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Recently, during a live chat Q&A, Googlers Matt Cutts and Maile Ohye, among others, faced the burning questions of webmasters around the world. Together, they put to rest some fears and myths, and confirmed some speculations. 
Below are the meatier results, with the straightest answers given first, followed by responses that were a bit on the ambiguous side, which we took the liberty of translating. Did you know there are about 200 factors that go into determining a site’s ranking in the search results? How about that Google made 450 tweaks to its algorithm last year?
Only one question during that session received conflicting answers from Googlers and wasn’t reconciled: Does the age of a website/domain affect its ranking?
Ohye answered this way: a site’s reputation can be a indicator to search engines, but of course, it’s not everything. Having a site for a long period of time can establish credibility with users, and as a search engine we also want to reflect this type of credibility. Of course, newer domains can also gain users and credibility. It seems like running a good site is a bit like running a reputable business. So yes, if your domain has been credible for years it can help. If you buy an old domain and put all your content on it in hopes of getting instant rankings, that’s not the best idea.
But, when the question was rephrased from another webmaster, Cutts answered: In the majority of cases, it actually doesn’t matter–we want to return the best information, not just the oldest information. Especially if you’re a mom/pop site, we try to find ways to rank your site even if your site is newer or doesn’t have many links. I think it is fair for Google to use that as a signal in some circumstances, and I try never to rule a signal out completely, but I wouldn’t obsess about it.
Official translation: Sometimes, when we say it does.
GOOGLE STRAIGHT TALK
Do 301 redirects carry over PageRank?
Where appropriate, ranking signals will be transferred across 301 redirects (if the same page has moved from one URL to another). This may take some time, so you should probably leave the redirect in place as long as you have control over the URL.
How many 301 redirects are acceptable?
It’s ok to chain a few together. The HTTP 1.0 standard allows for a maximum of 5 redirects for a URL, so keep it minimal.
Why do pages translated into different languages each have different rankings in their respective engines?
Google looks at content on a URL-by-URL basis, so even if you have translated top content from one language to another, Google might not treat it the same way as they would treat the original content. It’s also possible that the translated content is not as relevant as other original content in that language. Generally speaking, making sure that your content is as unique and compelling as possible for the users in that target market is the best thing to do.
Do backlinks from bad sites negatively affect my PageRank?
Those links might be positively affecting your PageRank (PageRank does not go down from "bad" links like those from adult sites). In general, you don’t have to worry about bad links like that which point to your site that aren’t under your control.
How often does your search algorithm change?
We change the algorithms all the time – last year we had over 450 changes.
Could sharing an IP address with a bad site get my site penalized?
The situations where it would matter are when the server is overloaded (can’t respond to your visitors) and when it’s incorrectly configured (not returning your site to your visitors). But otherwise that is no longer a concern.
Does Google have a problem with rank-checking software?
Rank-checking software is against Google’s Terms of Service and could result in blocking your IP address, and it doesn’t really help, especially when it comes to personalized or geotargeted results.
CIRCUITOUS ROUTES AND TRANSLATIONS
Question: Is there PageRank boost from .edu or .gov links?
Google’s Answer: You don’t get any PageRank boost from having an .edu link or .gov link automatically. If you get an .edu link and no one is linking to that .edu page, you’re not going to get any PageRank at all because that .edu page doesn’t have any PageRank.
Translation: If the .edu or .gov page is linked to, then yes, because that webpage now has some authority, just like with any (non-.gov or .edu) page.
Question: Does a page load time play a crucial role in Google Page Ranking? If yes how important is it?
Google’s Answer: I think the more important issue here is user experience. If your site loads fast, your users will be happy; if it loads slow, users will be less happy. Make your users happy, right?
Translation: Yes, and as important as 200 other factors.
Question: Aaron D’Souza of the Search Quality team was reported as stating that publishing the same content on two separate geotargeted paths under your domain will not trigger the dupe content filters. Is this correct?
Google’s Answer: In general, in a case like that, we’d try to pick the best page based on various factors, including geotargeting and language choices. If that page is one which is also available for other geotargeting/language choices, we will generally try to pick the version that our algorithms feel makes the most sense.
Translation: Yes, we think.
Question: I have reported sites that clearly have paid links (e.g. the backlink page says "Advertising" above the link), but Google does not seem to take action. Why would that be the case? These are .orgs who are clearly selling their .org juice.
Google’s Answer: While paid links and spam reports are being taken very seriously by Google, the results may not be seen immediately for users or even not at all. This does not mean no action is being taken on the offending sites. Also, the TLD of the sites should not be a factor being taken into account. For this reason reporting both, web spam and PageRank passing link selling makes sense and contributes in an important way to the quality of Google’s index.
Translation, partly based on .gov/.edu response: Google treats all top level domains the same, so a .org would have no more juice than a .com or .info. Further, clearly marked paid links (ones on pages labeled “Advertising”) are not necessarily violations of Google’s guidelines. If the links you reported were found to be nofollow links, then no action would be necessary. But keep trying to sabotage the competition. Business is war.
Question: Is it true that the fewer the links FROM your website, the more influence they have on the sites receiving those links?
Google’s Answer: PageRank is split up over the links from a page, but I would recommend not concentrating on this (as you won’t be able to "measure" and act upon it anyway) and instead making your site as usable as possible for your visitors.
Translation: Yes, the more you link the more the link juice passed on is diluted, but don’t go trying to figure out the formula in order to game the system. We’ll figure you out. We’re Google.
Question: Does getting a lot of comments in a blog help in being well indexed/ranked by Google?
Google’s answer: Having a lot of enthusiastic users commenting on your posts and doing so generating content on your site, certainly does not harm your rankings 
Furthermore, a large fan base gives the webmaster a bit of independence from search engine traffic, which is the reason why generating original and compelling content in order to nurture a group of committed users is something I would highly recommend to any blogger
Translation: Yes.
Question: Recently, you removed this suggestion: "Submit your site to relevant directories such as the Open Directory Project and Yahoo!" from your guidelines. Is there any chance that you will be discounting these kinds of links for ranking value in future?
Google’s Answer: There’s always the chance that we’ll discount directory links in the future. What we were seeing was quite a few novice people would see the "directory" recommendation and go out and just try to submit to a ton of directories, even if some of the directories were lower-quality or even fly-by-night directories that weren’t great for users. Right now we haven’t changed how we’re weighting directory links–we’ve only removed the directory suggestion from the webmaster guidelines.
Translation: Possibly.
Question: Until recentley (the last six months or so) a high ranking was achievable by submitting articles to article directories (providing they were 40%-60% unique), it no longer seems to be the case. Have links from article sites been de-valued at all?
Google’s Answer: In my experience, not every article directory site is high-quality. Sometimes you see a ton of articles copied all over the place, and it’s hard to even find original content on the site. The user experience for a lot of those article directory sites can be pretty bad too. So you’d see users landing on those sorts of pages have a bad experience. If you’re thinking of boosting your reputation and getting to be well-known, I might not start as the very first thing with an article directory. Sometimes it’s nice to get to be known a little better before jumping in and submitting a ton of articles as the first thing.
Translation: Yes.
Thank you for this great post. I thought some of these questions would never be answered by Google. Maybe this is a sign of Google’s "loosening the lips?" Can we expect more questions to be answered?
I understand the need to keep some information under wraps so we can’t "game" the system, but a few answers like these from time to time is nice.
Great report, Jason!
Exactly what I was thinking! Now hopefully they keep spillin the beans..
Great to see Google open up a little but !!
Regards,
Good information.
In a way it just confirms that Google is doing things pretyy reasonably. Moderation is good in SEO. Try to look at things from the perspective of the searcher, not from the perspective of the website owner.
Do things in a manner that will keep the searcher happy and you will fall in line with what Google is trying to accomplish. That will become more important as Google gets better at reaching thier goals.
It’s nice that they are starting to take the time to open up…still foggy…but at least it’s something to work with for a change!
Thanks Jason for sharing this!
-R
This seems a really great news article for us web masters.
I think many of us realised that directories had been devalued, and I suspect DMOZ and yahoo have to a lesser degree had their links out devlaued somewhat.
Also tells us something about what’s coming, so I’ll certainly be improving and limiting my own cholesterol directory, and hope other web masters will do the same with theirs.
Thank you
Well done post; I, like many others, have been paying close attention to various influencial bloggers in the MMO niche over the past year and it is interesting to compare their different observations to the responses from the big G that you have covered here. Some of the MMO people have definitely been on the money more than others this year.
This article is a gift. It has told me to always ask a question before I complete any optimization task. The question is "By completing this task, will I be honoring Google’s desire to offer up the best results based on a search query, or am I just trying like everyone else, to game the system?" I am going to assume Google is always at least 5 steps ahead of me in understanding the latest optimization trends and techniques and go with my gut instincts.
It is wonderful when we can get information straight from the horses mouth.
I am interested in learning more about article submissions. How do we know what article directories are ligit and which ones are not? What about Video Articles?
I am new at all of this and really want to get into Article marketing for my site. Did I miss the boat?
open to suggestions (c:
rafa
Hello Rafa. For the most part I’d say that you could probably trust most authors of SEO books recommendations as to which article submission sites make most sense. I’ve compiled a bunch of them from a few books I’ve studied and put the whole list on my home page on the right hand side column, along with more than 100 other links to various useful Search Engine Optimization and web design related tools etc. I can’t list them all here, but if you take a look (click on my signature “Florida SEO” and it will take you to my site) you’ll see not only the link for each good reliable article submission site, but the page rank of the site itself.
As much as I loved this interview I think the translations were truly what made this post lovable. My favorite was the last one with article marketing, "yes". I wasn’t too happy to hear about the death of article submission, as I obviously noticed diminishing returns from the practice but I still find it useful for traffic.
I am in a storm of Realty SEO…nice to have somthing for them to read that is very real!
Very interesting to know a bit inside about Google. I Google was very close and intransparent about their internal business. Although, I think this interview open just very little of them, but it’s a good start.
A good article. What I learned was:
Moderation in all things (except blog comments).
Deliver unique and useful content.
Avoid junk link directories and junk article directories. They can
Was indeed lloking for inforamtion like thsi and by going throught this piece of words content made mnay thing clear. Definitely theses updates on regualr basic will help us to followi teh SEO path and guidelines of Googel will boost to make everything free and fare.
We can’t pay for links, we should consider maybe not submitting to directories (including dir.Yahoo, DMOZ or second tier directories), blog posts are ok and "translated" site text doesn’t have to rank as well if it’s not as relevant in the "other" languages etc.
But it’s that last one that gets me most, because it happens even when English is the language. I have sites in America that can’t get close to ranking anywhere near their top competition here in America, yet when I check the referral logs I see that they consistently come up on page one in Google in Great Britain, Australia and New Zealand above these identical web sites when they show up in their Google search engine results abroad!
What I’m saying is that these are the identical sites I see ranked first here in America showing up in Google over there beneath my own sites. So where is the relevance?
One such site is for organic skin care products. Do the English, Australians and New Zealanders have more skin problems or a greater need for skin care products than Americans? Hardly! And if so – then why is it that the American competition is also showing up over there – but ranked lower? Skin care is skin care!
I can make all kinds of guesses about alternative ranking algorythms here as opposed to overseas, about human beings working here at Google USA manually interfering, or that the sheer number of back-links counts only in America (over the actual content of the site) but not overseas,. In any case, they’re all English speaking countries using Google as their search engine and their databases, since they show the same results, are the same databases as ours – only apparently they aren’t being filtered using the same algorythms or human imposed rules.
I’d love for someone to ask Google to answer why that is. I’m sure their answer would be very interesting to quite a few people.
but the comments had me rolling…thanks!
Make a website people like and google will rank you well.
With Google making so many changes so frequently the days of ranking exploitations are dead.
You’re better off focusing your time and money on making a great website.
Great article !
Good to see Google is emphasizing the user’s experience. I see too many sites trying to "game" the system and usability goes down. Creating good original content and maintaining site usability are still the core of the matter.
Thanks for the clarifications.
I don’t think Search Engine Optimization is so much "gaming the system" as it is simply looking at the competition to see what they have done right, and then doing as much or more of the same and better if possible.
Surfing the web means the freedom to surf where you want, and when building a site and optimizing it, we want to be part of the party where the most people are, and as the old saying goes in business it’s all about “location, location, location, and in either case – for the surfer or the business, that happens to be Google’s first page.
To make an analogy, compare actual physical land-locked businesses and surfers at popular beaches to online businesses and web surfers constantly arriving on the first page of Google. In either case we all know that in business the phrase is "Location, location, location". So Google rules are to web based businesses and surfers what the Government laws and regulations are to business owners who have set up shop near the highly profitable tourist filled surf area beaches. There are rules that you have to comply with or they shut you down.
In Google it can happen in the blink of an eye.
All the surfers dry off and head to their favorite restaurant and bar – only to find out that it’s not there anymore (it was there last night) but has been replaced by a not for profit library filled with encyclopedias about sea-food and beer, and the once popular restaurant now finds itself lost somewhere in the Adirondacks along with all the restaurant staff who still have families to support – and all because Google didn’t tell them that they were changing the rule about leaving full color flyers (links) at the county Tourism Information Bureau Office (online directories or whatever) when for the past four years it was perfectly fine to leave them there.
So search engine optimization isn’t gaming the system so much as it is keeping or improving your position by knowing and observing the rules.
To make another analogy, knowing what the rules are and observing them so as not to be penalized is the same as keeping up with changes in the law to avoid punishment because, as the courts love to say: “ignorance of the law is no excuse”.
If the law permitting right turns on red were changed, and you no longer turned right on red to avoid getting a traffic ticket nobody would call it “gaming the system”. People would call that “obeying the law”, “being smart”, and “driving responsibly”.
Thanks for the great article! Here are my comments:
Well that proves it .edu and .gov sites are no better than any other link, unless of course the site linking has more backlinks to it (thus more pagerank). I know that one has been a heated discussion in the past.
Your translation of the question "I have reported sites that clearly have paid links…" s totally off. They were not saying that the sites you reported "are not necessarily violations of Google’s guidelines" rather they we saying that Google does not take direct action on each reported website instead they analysis what the issue is and come up with an algo that will detect this issue and handle it a proportionate. So your reports help their developers make the algos for the spam your reporting on.
And WOW, so Google did not change the link value of directories. The why was everyone crying about directory links being de-valued?
On the links from article sites, he did not mention that they were all de-valued. I believe there are only specific article sites that have been de-valued where as other ones remain valued because they do have quality content like ezinearticles.com for example.
A man wanted to get into his work building, but he had forgotten his PIN
Code. However he did remember five clues.
These are what those clues were:
1). The fifth number plus the third number equals to 14.
2). The fourth number is one more than the second number.
3). The first number is one less than twice the second number.
4). The second number plus the third number equals to 10.
5). The sum of ALL five numbers is 30.
Dude, you up and brought math into my thread. You don’t know me very well. All posts are official no-math zones. My brain is tired just from reading that.
I would like to know the answer though…just too lazy to care.
Clue: First number must be odd since it is one less than a double.
Answer: seven-four-six-five-eight
74658
The biggest take away I think I recieved is to STOP submitting articles to ezinearticles.com and articlemarketer.com.
Jason – Should I stop submitting articles?
You know, I can’t say about those sites specifically. I think Google probably takes it on a case-by-case basis and you probably should too. If you’re getting benefit from it why stop? I think the emphasis was on low quality article directories and, apparently, syndication across multiple directories…the user-experience doesn’t seem great on those types of things, but I’m just one user. The only thing I can say, from a writer’s perspective, it’s usually not just THAT you are published, but WHERE you are published and how many people are able to access what you write…some write for the purity and love the obscurity and others actually want to be heard…for most it’s the latter. So the question is likely, are you being heard? If so, don’t fix it if it ain’t broke.
Love the article and agree with many thats its nice to see google opening up more and sharing its tweeks! It has told me to always ask a question before I complete any optimization task. The question is "By completing this task, will I be honoring Google’s desire to offer up the best results based on a search query, or am I just trying like everyone else, to game the system?" I am going to assume Google is always at least 5 steps ahead of me in understanding the latest optimization trends and techniques and go with my gut instincts. Will keep checking back to find out more information, thanx Google! – Sue
Hi!
we are having computer with internet connection and we are searching for a true home based add placing job for one year ago But still now we diid not get a true home based work.if it’s possible means, kindly search and tell me the write website to earn money in home.
Regards,
S.Samuel
Great article – what it really means is everything needs more time and effort but try telling clients that they need to spend more!
How do you edit on this blog when you’ve made a typo?
It would be great to get feedback like this every month – or at least every quarter!
I am surprised they are devaluing the articles like that. Many SEO sites push the article submission as a great way to get links – which it can be if done right. I suppose you need to publish on your own site first and let google find the content so you become the authority before submitting to any article publication sites.
Thanks for publishing this info!
Nice post. Have you seen the latest from Google — they have created a 22 page search engine optimization guide. I find it amazingly shocking that they are catering to the SEO community in such a manner and sharing as much information as they are. The SEO guide is definitely well deserved and can help anyone focus on building the perfect (authority) website. However, I wonder the motive behind Google revealing this information, even though it’s pretty common knowledge amongst ethical WhtieHat SEO, but it definitely raised my eyebrows because Google has until recently been tight lipped about any SEO tactics — aside from the Webmaster Guidelines and notably, Matt Cutts blog.
Google seems to really be focusing on user experience – data which they are probably getting from Google Analytics. Seems safe to say that a variety of traffic sources, a high page view count and time on the site, and a low bounce rate would be among the most important factors.
I just thought of something. When you mentioned Google Analytics, Google Ad Sense came to mind. Lots of bloggers are using Ad Sense in their blogs to make money, and I’m wondering if blogs count as the highest percentage of Ad Sense carrying sites. If so, then an innocent tweak by Google to their own algorythms that happens to make more potential revenue making Blog sites come up first on Google would accidentally make Google a whole lot more money.
Thank you for making this information available and sharing with the Internet community.
This is great information to know. The bottom line is never a straight one in the online game, is it?