Google is looking to enhance users‘ search experience with an improved algorithm for doorway pages.
Doorway pages or sites are multiple, similar pages in user search results, all of which go to the same destination. So while these can help marketers maximize their search footprint for ranking purposes, they detract from a user’s search experience.
“To improve the quality of search results for our users, we’ll soon launch a ranking adjustment to better address these types of pages,” Google said in a statement, adding that this change may heavily influence sites with large and well-established doorway campaigns.
To examine if your site will be considered as a “doorway page” by Google, it suggests you refer to the following questions:
- Is the purpose to optimize for search engines and funnel visitors into the actual usable or relevant portion of your site, or are they an integral part of your site’s user experience?
- Are the pages intended to rank on generic terms yet the content presented on the page is very specific?
- Do the pages duplicate useful aggregations of items (locations, products, etc.) that already exist on the site for the purpose of capturing more search traffic?
- Are these pages made solely for drawing affiliate traffic and sending users along without creating unique value in content or functionality?
- Do these pages exist as an “island”? Are they difficult or impossible to navigate to from other parts of your site? Are links to such pages from other pages within the site or network of sites created just for search engines?