SEO Just Got More Important With The Launch Of Facebook’s ‘Fake News’ Fighting ‘Click-Gap’ Signal
Dallas Rabot
Yesterday Facebook announced and globally rolled out “Click-Gap” a new signal in its News Feed algorithm to fight the spread of ‘fake news’ on its platform. What immediately became clear to SEOs out there is that Click-Gap is Facebook’s version of Google’s PageRank algorithm.
How Click-Gap Works
Details are still scarce, but what is clear is that to reduce misinformation and low-quality content appearing on Facebook News Feeds Click-Gap looks at the authoritativeness of the website outside of Facebook’s own network.
What this means is that web domains which have a lot of high-quality inbound links pointing to them from other authoritative and trusted websites will help surface their posts and links higher up and more often in Facebook user News Feeds.
For posts from web domains on Facebook’s News Feed that only a few other low-quality websites on the broader web are linking to will have more limited audience reach by Facebook.
How It Changes The SEO Landscape
Links. Websites that are seen as experts in their field and have a solid SEO strategy in place that encompasses building quality inbound links to their website will not only benefit from having their websites rise in Google’s search results – but will now have more visibility in Facebook News Feeds too.
The Future of Facebook Click-Gap
While it is very early, Click-Gap is Facebook’s beginning in a long process to improve the trustworthiness of its content and fight Fake News. It’s an important page they have taken out of Google’s playbook and have now implemented in a relatively rudimentary form when compared to Google.
Over the decades Google’s own PageRank algorithm has changed significantly and sits within an overall search algorithm that is known to encompass over 250+ ranking signals (and 10,000 variations and sub-signals) to determine it’s Search Engine Results Pages (SERP’s).
There is no doubt that Facebook’s Click-Gap signal will be rapidly refined as more data comes in.
Dallas is Pure SEO's Head of Product. He has over a decade of local and overseas experience in Search Engine Optimisation. He previously co-founded a web & mobile app development company and holds multiple industry-leading SEO certifications.
Dallas is interested in the intersection between digital media & business. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Auckland - a Film, TV & Media Studies major, and a Diploma in Business from Auckland University of Technology.
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