Bing/Yahoo & Google SEO Similarities and Differences
Both Bing and Google want your query to receive the best answer quickly. The success of a search engine depends on it. Algorithms and crawlers search and index web content to get your answer as fast as possible. Because both Bing and Google share the same goal, they also share some SEO characteristics. Yahoo search SEO is the same as Bing.
Bing/Yahoo & Google SEO Similarities
Top Brands
Top brands link higher than new brands or less well-known ones. They get an extra tick in the box that moves them up the page ranking in any search query. Google will also overlook links related to the brand name that would demote a lesser-known name.
Backlinks
Names for backlinks include: “one-way links”, “incoming links”, or “inbound links’, and they occur when an external website links to your content. Both Google and Bing see these as validation or “voting for” your content.
Google uses PageRank (an algorithm) to rate the quantity and quality of the links. Bing is less fussy about the quality and prefers pages with backlinks – at least one.
Geo-Keywords
Both Bing and Google use geo-specific keywords to value a page for its local content. Local sites rank higher on Bing. Google prefers to answer the question but takes locality into account.
If your business is local, you want to highlight this aspect in your choice of keywords.
User Engagement
A low bounce rate when a visitor clicks onto your content is another vote of confidence in the quality of your content for both search engines. The logic being that visitors will only stay if your page is straightforward and useful. That leads to the next outstanding quality.
Relevant Quality Content
Bing and Google don’t employ an army of people to read every page on the web. They rely on AI and algorithms. These assess quality content according to the current rules and at the moment:
- Long-form content – at least 1,500 words
- Keywords and phrases used naturally – around five to seven.
- Outward links to reputable pages with good page authority.
Bing/Yahoo & Google SEO Differences
Google invests heavily in producing the best AI to source relevant and useful content for searchers. There are differences in the ways Yahoo Search ranks pages.
Keywords
Google “sees” context and is not looking at matching an exact word or phrase –RankBrain uses machine learning to understand the meaning relative to search terms.
Yahoo! Search is still matching exact words and phrases, so using them improves your rankings, especially in meta descriptions, headings, and sub-headings.
Backlink Quality
Google checks the page rankings of the website linking to your content. It is interested in high-quality links. Bing thinks more is better, and it ranks linking websites by their domain age and indicators like .gov, .org, and .edu. Google will index all pages, but Bing drops off pages without at least one backlink.
Social Signals
Google says that it ignores social media likes and mentions. Yahoo search (Bing) sees them as a vote of confidence, and an active social media profile increases your ranking.
Multimedia Content
Bing is better than Google in valuing images, videos, and audio for ranking. Bing also reads Flash websites, whereas Google treats these as if they don’t exist. Google assesses the text as the primary way of evaluating content.
Opening Content
Google tries to index all content – it used to only crawl through the first 100K. Search Yahoo (Bing) still looks at the front pages and more or less stops after 100K if it doesn’t find what it is looking for on your website. This approach makes a difference to where you place your keywords and content for ranking purposes on Yahoo! Search.
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