Search Engines

Understanding how search engines work, Google in particular, is important when working in SEO. The basics of crawling and indexing are amazingly useful to understand if you want to rank your own content.

Additionally, Google updates its algorithm several times a year. Understanding the more significant updates, and how they work, can help you to craft content and SEO strategies that are up-to-date.

We've written extensively about how search engines work, and included some of the top resources here. You can also browse the latest posts on search engines from the Moz blog below.

How Search Engines Work : New to SEO? Start with the basics of how search engines operate with our free beginner's guide.

Search Engine Ranking and Visibility : Learn the fundamentals of how search engines rank content on search engine result pages.

Google Algorithm Update History : A complete history of Google algorithm updates since 2000. This includes important links and references for understanding how Google works.

How Search Engines Value Links : Search engines work off a number of signals, but two of the most important are content and links. In this video, Rand Fishkin explains the basics of link evaluation.

MozCast : Is Google updating it's algorithm as we speak? MozCast is the Google algorithm weather report, so you can see how much Google results are changing each day.

Is Google Judging You Based on a Template?
Search Engines

Is Google Judging You Based on a Template?

Is there another factor at work affecting your rankings? In this post, Aaron Friedman presents the idea that Google may be segmenting search results by industry and type of content, and offers up the results from three case studies and provides advice for how to work within the confines of a template you don't fully control.
RankBrain Unleashed
Technical SEO Advanced SEO Search Engines

RankBrain Unleashed

RankBrain. We know it happened, but beyond that, the details of this Google algorithm update are largely a mystery. What is RankBrain, what does it do, and is it even possible to optimize for it? Join Gianluca Fiorelli as he outlines what we do know and ponders the possibilities of what we don't.

Get Moz Blog email updates in your inbox