There is a PBS documentary about this very thing and how it got started. Very cool and worth the watch. Needless to say, the researcher had quite a few hurdles to overcome.
> As someone who has spent years manipulating ranking I can tell you this has nothing to do with effecting ranking and is most likely about optics/human readability increasing CTR.
I do not agree. For example, CTR can be increased by modifying the design/text of a button. Or modifying the placement of the button, etc. CTR will not increase or decreased based on the structure of the URL. Hence the word CLICK in "CTR". Most of the time if the URL is listed somewhere, its truncated. Mobile phones trim it down to the domain name.
Plus it's just bad practice and will run into problems eventually. What happens when you have similar titles? Does this increase CTR or increase mistakes?
I still think its a shady practice and can't think of a single reputable major publication that would utilize that structure for Editorial. They should be penalized for a blatant attempt at manipulation. There is no other logical reason for it.
The verge: /features/23931789/seo-search-engine-optimization-experts-google-results.
> If you have data that shows urls like "/id/date/title-of-post" rank worse than "rootdomain/title-of-post" (which is nearly impossible to accurately measure due to the nature of how things are _really_ ranked) I'd argue that the rankings are related to the CTR rather than the URL structure.
Of course I don't have the data, but one has to assume they are doing it for one simple reason. Manipulation in search. It's not for a better user experience. How often are you typing in URLs manually?
> No judgement, but this seems like an odd stance to me. You seem to feel there is some sort of established standard in the structure of website pages/hierarchy, particularly one that should have punishments enforced against those who don't abide... Thankfully there is not, if there were then there would have to be some sort of agreement on these things - who is going to make those decisions? Who are those decisions going to be optimal for?
Generally speaking, yes URL taxonomy has best practices. I don't believe someone is going to create an about us page with /id/date/about-us and thinks that is a good idea, but anything is possible.
I think Danny should avoid future interviews with the Verge. heh. But seriously, I just don't like how the tone of the interview came across. Does anyone see Danny yelling in these conversations to warrant the use of the exclamation mark? If anything this makes the Verge look bad.
As for addressing SEO concerns. There is a lot of frustration out there these days by small sites and companies trying to make their way and Google results can be hit or miss. Major publications like CNET, Forbes, CNN etc are purposefully creating content and cramming it with affiliate links to sell crap to the masses. When a major publication writes about something its not an expert in, one has to start to raise eyebrows and wonder... Its painfully obvious. They get away with it because they are huge brands and can rank for anything, so they are abusing their power.
Additionally, I want to mention an obvious manipulative practice that companies seem to be rewarded for, when if anything, should be penalized for.
And that is avoiding the "standard news" syntax of published content via manipulative URLS. Namely, avoiding using /id/date/title-of-post (or something similar) and just using the rootdomain/title-of-post to make it rank higher and seem more important than it is. These pages are not an About page, or Privacy Page, or Terms of Service page. Its manipulation and a shady practice and companies should be penalized for it.
To me this is fair criticism. I was thinking the same thing. However, the world does need a viable competitor to Nvidia in AI.
AI is not going anywhere. This is not a fad like some of the others mentioned but more likely than not where the next decade of innovation is built on.
a 2.37% click through rate is far from ideal. Twitter analytics specifically does not mention clicks on links for this very reason. instead they simply track all clicks... links, profile, hashtags, etc.