User signals are measurable behavior data from searchers, such as click-through rate in search results, returning to the results page, time on site, bounce rate and repeat visits. Whether and how Google uses them for ranking is disputed in the SEO community.
Does Google use user signals?
Google’s page on ranking results says: “We also use aggregated and anonymized interaction data to assess whether search results are relevant to queries. We transform that data into signals that help our machine-learned systems better estimate relevance.” Google does not say which behavior data this covers or how much weight it has.
SEO sources disagree. Some treat click-through rate and return-to-results as direct ranking factors. Others see them as hard to interpret and easy to manipulate, and expect at most an indirect effect. Metrics such as bounce rate also mean different things on different page types, since a blog post and a checkout page are used differently.
What can site owners measure?
Click-through rate is available in Search Console. Visit data such as time on site and bounce rate comes from a web analytics tool.
Example
A page ranks at position 3 but has a low click-through rate because its title says little. A more specific title will often raise the rate without any change to the content (assessment).
Sources
- Ranking results – How Google Search worksgoogle.com
- User Signals – Conductor Academy (secondary)conductor.com
- Usersignale – Seokratie (secondary, German)seokratie.de
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