TadeuRezend
Yep. I think the "longer = better" thing is partly a oversimplification, and maybe partly a quirk of the system. If I take longer to find what I need then I was technically "engaged" longer. If Google tracks engagement — and why wouldn't they? — that may give them positive signals. But that doesn't mean my needs were better met. And the long content problem has reached a point where I rather just open 5 tabs and find a post that gets to the point, rather than navigate content so long that it needs a table of contents.

But then again, I do read an usual amount of blog content. I'm sure the average user isn't nearly as bothered by this.
ibanez
I guess the big question though is where someone like you lies on the spectrum compared to the average surfer when it comes to clicking to page 2 in the search results, or even scrolling past the top 3 on page 1 for that matter. You're probably in the 1% or less and that doesn't translate to sales for businesses trying to land on a top slot.

partly a quirk of the system.

That's definitely a fundamental problem with search engine results. The fact is every measurable signal can be manipulated in some way whether it be keyword density, backlinks, etc… and as a result, good content frequently never makes it's way into the Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs). I find SEO super interesting (and necessary for my freelance work), but it's also infuriating when I find myself changing around good content in an attempt to game an arbitrary system.
TadeuRezend
Yep. On both counts. I'm an oddball case so my frustration isn't a sign that the system needs to change. And having to lower a content's quality for SEO reasons is a pain.

But then again, if the content is good and changing will help it reach more people through organic traffic, then maybe it's worth it. I mean, if a great article about trees falls in the forest and no one reads it, was there a point to it being great?

Man that talk got long winded. I guess it's what happens when content writers decide to geek out 😂.

I do think that the trend of 3000+ articles will start to bother the average user eventually. But that probably years out. And who knows what will change before then. Maybe some other factor will kill the trend before it gets on regular people's nerves.
ibanez
IMHO the only way the system will change for the better – meaning for both users like yourself and the average user, is either every search result is delivered by a human being (which is impossible on a global scale) or more search competitors gain enough traction to rival Google AND those search competitors use rating mechanisms that are opposite those which Google uses (so you can't game one without hurting your position in the other). A tall order on either option.
NHRADeuce

If Google tracks engagement — and why wouldn't they?

Because they don't want to lose an antitrust suit. The ONLY way to accurately track engagement is to collect data from the browser or code on the site. The only thing they can track from search results pages are bounces (not necessarily bad) and pogos (probably bad).

If Google uses engagement data from Google Analytics (GA) or Chrome, that puts sites that don't use GA or have lower share of users using Chrome at a disadvantage. That would land them with an antitrust suit that potentially allows the government to subpoena the Google algorithm.

Google tracking on site engagement is not a technical question, it's a legal one. Until Google figures out how to track 100% of users on 100% of sites without requiring sites and users utilize their software, they will not use engagement as a rank signal.
TadeuRezend
They can track what I clicked on the search results and how long I took to go check other search results after opening a given article. But yeah. If I click an article and that's the end of my search, they shouldn't know whether or not I was there for 5 minutes or 50.

Plus I wonder how much even Google understands what they track. They know what data they're feeding the algorithm and what goals they want it to achieve. With machine learning, it should be impossible to determine for sure what inferences the algorithm is deriving from that data.
NHRADeuce
Exactly. If you go back to a search result page and click another result (pogo), you can make an argument that the user didn't find what they were looking for so the result is bad. Or it could be a user price shopping and every result is good. So even a pogo is fairly ambiguous.

It only gets worse from there because engagement metrics are highly dependent on intent. If you're looking for an address or phone number or price, long dwell time or multiple pages visited are bad. If your reading how to articles then long dwell time and multiple pages is great.

Google has a hard enough time identifying good content consistently, the technology is simply not there yet to decipher on site engagement – if they had a way to collect that data without triggering antitrust lawsuits.

thesupermikey

Yeah, I never understood why guru's recommend this.

Oh, that's easy. They saw Wirecutter (and similar websites) producing these 10,000 word product roundups and they assumed they were disrupting the already stagnate affiliate website racket. They assumed that the reason those articles were dominating search results because they were long. Not because they were well researched, well written, and updated based on new information.