Three myths about search intent

We end up explaining this on discovery calls often enough that it deserved writing down. A few things about search intent that get repeated more often than they get checked.

Search engines are trying to answer a question, so the pages that answer questions clearly tend to do well. It is worth deciding this deliberately rather than inheriting whatever the last person set up.

“It only matters for big sites”

Match the format people expect for that query. This is the sort of thing that compounds, quietly, in both directions. If two people in the business would answer this differently, that gap is the actual problem.

“We can deal with it after launch”

Sometimes true, usually expensive. The reasoning matters more than the rule, because the rule has exceptions.

“Our platform handles it”

Look at the current results to see what the engine rewards. That sounds obvious written down. It is still the thing most often skipped. The practical test is whether someone new to the project could tell, in a minute, that it had been handled.

What this looks like day to day

Technical fixes remove obstacles; content earns the position. Both are needed and they are not interchangeable. Three things worth confirming about search intent before you move on:

• Someone can say what the current setup is without going to look
• Look at the current results to see what the engine rewards — and you know whether that is true here
• There is a way to tell whether the last change to this helped

None of this needs a rewrite. Most of it is a morning's work once someone decides to do it.