Tips for getting help with your site

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

As a search company, we at Google try to develop scalable solutions to problems. In fact,
Webmaster Tools was born out of this instinct: rather than fighting the losing battle of trying
to respond to questions via email (and in multiple languages!), we developed an automated,
scalable product that gives webmasters like you information about your sites and lets you handle
many requests yourself. Now you can
streamline the crawling of your site,
improve your sitelinks,
və ya
clean up after a malware attack
all on your own.

Of course, our
Help Forum
still gets hundreds of questions from site owners every week—everything from “Why isn’t my
site in Google?” to very specific questions about a particular
API
call or a typo in our documentation. When we see patterns—such as a string of questions about one
particular topic—we continue to use that information in scalable ways, such as to help us decide
which parts of the product need work, or what new features we should develop. But we also still
answer a lot of individual questions in our forum, on our
blog, and at
industry events. However, we can’t answer them all.

So how do we decide which questions to tackle? We have a few guiding principles that help us make
the most of the time we spend in places like our forum. We believe that there are many areas in
which Google’s interests and site owners’ interests overlap, and we’re most motivated by questions
that fall into these areas. We want to improve our search results, and improve the Internet; if
we can help you make your site faster, safer, more compelling, or more accessible, that’s good for
both of us, and for Internet users at large. We want to help as many people at a time as we can,
so we like questions that are relevant to more than just one person, and we like to answer them
publicly. We want to add value with the time we spend, so we prefer questions where we can provide
more insight than the average person, rather than just regurgitating what’s already written in
our Help Center.

The reason I tell you all this is because you can greatly increase your chances of getting an
answer if you make it clear how your question helps us meet these goals. Here are some tips for
increasing the likelihood that someone will answer your question:

1. Ask in public. If you post your question in our forum, the whole world gets to see the
   answer. Then when Betty has the same question a week later, she benefits because she can find
   the answer instantly in our forum, and I benefit because it saves me from having to answer the
   same question twice (or ten times, or fifty times, or…). We have a very strong preference for
   answering questions publicly (in a forum, on a blog, at a conference, in a video…) so that
   many people can benefit from the answer.
2. Do your homework. We put a lot of effort into writing
   articles,
   blog posts and FAQs
   to help people learn about search and site-building, and we strongly encourage you to
   search our
   Help Center,
   blog and/or
   forum
   for answers before asking a question. You may find an answer on the spot. If you don’t, when you
   post your question be sure to indicate what resources you’ve already read and why they didn’t
   meet your needs: for example, “I read the
   Help Center article on affiliate websites
   but I’m still not sure whether this particular affiliate page on my site has enough added value;
   can I get some feedback?” This shows that you’ve taken the time to try to help yourself, it
   saves everyone from reiterating the obvious solutions if you’ve already ruled those out, and it
   will help get you a more specific and relevant answer. It can also help us improve our
   documentation if something’s missing.
3. Be specific. If you ask a vague question, you’re likely to get a vague answer. The more
   details and context you can give, the more able someone will be to give you a relevant,
   personalized answer. For example, “Why was my URL removal request denied?” is likely to get you
   a link to
   this article,
   as removals can be denied for a variety of reasons. However, if you say what type of removal you
   requested, what denial reason you got, and/or the URL in question, you’re more likely to get
   personalized advice on what went wrong in your case and what you can do differently.
4. Make it relevant to others. As I said earlier, we like to help as many people at a time
   as we can. If you make it clear how your question is relevant to more people than just you,
   we’ll have more incentive to look into it. For example: “How can site owners get their videos
   into Google Video search? In particular, I’m asking about the videos on www.example.com.”
5. Let us know if you’ve found a bug. As above, the more specific you can be, the better.
   What happened? What page or URL were you on? If it’s in Webmaster Tools, what site were you
   managing? Do you have a screenshot? All of these things help us track down the issue sooner.
   We appreciate your feedback, but if it’s too vague we won’t understand what you’re trying to
   tell us!
6. Stay on-topic. Have a question about Google Analytics? iGoogle? Google Apps? That’s
   great; go ask it in the
   Analytics / iGoogle / Apps forum.
   Not every Googler is familiar with every product Google offers, so you probably won’t get an
   answer if you’re asking a Webmaster Central team member about something other than Web Search
   or Webmaster Tools.
7. Stay calm. Trust me, we’ve heard it all. Making threats, being aggressive or accusatory,
   YELLING IN ALL CAPS, asking for “heeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp!!!!!1!!,” or claiming Google is involved in
   a mass conspiracy against you and your associates because your sites aren’t ranked on page
   one… Rather than making others want to help you, these things are likely to turn people off.
   The best way to get someone to help is by calmly explaining the situation, giving details, and
   being clear about what you’re asking for.
8. Listen, even when it’s not what you wanted to hear. The answer to your question may not
   always be the one you wanted; but that doesn’t mean that answer isn’t correct. There are many
   areas of SEO and website design that are as much an art as a science, so a conclusive answer
   isn’t always possible. When in doubt, you can ask people to cite their sources, or to explain
   how/where they learned something. But keep an open mind and remember that most people are just
   trying to help, even if they don’t agree with you or tell you what you wanted to hear.
9. Bonus tip: Are you more comfortable communicating in a language other than English? We
   have Webmaster Help Forums
   available in 18 other languages.

Posted by
Susan Moskwa,
Webmaster Trends Analyst