Google Wants More Site Diversity on its Search Results

Google has announced that it made some changes to Google Search to ensure site diversity on the results it shows users.

In a tweet via its handle Google SearchLiason (@searchliason), the company explained that the update was driven by feedback coming from users who complained about receiving multiple listings from the same site on the top results. Google said:

“We’ve heard your feedback about this and wanting more variety. A new change now launching in Google Search is designed to provide more site diversity in our results….”

Google explained that the change would allow no more than two listings from the same source on the top search results. However, the company also noted that if the system determined that it’s relevant to show a user multiple pages from one website due to the nature of the query, it would do so.

“This site diversity change means that you usually won’t see more than two listings from the same site in our top results. However, we may still show more than two in cases where our systems determine it’s especially relevant to do so for a particular search….”

More Site Diversity in Results

Google clarified that the site diversity change they made to Google Search was not part of the June 2019 core algorithm update they rolled out last Monday. The two updates were reportedly different and in no way connected to each other.

Google further explained:

“Site diversity will generally treat subdomains as part of a root domain. IE: listings from subdomains and the root domain will all be considered from the same single site. However, subdomains are treated as separate sites for diversity purposes when deemed relevant to do so…”

As always, the announcement created some buzz and had confused people flooding Google’s Twitter thread with questions. Some posted screenshots of sample queries (a shown below) wherein Google Search supplied more than two listings from the same site.

Google’s Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) explained that the update they made wouldn’t be perfect. However, they would continue working to improve it.

Read More: New Study Unveils The Technical Optimization Standards Of Top Pages On Google