Many people have speculated in the past and it is clearer than ever that Google organizers many SERPs according to what they believe is the most useful results for a specific user intention. The Google bombshell reported by SEOMoz on the leak of Google’s Search Quality Guidelines which outlines many interesting categorizations of Google’s outlook on the relationship between user intentions as seen through their search query and the websites that show up for that keyword.

The most important idea that one can gain from this document is that linking in many ways is secondary to a website’s ability to offer a useful address for their intentions that lie behind their search.  The emphasis placed on picking useful sites and not necessarily those sites that have the most links or content is something that is becoming more and more apparent as time goes on.  This is certainly the case after Panda update, but this is also a self fulfilling concept in the sense that sites that are most useful for a given keyword will eventually get the kind of links Google wants to see and of course a lower bounce rate driving that site higher on the SERPs.

It is clear going forward that it will be harder and harder to “game” the system through linking and rather what will really matter is building quality sites with “useful” information.