I spotted a thread at Black Hat World asking why have we not seen a case where a former Google employee who worked in search quality sell their knowledge or publish the secret sauce on what it would take to rank well quickly and get rich fast. Or why haven't these former Googlers done it for themselves, exploit their knowledge to rank well in Google and make a quick buck?
I decided to ask some former Googlers who worked in the search quality team at Google but now no longer work at Google. What they have said may be interesting to you. This is all captured in a Google+ thread.
Pedro Dias, someone at the higher levels of the Search Quality Analyst team, who worked at Google for about five years and then leaving to move closer to home, I believe. He gave several reasons why he has personally not given up the secret sauce.
- Because SQ Googlers hate spam and anything related to cheating or manipulation... We have seen the darkest of the web... Really;
- Because this would undermine the trust between all my current and ex-colleagues;
- Because we prefer to have it long term, than to work for the "get rich quick";
- Because we don't see SEO as "gaming the system"... Despite what many SEOs say. We have our own vision, we prefer to think like Search Engineers and help businesses understand Search rather than selling magic formulas and torching them.
- Because we signed an NDA, although it doesn't count as much as the points above.
- And sometimes because we like to know stuff that others don't and keep it like that :P
I grilled him a bit more, because I really wonder if they do know the secret sauce. I asked Pedro, " do you have deep dark secrets that you can use to exploit the algo and rank #1 for [viagra] or something that competitive." He responded:
Again, I would prefer not to go into such details mentioning that I know X, Y or Z... I feel fortunate to have been part of a select group and touched some very important and exclusive areas, that's all I can say...
I guess once a Googler, always a Googler.
Kaspar Szymanski, who worked in the Search Quality Strategist and was at Google for about seven years, chimed in also. He told me:
Just like my clients value expertise, they equally value integrity.
Fili Wiese, who worked at Google for about seven years also but not just in the search quality team, also the ad quality team, said it short also, "I agree with Pedro Dias and Kaspar Szymanski."
Again, I still wonder, if Google has anything that one of these former Googlers can truely exploit and get rich quickly with. Yea, I am sure there are some things that will work in the short term and Googlers and non-Googlers can figure those out. But long term - you still need to know the fundamentals.
It just happens that all of these Googlers quoted here act in somewhat of an SEO and search consultant role now.
Forum discussion at Black Hat World & Google+.
Image credit to BigStockPhoto for zipped mouth
