Google is watching
Here's an intriguing precedent: Google has introduced a new feature into its ranking algorithm - which determines the prominence of a website in Google search results - to account for online merchants that it deems to provide an extremely poor user experience.
The change has been made in direct response to a NYT story that described the case of an e-tailer that gained search prominence as a direct result of ill-treating its customers. In short, the large volume of online complaints linking to the site had the effect of increasing its Google ranking.
Clearly Google doesn't need PR like this. While there is a whole industry devoted to ‘gaming' Google - i.e. using proactive techniques to increase Google ranking - if the search giant is seen to be rewarding bad, or even illegal, behaviour, users might feel inclined to use another search engine.
"I am here to tell you that being bad is, and hopefully will always be, bad for business in Google's search results," said Google fellow Amit Singhal, in a blog post. "...in the last few days we developed an algorithmic solution which detects the merchant from the Times article along with hundreds of other merchants that, in our opinion, provide an extremely poor user experience."
Of course it's laudable that Google is striving to prevent websites appearing near the top of search results for the wrong reasons, however much this move may have been motivated primarily by PR needs. But the precedent of Google introducing its own qualitative judgments into the ranking algorithm is a worrying one.
Furthermore, the timing of this move is especially poignant coming just a couple of days after the European Commission announced it was going to investigate complaints that Google lowers its ranking for sites that compete with it. If Google was considering arguing in its defence that it doesn't actively manipulate the ranking algorithm, that position is surely undermined by this move.
