How Google understands synonyms
Google software engineer Steven Baker wrote a blog post on how Google handles synonyms. Understanding natural language is a challenge for all search engines and Google found that 70% of user searches are affected by synonyms.
Feedback from users and quality raters on search result page mistakes isn’t used to manually fix bad synonyms, but rather to refine algorithms. Through this process, Google has achieved an impressive 98% accuracy in understanding synonyms.
Google is able to distinguish between singular and plural versions of a word that may have different meanings (like arm reduction and arms reduction) and will bold synonyms in snippets just like the actual words that formed the query.
How Google’s algorithm changes can affect SEO
We can assume that using synonyms in page content, anchor text and link titles would make the language flow more naturally, wouldn’t affect rankings and would definitely improve user experience on websites.
The truth is that currently SEO still needs to optimise for different synonyms to be able to rank pages for competitive keywords. Check a comparison between searches for “motorbike” and “motorcycle”: The two SERPs are completely different and synonyms aren’t bolded. Interestingly enough, Wikipedia’s “Motorcycle” page ranks #1 for motorbike, but only #5 for motorcycle.
Search results will change if you add a “+” before the keyword to exclude synonyms.
Give Google feedback on algorithm mistakes using the #googlesyns Twitter hashtag or through the web search help center forum.
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