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Well, Stack Overflow gets about 90% of its traffic from organic search results, on the order of millions of daily page views. The traffic Google sends us did no

by spolsky 16y ago

Well, Stack Overflow gets about 90% of its traffic from organic search results, on the order of millions of daily page views. The traffic Google sends us did not perceptibly change when they switched to Instant. So anecdotally I can tell you that this is just demonstrably not true for one large-volume site.

spolsky 16y ago
Now that I think about it, the whole argument is bogus. For every SERP where your result loses traffic by virtue of falling below the fold, there's probably a SERP where your result gains traffic because the competitors fall below the fold. Sorry, this hypothesis is neither logically correct nor is it backed up by any facts. Do some real experiments next time before you start making claims of having discovered scientific truths.
- keltex 16y ago
  I don't think that SO's users are representative of google's as a whole. For example, there are a lot less advertisements on software development related searches. What I was pointing out is the high-volume, high revenue searches are being impacted. Plus I'm guessing that people who do those searches are much less savvy than your community. They are less likely to scroll, they have smaller screens and they are problem less discerning between paid and organic results.
  - spolsky 16y ago
    Any evidence of that?
    - keltex 16y ago
      Which part? The fact that novice users have a hard time distinguishing between PPC and organic results? Anecdotal with the many novice users I have dealt with. That there is less advertising for software related keywords vs. other types of keywords? Try out Google's adwords traffic estimator: https://adwords.google.com/select/TrafficEstimatorSandbox https://adwords.google.com/select/TrafficEstimatorSandbox
      - spolsky 16y ago
        Any evidence that "high-volume, high revenue searches are being impacted"?
- gvb 16y ago
  In addition, the push down of the "fold" only exists as long as the user is doing the "instant" part. As soon as the user decides the search is what he wants and either hits <ENTER> or clicks on it with the mouse, the drop-down box disappears and the results that were "below" the "fold" go back to the original place. The 25% statistic is also tenuous: if you have a bigger screen than the illustration in the blog, you will have more results shown (i.e. Google will "steal" less than 25% of the results). If you want to be more dramatic, do an instant search with a really small window and OMG!!! Google will "steal" 100% of your results.
bullseye 16y ago
Does Google drive a significant amount of organic traffic to Stack Overflow for short term searches? I permanently disabled Instant after a few searches, so I have no opinion one way or another as to the effects of it on search. However, it seemed like it was designed to be useful for short queries. Stack Overflow, on the other hand, is extremely useful for long tail searches. To be honest, since I typically use SO to solve a specific problem, I don't know what short terms I'd use to land on a page of interest.

by spolsky 16y ago

spolsky 16y ago

Now that I think about it, the whole argument is bogus. For every SERP where your result loses traffic by virtue of falling below the fold, there's probably a SERP where your result gains traffic because the competitors fall below the fold. Sorry, this hypothesis is neither logically correct nor is it backed up by any facts. Do some real experiments next time before you start making claims of having discovered scientific truths.

keltex 16y ago
I don't think that SO's users are representative of google's as a whole. For example, there are a lot less advertisements on software development related searches. What I was pointing out is the high-volume, high revenue searches are being impacted. Plus I'm guessing that people who do those searches are much less savvy than your community. They are less likely to scroll, they have smaller screens and they are problem less discerning between paid and organic results.
- spolsky 16y ago
  Any evidence of that?
  - keltex 16y ago
    Which part? The fact that novice users have a hard time distinguishing between PPC and organic results? Anecdotal with the many novice users I have dealt with. That there is less advertising for software related keywords vs. other types of keywords? Try out Google's adwords traffic estimator: https://adwords.google.com/select/TrafficEstimatorSandbox https://adwords.google.com/select/TrafficEstimatorSandbox
    - spolsky 16y ago
      Any evidence that "high-volume, high revenue searches are being impacted"?
gvb 16y ago
In addition, the push down of the "fold" only exists as long as the user is doing the "instant" part. As soon as the user decides the search is what he wants and either hits <ENTER> or clicks on it with the mouse, the drop-down box disappears and the results that were "below" the "fold" go back to the original place. The 25% statistic is also tenuous: if you have a bigger screen than the illustration in the blog, you will have more results shown (i.e. Google will "steal" less than 25% of the results). If you want to be more dramatic, do an instant search with a really small window and OMG!!! Google will "steal" 100% of your results.

bullseye 16y ago

Does Google drive a significant amount of organic traffic to Stack Overflow for short term searches? I permanently disabled Instant after a few searches, so I have no opinion one way or another as to the effects of it on search. However, it seemed like it was designed to be useful for short queries. Stack Overflow, on the other hand, is extremely useful for long tail searches. To be honest, since I typically use SO to solve a specific problem, I don't know what short terms I'd use to land on a page of interest.