Reddit appears 97.5% of the time in product review queries on Google Search and accounts for nearly two-thirds of the slots reserved for Google’s Discussions and Forums SERP feature, according to a new analysis.
Why we care Reddit can be a valuable resource for searchers, but it seems to have an obvious spam problem. More than half of the Reddit threads analyzed in this analysis appear to have affiliate links in the comments, as noted in the analysis by author Glen Allsopp, who wrote that “promotion by of Google feels excessive,” adding these “current searches.” The results are the worst I can remember seeing.”
By the numbers. An analysis of 10,000 key phrases found that discussions and forums appear 77% (7,702) of the time. In total, 766 individual forums appeared, but only Reddit and Quora had 3x the visibility of any other forum:
Reddit appeared in 7,509 results and was featured 14,263 times. Quora appeared in 3,513 results and was featured 3,832 times. All other domains (766 of them), combined, appeared 4,989 times, and most sites never got a second listing like Reddit. Some were inactive, but there were no new forums or forums with a low number of posts.
Overcorrection? So why is Google putting so much pressure on Reddit? It could be partially in response to several stories over the past couple of years about users adding “Reddit” to the end of their queries. But based on the results of this analysis, Google may have overcorrected for this issue.
The analysis You can read the full detailed analysis here: Discussion forums dominate 10,000 product review search results.
Answer from Reddit. After this article was published, a Reddit spokesperson contacted Search Engine Land with concerns about the detailed report, calling it “flawed and misleading.” The spokesperson told me:
“The examples being shared seem well chosen. Google is sending more product review traffic because we have good, legitimate product reviews. What is not true is that Reddit posts are being spammed as a result of this and that we are blocking threads as a way of dealing with spam.” Many of the communities from which the “best” content is pulled have rules to remove spam or unwanted comments and posts that are not ‘ add to a discussion or question. We also provide tools and insights for our moderators to deal directly with spam content, such as our spam filter and community health page.”
The Reddit spokesperson added Reddit launched a new spam detection method in the third quarter of 2023, which helped identify 2 million spam accounts.
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