Get to Know the Googlebot

If you work in digital marketing or have ever tried marketing your products or services, you have most likely heard one of the phrases “Google crawlers,” “Google spiders,” or “Googlebot.” But what exactly do they mean?

Google crawler (sometimes referred to as a spider) is a generic term for any program used to automatically discover and scan websites by following links from one web page to another. Googlebot is the main crawler used for Google Search.

What does a Googlebot do?

The data Googlebots find as they crawl from link to link gets stored in a collective index. This is the index that online search results get pulled from, which makes it one of the biggest reasons you should care about Google crawlers. Due to the nature of the Googlebot software, the way your website uses text links becomes significantly important. Streamlining the process that allows Googlebots to crawl from page to page will help your website rank accurately on the search engine result pages (SERPs). This means that a good Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy always keeps Google spiders in mind to help them easily digest your website’s relevant pages.

How many Googlebots are there?

While Google has 16 types of crawlers designed for various purposes, there are two most relevant types:

• Googlebot Smartphone: a mobile crawler that simulates a user on a mobile device.
• Googlebot Desktop: a desktop crawler that simulates a user on a desktop.

Both of these crawler types attempt to understand and experience websites the way humans do, which is why it’s vital to keep user experience in mind when optimizing your website.

How do you improve your website for Googlebots?

The main thing you need to do to optimize your website for Googlebots is making sure your image links, navbar, anchor text, and any other links are working properly. The easier it is for this software to sift through your content, the higher your website’s crawlability. 

When you can’t guarantee successful crawlability yourself, 5 Horizons can help. We make sure that the most important pages on your website do not get blocked, and that Googlebots have the most streamlined path of crawling your website through site maps, fresh content, and internal linking.

Here at 5 Horizons, we keep Google spiders in mind when building or helping you with your websites. Contact us today to learn more about our offerings.