Google Blip

Definition - What does Google Blip mean?

Google blip is a term used to describe the result flaws that the Google search engine sometimes presents. This term was first coined in 2002 by Danny Sullivan, the editor of SearchEngineWatch, on his industry newsletter about the time when the search results placed Microsoft’s home page as the top result for the query words, "go to hell". This kind of blip or glitch has nothing to do with the Microsoft site or the aforementioned search phrase being present in the site, but is a result of the phrase being present in the same context as the link to Microsoft’s site.

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Techopedia explains Google Blip

What happened with the "go to hell" result in 2002 is a classic example of link building at work. Because Microsoft has a lot of enemies who are against the commercialization of software, the phrase "go to hell" appears a lot along with a link to Microsoft’s home page. This still happens from time to time because there are thousands of old websites and domains that are still up but are no longer updated because the owners forgot about them or simply moved on from them.

Google blips are mostly caused by search engine optimization (SEO) and link building, which is a major feature in the search engine itself. The result is not simply determined by which websites contain the word or phrases but also how many other sites link to a website. That's why back linking is very important in SEO.