Insights

10 Things You May Not Know About Google Search

Author - Brett Tudor
19.05.2022

Most people that use the Internet are familiar with using Google. It is something we have come to take for granted. The ubiquitous search engine continues to dominate and for any business that relies on traffic from search results, having good visibility on Google is essential whether that be through Google ads or the organic search results.

Unfortunately, that visibility is far from guaranteed and even if a site is visible this doesn’t always guarantee traffic or sales. This often leads to a lot of myths and misconceptions about Google search which we’ll dispel in the following 12 things you probably didn’t know about Google Search.

Google has a near 90% market share amongst search engines

Google’s domination shows known signs of decline. When it comes to monopolies Google will take some beating. The search engine dominates its sector with 86.19%. Compare this to Bing’s measly 2.69% and there is little sign that Google will become less important any time soon. So while it is important to be visible on rival search engines, high visibility on Google is the best and only way to gain meaningful organic search traffic to your website.   (Source: earthweb.com)

45.3% Google Searches on mobile are voice searches.

The use of voice search has grown considerably in recent years to the point where nearly half of people searching with their phones use their voice. This has important implications for your organic SEO strategy. With most people now using mobile phones to search for things online, thinking about how people search and the keywords they are likely to use is just as important as ever. People will certainly use their phone to ask questions and providing answers to these questions will improve organic search reach significantly over time.

People spend an average of 16 minutes on Google each day (Source: Alexa, 2021)

Not as long as you might expect. As marketers we often imagine people spending half their day on the Internet but when you consider that the average person spends just 16 minutes on Google search that really puts into perspective how hard you need to work for each individual website visitor and harder still for a customer. Pursuing the right keyword strategy will ensure your website is capturing visitors when they are in the mood to take action. (Source:financesonline.com)

…that said Google searches increased by 22% in the year to 2020 (Semrush, 2021)

Google searches increased by 22% in 2020 according to Semrush but was this at least partly down to most people being stuck in lockdown and spending more time searching online? Possibly, and this is one thing to take away from statistics. Many site owners will have seen a benefit from these extra searches only to find a marked downward trend afterwards as people reverted back to their usual search habits. 

Google users visit 6.87 pages on average (DataReportal, 2021)

If people search on Google will visit 6.87 pages on your website then this increases the importance of making every web page count. Usability is also critical to get the best out of each visit. Your website should make it easy to convert visits no matter which pages they visit to maximise the potential of those visits. 

Only 33.9% of Internet users discover brands when using a search engine (DataReportal, 2021)

This is an interesting statistic you would think would be a much higher percentage. However, understanding how search engines work it shouldn’t come as a surprise. With organic search it is more about the user and the product or service they are searching for. If you wish to raise brand awareness then there are probably better options to explore than search engines.

53.1% of internet users do their research on brands using search engines (DataReportal, 2021)

While people may not use the Internet to find brands, more than half will use search engines to find out more about them. This emphasises the importance of creating a good impression when people visit your website much as you would if they were to visit your office or shop. Those brand that invest in their image will gain an edge over those that don’t.

Websites on the first page of Google load in just 1.65 seconds on average. (Backlinko, 2020)

If this measurement is accurate, then it emphasises the importance of having a fast loading website. There are many factors that can influence the load time of a website including servers (shared hosting is often slower than dedicated), image files sizes and if you run a WordPress website the number of plugins it uses. For a site to load in 1.65 seconds or less, it has to run optimally and be free of any unnecessary features that use up too much bandwidth.

The top search result on Google will have 3.8 times more backlinks than those sites lower down on page one (Backlinko, 2020)

Anyone who understands SEO will know that backlinks are important so it should come as little surprise that the top result on average has more than the rest. While backlinks are not the only ranking factor, Google rewards sites that have high volumes of backlinks from reputable and relevant sources so it is well worth spending time acquiring these links to improve SEO long term.

Longtail search queries make up 91.8% of searches on Google

Longtail search queries or those queries that are more detailed than primary search queries making up the vast majority of searches should also not come as a surprise. When you think of how you might search for something online, you would often use a more descriptive search query to find exactly what you want. 14.6% of searches are also in the form of a question, Google has largely taken the place of asking an expert or picking up a book to get questions answered. IF you want to know something “Google it” as people often say.

This is why spending the time to produce lots of good content and knowledge sharing is so important on a website. If your content doesn’t hit the mark, then traffic from organic search is unlikely to grow.