1. SMX Madrid 2008 Uncovering the Algorithm A Peek Inside How Google Evaluates and Ranks Pages

2. Why Do We Need to Understand Google's Algorithm?

3. To Predict the Potential Challenges of Earning Top Rankings

4. To Evaluate Strengths & Weaknesses in a Site's Strategy

5. To Provide Expert Advice to Clients, Developers & Management

6. To Understand How to Compete in the Search Results

7. What Tactics Are Used to Understand Algorithms?

8. Split-Testing with Nonsense Words on Controlled Domains

9. An Example: This link carries more weight than this link. Why? Because it's higher up in the code.

10. Trial-and-Error Testing in the SERPs

11. Examination of Search Engine Patent Applications

12. An Example:

14. Parsing Academic Information Retrieval Papers & Tests

15. An Example:

16. Paying Close Attention to the Search Engine Representatives

17. An Example: Owning a keyword match domain name is going to carry some weight in Google for the foreseeable future. It is something we want to reward. - Matt Cutts at the Domain Roundtable April 2008

18. Learning from Blogs, Forums & the Online Community

19. “Sexto Sendido” for the SERPs

20. What Are the Major Elements in Google's Algorithm

21. Keyword Usage

22. Title Tags

23. Headline Tags

24. Body Text

25. Domain Names & URLs

26. Link Anchor Text This Anchor Text tells search engines that this URL is relevant to those keywords

27. An Aside on Anchor Text...

28. Meta Description Tag

29. Meta Keywords Tag Meta Keywords in HTML

30. Image Alt Tags

31. Emphasized Text (Bold/Strong)‏

32. Semantic Analysis?

33. Domain Authority

34. Building a “Domain Graph” of Links

35. Domain-Level Trust Evaluation

36. Inbound Link Diversity YourSite.com

37. Branded Search Volume

38. Registration Data & History

39. Page Level Link Analysis

40. Internal vs. External Links

41. Editorial Link Assessment

42. TrustRank

43. PageRank

44. Links as Votes (aka Raw Link Juice)‏

45. Temporal Evaluation & QDF

46. External Link Growth Over Time

47. Content Changes over Time September 2005 May 2008

48. QDF - “Query Deserves Freshness”

49. Intent Detection & “QDD”

50. Detecting Multiple Query Intents and Applying “Query Deserves Diversity”

51. Selecting Unique Results Company names (where searchers might want positive and negative press, along w/ official company domains, e.g. “Inditex”) Product searches (where e-commerce style results might ordinarily fill up the SERPs, but Google tries to provide some reviews and non-commercial, relevant content, e.g. “iPod”) News & political searches (where it might be prudent to display "all sides" of an issue, rather than just the politically one-sided blogs that did the best job baiting links, e.g. “Zapatero”)‏

52. Supplemental & Duplicate Results

53. Why Do Pages Go “Supplemental”?

54. Duplicate Content Issues

55. How Search Engines Handle Duplicate Content – Step 1

56. How Search Engines Handle Duplicate Content – Step 2

57. Step 3

58. How Search Engines Handle Duplicate Content – Step 4

59. GeoTargeting

60. Elements that Predict Location Server Hosting Location Language Domain Extension Domain Registration Data

61. Spam Detection

62. Hidden Content

63. Hidden Text in HTML

65. Cloaking

66. Manipulative Linking

67. Parasite Hosting

68. The Future of Algorithms

69. Personalization

70. User & Usage Based Data

71. Focus on Non-US/Non-English Results

72. More Advanced Link Interpretation

73. More Social Data

74. Thank You! Slides online at: www.seomoz.org/dp/smx-madrid