of which isn’t so great and maybe looks a tiny bit spammy. (They sell mostly through ebay as opposed to on their main site). Also, these sites seem to have put it on most of their pages! So my questions are; Is this seen as black or grey hat? Is it the fact we put in anchor text with our brand? Or is it the fact the url is transparent in the coding? Or is it the fact the sites are using sitewide links? In any case would Google react so quickly as to penalise us in two days? If this is the issue, do you think there’s anything we can do to stop getting penalised? (Other than having to e-mail 39 retailers back and getting them to take the badges down). Thoughts much appreciated – we do our SEO in-house and are still learning every day… Thank you James
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | OptiBacUK0