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Couldn't one come to another conclusion here? In fact several other conclusions. For one, since users were getting more results on the page they didn't need to

Couldn't one come to another conclusion here? In fact several other conclusions. For one, since users were getting more results on the page they didn't need to go to a second results page, thus causing the drop-off in traffic. If you're going to come to some grand "Aha!" moment, you should define your experiment. Were these the same users? on the same day? searching for the same stuff? What browsers were they using? Did they have their windows maximized? What was their screen size? ... and so on.

quoderat 18y ago
Though I've never been able to find the results and complete study methodology online (can anyone?), Mayer is a CS grad from Stanford, as well as head of the UI team at Google. I'm guessing she and her group know what they are doing. I'd be more than willing to bet that they controlled for these variables you mention, else the test would be useless. Sure, it's right to be skeptical, but they do this for a living. Given Google's stake in having accurate data, they probably bothered to do it correctly. (And I am not usually a defender of Google.)
- ojbyrne 18y ago
  Sure, but not necessarily to report it to the press correctly.
cedsav 18y ago
"After a bit of looking, Marissa explained that they found an uncontrolled variable." I guess that means they controlled for the other variables.
- dhimes 18y ago
  I'm getting more questions as I start to think about this. They get revenue from ads, not searches. Did they vary the number of ads displayed? Did people look at the first page of 10, not find what they saw, then check the ads, find what they saw (which may be a page two organic result), and click the ad? If that is what is happening, then I can see why Google would lose. That is, their main conclusion would be that people tend to check organic results first. If that's true then if a company that has to pay to be page 1 is organically moved there by increasing the number of results displayed, then G loses. They check this by seeing if revenue goes up when they limit the results to 5 ads.
  - sgk284 18y ago
    I don't have exact numbers, but well over 99% of searchers never click (and generally won't even look past) the 3rd result.
agotterer 18y ago
How does it not make more sense that traffic dropped because the average user only wants to see 30 results and saw them all on a single page instead of navigating to three separate pages. Revenue dropped because they showed 1/3 the amount of adwords. Did I miss something here?

quoderat 18y ago

Though I've never been able to find the results and complete study methodology online (can anyone?), Mayer is a CS grad from Stanford, as well as head of the UI team at Google. I'm guessing she and her group know what they are doing. I'd be more than willing to bet that they controlled for these variables you mention, else the test would be useless. Sure, it's right to be skeptical, but they do this for a living. Given Google's stake in having accurate data, they probably bothered to do it correctly. (And I am not usually a defender of Google.)

ojbyrne 18y ago
Sure, but not necessarily to report it to the press correctly.

cedsav 18y ago

"After a bit of looking, Marissa explained that they found an uncontrolled variable." I guess that means they controlled for the other variables.

dhimes 18y ago
I'm getting more questions as I start to think about this. They get revenue from ads, not searches. Did they vary the number of ads displayed? Did people look at the first page of 10, not find what they saw, then check the ads, find what they saw (which may be a page two organic result), and click the ad? If that is what is happening, then I can see why Google would lose. That is, their main conclusion would be that people tend to check organic results first. If that's true then if a company that has to pay to be page 1 is organically moved there by increasing the number of results displayed, then G loses. They check this by seeing if revenue goes up when they limit the results to 5 ads.
- sgk284 18y ago
  I don't have exact numbers, but well over 99% of searchers never click (and generally won't even look past) the 3rd result.

agotterer 18y ago

How does it not make more sense that traffic dropped because the average user only wants to see 30 results and saw them all on a single page instead of navigating to three separate pages. Revenue dropped because they showed 1/3 the amount of adwords. Did I miss something here?