Website positioning performs a job in Automattic’s counterclaim in opposition to WP Engine. The authorized doc mentions search engine marketing six occasions and Website positioning as soon as as a part of counterclaims asserting that WP Engine excessively used phrases like “WordPress” to rank in search engines like google and yahoo as a part of an “infringement” marketing campaign that makes use of WordPress logos in commerce. An in depth take a look at these claims reveals that a number of the proof could also be biased and that claims about Website positioning depend on outdated data.
Automattic’s Claims About Website positioning
Automattic’s counterclaim asserts that WP Engine used Website positioning to rank for WordPress-related key phrases and that that is inflicting confusion.
The counterclaim explains:
“WP Engine additionally has sown confusion in recent times by dramatically growing the variety of occasions Counterclaimants’ Marks seem on its web sites. Beginning in or round 2021, WP Engine started to sharply enhance its use of the WordPress Marks, and beginning in or round 2022, started to sharply enhance its use of the WooCommerce Marks.”
Automattic subsequent argues that the repetition of key phrases on an internet web page is WP Engine’s Website positioning technique. Right here’s the place their claims turn into controversial to those that know the way search engines like google and yahoo rank web sites.
The counterclaim asserts:
“The elevated variety of appearances of the WordPress Marks on WP Engine’s web site is especially prone to trigger confusion within the web context.
On data and perception, web search engines like google and yahoo issue within the variety of occasions a time period seems in a web site’s textual content in assessing the “relevance” of a web site to the phrases a consumer enters into the search engine when on the lookout for web sites.
WP Engine’s choice to extend the variety of occasions the WordPress Marks seem on WP Engine’s web site seems to be a aware “search engine marketing” technique to make sure that when web customers search for corporations that supply companies associated to WordPress, they are going to be uncovered to confusingly written and formatted hyperlinks that take them to WP Engine’s websites fairly than WordPress.org or WordPress.com.”
They name WP Engine’s technique aggressive:
“WP Engine’s technique included aggressive utilization of search engine marketing to make use of the WordPress and WooCommerce Marks extraordinarily regularly and confuse customers trying to find approved suppliers of WordPress and WooCommerce software program;”
Is The Quantity Of Key phrases Used A Rating Issue?
I’ve twenty-five years of expertise in search engine marketing and have a concomitantly deep understanding of how search engines like google and yahoo rank content material. The very fact is that Automattic’s declare that search engines like google and yahoo “issue within the variety of occasions” a key phrase is utilized in a web site’s content material is inaccurate. Trendy search engines like google and yahoo don’t issue within the variety of occasions a key phrase seems on an internet web page as a rating issue. Google’s algorithms use fashions like BERT to achieve a semantic understanding of the which means and intent of the key phrase phrases utilized in search queries and content material, ensuing within the skill to rank content material that doesn’t even include the consumer’s key phrases.
These aren’t simply my opinions; Google’s net web page about how search works explicitly says that content material is ranked in response to the consumer’s intent, no matter key phrases, which immediately contradicts Automattic’s declare about WPE’s Website positioning:
“To return related outcomes, we first want to determine what you’re on the lookout for – the intent behind your question. To do that, we construct language fashions to attempt to decipher how the comparatively few phrases you enter into the search field match as much as probably the most helpful content material obtainable.
This entails steps as seemingly easy as recognizing and correcting spelling errors, and extends to our subtle synonym system that permits us to search out related paperwork even when they don’t include the precise phrases you used.”
If Google’s documentation will not be convincing sufficient, check out the search outcomes for the phrase “Managed WordPress Internet hosting.” WordPress.com ranks #2, regardless of the phrase being utterly absent from its net web page.
Screenshot Of WordPress.com In Search Outcomes
What Is The Proof?
Automattic gives a graph evaluating WP Engine’s common month-to-month mentions of the phrase “WordPress” with mentions printed by 18 different net hosts. The comparability of 19 whole net hosts dramatically illustrates that WP Engine mentions WordPress extra typically than any of the opposite internet hosting suppliers, by a big margin.
Screenshot Of Graph
Right here’s a close-up of the graph (with the values inserted) exhibiting that WP Engine’s month-to-month mentions of “WordPress” far exceed the variety of occasions phrases containing WordPress are used on the internet pages of the opposite hosts.
Screenshot Of Graph Closeup
Individuals say that numbers don’t lie, and the graph presents compelling proof that WP Engine is deploying an aggressive use of key phrases with the phrase WordPress in them. Leaving apart the debunked concept that keyword-term spamming truly works, a better take a look at the graph comparability reveals that the proof will not be so robust as a result of it’s biased.
Automattic’s Comparability Is Arguably Biased
Automattic’s counterclaim compares eighteen net hosts in opposition to WP Engine. Of these eighteen hosts, solely 5 (together with WPE) are managed WordPress internet hosting platforms. The remaining fourteen are generalist internet hosting platforms that supply cloud internet hosting, VPS (digital personal servers), devoted internet hosting, and area title registrations.
The importance of this truth is that the comparability might be thought of biased in opposition to WP Engine as a result of the typical point out of WordPress will naturally be decrease throughout the complete web site of an organization that gives a number of companies (like VPS, devoted internet hosting, and area title registrations) versus a web site like WP Engine that gives just one service, managed WordPress internet hosting.
Two of the hosts listed within the comparability, Namecheap and GoDaddy, are primarily often known as area title registrars. Namecheap is the second largest area title registrar on the planet. There’s no must belabor the purpose that these two corporations in Automattic’s comparability could also be biased decisions to match in opposition to WP Engine.
Of the 5 hosts that supply WordPress internet hosting, two are plugin platforms: Elementor and WPMU Dev. Each are platforms constructed round their respective plugins, which implies that the typical variety of mentions of WordPress goes to be decrease as a result of the typical could also be diluted by documentation and weblog posts concerning the plugins. These two corporations are additionally arguably biased decisions for this type of comparability.
Of the eighteen hosts that Automattic selected to match with WP Engine, solely two of them are comparable in service to WP Engine: Kinsta and Rocket.web.
Comparability Of Managed WordPress Hosts
Automattic compares the month-to-month mentions of phrases with “WordPress” in them, and it’s clear that the selection of hosts within the comparability biases the outcomes in opposition to WP Engine. A fairer comparability is to match the top-ranked net web page for the phrase “managed WordPress internet hosting.”
The next is a comparability of the top-ranked net web page for every of the three managed WordPress hosts in Automattic’s comparability listing, an easy one-to-one comparability. I used the phrase “managed WordPress internet hosting” plus the area title appended to a search question with a view to floor the top-ranked web page from every web site after which in contrast what number of occasions the phrase “WordPress” is used on these pages.
Listed here are the outcomes:
Rocket.web
The house web page of Rocket.web ranks #1 for the phrase “rocket.web managed wordpress internet hosting.” The house web page of Rocket.web comprises the phrase “WordPress” 21 occasions.
Screenshot of Google’s Search Outcomes
Kinsta
The highest ranked Kinsta web page is kinsta.com/wordpress-hosting/ and that web page mentions the phrase “WordPress” 55 occasions.
WP Engine
The highest ranked WP Engine net web page is wpengine.com/managed-wordpress-hosting/ and that web page mentions the phrase “WordPress” 27 occasions.
A good one-to-one comparability of managed WordPress host suppliers, chosen from Automattic’s personal listing, reveals that WP Engine will not be utilizing the phrase “WordPress” extra typically than its opponents. Its use falls immediately in the course of a good one-to-one comparability.
Quantity Of Instances Web page Mentions WordPress
- Rocket.web: 21 occasions
- WP Engine: 27 occasions
- Kinsta: 55 occasions
What About Different Managed WordPress Hosts?
For the sake of comparability, I in contrast an extra 5 managed WordPress hosts that Automattic omitted from its comparability to see how typically the phrase “WordPress” was talked about on the top-ranked net pages of WP Engine’s direct opponents.
Listed here are the outcomes:
- WPX Internet hosting: 9
- Flywheel: 16
- InstaWP: 22
- Pressable: 23
- Pagely: 28
It’s obvious that WP Engine’s 27 mentions put it close to the higher stage in that comparability, however nowhere close to the extent at which Kinsta mentions “WordPress.” Up to now, we solely see a part of the story. As you’ll see, different net hosts use the phrase “WordPress” way over Kinsta does, and it received’t seem like such an outlier when in comparison with generalist net hosts.
A Comparability With Generalist Net Hosts
Subsequent, we’ll evaluate the generalist net hosts listed in Automattic’s comparability.
I did the identical form of seek for the generalist net hosts to floor their top-ranked pages for the question “managed WordPress internet hosting” plus the title of the web site, which is a one-to-one comparability to WP Engine.
Different Net Hosts In contrast To WP Engine:
- InMotion Internet hosting: 101 occasions
- Greengeeks: 97 occasions
- Jethost: 71 occasions
- Verpex: 52 occasions
- GoDaddy: 49 occasions
- Cloudways: 47 occasions
- Namecheap: 41 occasions
- Liquidweb: 40 occasions
- Pair: 40 occasions
- Hostwinds: 37 occasions
- KnownHost: 33 occasions
- Mochahost: 33 occasions
- Panthen: 31 occasions
- Siteground: 30 occasions
- WP Engine: 27 occasions
Loopy, proper? WP Engine makes use of the phrase “WordPress” much less typically than any of the opposite generalist net hosts. This one-to-one comparability contradicts Automattic’s graph.
And only for the report, WordPress.com’s top-ranked web page wordpress.com/internet hosting/ makes use of the phrase “WordPress” 62 occasions, over twice as typically as WP Engine’s net web page.
Will Automattic’s Website positioning Claims Be Debunked?
Automattic’s claims about WP Engine’s use of Website positioning could also be primarily based on shaky foundations. The claims about how key phrases work for Website positioning contradict Google’s personal documentation, and the truth that WordPress.com’s personal web site ranks for the phrase “Managed WordPress Internet hosting” regardless of not utilizing that actual phrase seems to debunk their assertion that search engines like google and yahoo issue the variety of occasions a consumer’s key phrases are used on an internet web page.
The graph that Automattic presents of their counterclaim doesn’t symbolize a comparability of direct opponents, which can contribute to a biased impression that WP Engine is aggressively utilizing the “WordPress” key phrases extra typically than opponents. Nevertheless, a one-to-one comparability of the particular net pages that compete in opposition to one another for the phrase “Managed WordPress Internet hosting” reveals that lots of the net hosts in Automattic’s personal listing use the phrase “WordPress” much more typically than WP Engine, which immediately contradicts Automattic’s narrative.
I ran WP Engine’s Managed WordPress Internet hosting URL in a Key phrase Density Instrument, and it reveals that WP Engine’s net web page makes use of the phrase “WordPress” a mere 1.92% of the time, which, from an Website positioning perspective, may very well be thought of a modest quantity and much from extreme. It will likely be attention-grabbing to see how the choose decides the deserves of Automattic’s Website positioning-related claims.
Featured Picture by Shutterstock/file404
