You must have heard about Google RankBrain; one of the latest algorithm updates. The RankBrain update was announced during the Bloomberg interview of Greg Corrado, one of the top scientists in Google. However, the algorithm is already working, and you might have noted some difference.
This is essentially an artificial intelligence type of signal aimed at improving the search results. However, many people have been asking; how exactly does the RankBrain operate?
To get this question right, this post will dig deeper into this unique algorithm for you.
Table of Contents
RankBrain is small but part of something very big
RankBrain is one of the thousands of various components that comprise of Google algorithm. However, it is one of the most crucial signals.
It utilizes artificial intelligence
By applying artificial intelligence, the technology helps to aggregate info about user’s intent as well as his/her satisfaction when using Google. The target is ensuring that Google generates better results for its clients.
RankBrain learns and progressively evolves with time
Unlike other signals that only discover the content that sites have, RankBrain is different because it learns and evolves over time. The learning machine can grasp what clients were searching a few days to make correct predictions better UX.
RankBrain is the starting point that will surpass even experts
It is very interesting to note that RankBrain has demonstrated the ability to surpass human experts. Studies done on the RankBrain showed that it could guess correct answers compared to human beings with a huge margin of about 10%.
The signal helps to process entirely new searches
Part of the key objective is helping webmasters handle about 15% of all queries received on Google every day. In particular, the RankBrain helps to handle all the new content (discovering new content). This translates to about 450 million queries every day.
RankBrain is closely related to Hummingbird update
The Google Hummingbird is famous as the overhaul of the way Google processes various organic queries. Talk of evolution from finding strings to finding things. The focus here shifted to semantic search to raise the accuracy of understanding what the searcher wants.
However, RankBrain moves a step further than the Hummingbird. It looks at the same phrases and makes the right guess to give appropriate answers as opposed to simply applying mathematical equations. This means interpreting the queries as opposed to simply generating results. Corrado says that Google wanted to make it feel like you are talking to a person when making queries.
RankBrain is still evolving, and it remains unclear how things will be affected
While this is a great stride that demonstrates the far Google is willing to go to enhance UX, how it will affect things remains unclear. As an evolving factor, it is likely to become an important query processor and a major ranking factor. In digital marketing, the main focus should be optimizing content and site.
According to some experts, RankBrain affects entity search. This means that if Google poorly understands the intent of a user, it resorts to the RankBrain to generate the most probable result. This is likely to become more important in the future as Google goes full throttle on its focus on UX.
The RankBrain could act as a pointer of how Google anticipates Voice Search to operate. With its hundreds of experts working on AI, it is just a matter of time before technology can be applied to answer logical questions.
