Introduction to Search Engine Optimization Exam Answers

Introduction to Search Engine Optimization Exam Answers

In this course, you will be introduced to the foundational elements of how the most popular search engine, Google, works, how the SEO landscape is constantly changing and what you can expect in the future.

 

• Pass rate: 80% or higher to pass
• Retake period: Attempts 3 every 8 hours.

Exam: https://www.coursera.org/learn/search-engine-optimization

 

Questions:

 

Getting Started & Introduction to SEO

Graded Quiz • 30 min, Week 1

 

From the list below, choose the answer that most closely matches what the instructor described as the BEST way to learn and implement SEO, according to the lectures in this lesson.

• Following Google best practices and reaching out to Google with questions and concerns
• Strict adherence to standards documents and workflow procedures
• Continuous practice, testing, and modifying of content and optimization plans
• Repetition of ideas and policies that have been proven to succeed in the past

 

The overall focus of most “white hat” SEOs is traditionally:

• Improving organic search results
• Increasing advertising revenue
• “Churn and burn” SEO (high turnover)
• Acquiring paid links

 

True or False: Search Engine Marketing is another, interchangeable term for SEO.

• True
• False

 

Based on the discussion of SEO careers in this course, which of the following are potential careers that fall under the SEO umbrella? (Select all that apply.)

• Contracting for a variety of sites and companies
• Running the Public Relations campaign for a website
• Developing content for blogs and social media
• Working in-house for a company
• Working on-site at a marketing agency

 

How much of a website’s traffic comes from the first page of search results?

• Approximately 40%
• Less than 20%
• Close to 100%
• Approximately 70%
• Approximately 25%

 

What are three things an SEO hiring manager might look for in an SEO job candidate? (Select all that apply.)

• Whether or not the candidate is a good cultural fit
• Their college GPA
• Current level of SEO skill and knowledge
• How quickly a candidate can acquire new skills

 

Why might an SEO hiring manager ask a job candidate to perform a quick site audit? (Select all that apply.)

• To assess the candidate’s ability to work well with graphic artists
• To see if a candidate can identify issues to be addressed and make recommendations
• To ensure the candidate only has a basic understanding of SEO issues
• It mirrors a task the candidate would have to do if hired

 

Which of the following should a SEO job candidate include in their LinkedIn profile to attract potential employers? (Select all that apply.)

• List of SEO skills that appeal to employers, such as HTML proficiency
• Link to a website you have created to demonstrate your skills in making a website more visible in search engines
• Key words related to SEO
• Links to articles of SEO professionals you admire

 

What is something SEO professional Dave Lloyd suggests you do to help learn how to improve a website’s ranking in a search engine?

• Place a unique sentence somewhere on your website and then search for it
• Link your site to your Facebook profile
• Randomly try out various key words on your site to see what helps its rank
• Ask friends to visit the site to boost its ranking

 

Suppose you have 1-3 years SEO-related experience, you’ve built your own website and know the basics of HTML, and you have one year of experience working in a company; for which position would you be best qualified?

• In-house Junior SEO Analyst
• In-house Senior SEO Analyst
• Agency Junior SEO Analyst

 

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Introduction to Search Engine Optimization – Evolution of SEO

Graded Quiz • 30 min, Week 2

 

What is the primary method by which robots (crawlers, spiders) discover new web pages?

• Google and other search engines manually add new sites to an index on a regular basis
• User queries activate robots and cause them to begin searching the web
• Robots follow the path created by websites linking to each other
• Webmasters submit their sites to be indexed

 

True or False: Search engines have evolved to the point where the relevance and density of keywords are no longer a ranking factor for websites.

• True
• False

 

The person widely referred to as the creator of the World Wide Web is:

• Alan Emtage
• Vannevar Bush
• Gerard Salton
• Ted Nelson
• Tim Berners-Lee

 

According to this course, which of the following is the first true “search engine”?

• ALIWEB
• ARCHIE
• ARPANET
• WWW Wanderer
• SMART

 

Google’s version of sponsored links that appear for certain keywords is called:

• Excite
• AdWords
• Overture
• AdVerbs
• AdSense

 

What does a robot determine about a new website once it has analyzed it? (Select all that apply.)

• The relevance of content to a user’s search
• The quality of the site’s content
• What the site is about
• What topics the site should rank for

 

How was the Excite search engine unique for its time?

• It did not provide a ranking system
• It ranked search engine results based on statistical analysis of word relationships
• It collected titles and headers of web pages using a linear search method
• It listed results as they were discovered on the Internet

 

In which of the following ways did the Yahoo search engine revolutionize web searching?

• It created directories for users to navigate
• It was the first to index titles and URLs
• It was the first to analyze word relationships
• It created headers to simplify searches

 

In the early 1990s, what was a primary debate regarding the identity of the Internet?

• Should it charge for user usage?
• Should it continue to exist, or was it already obsolete?
• Should it restrict access to users based on geographical location?
• Should it be monetized or remain a free exchange of information?

 

What action can you take to aid in the process of having web crawlers, spiders, or robots discover your site?

• Perform a search query
• Add your site to free services like Google Webmasters Tools
• Submit your site directly to a search engine

 

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Introduction to Search Engine Optimization – Current SEO Best Practices

Graded Quiz • 30 min, Week 3

 

In the context of this course and of SEO, what is an algorithm?

• All of these describe an algorithm
• A piece of software designed to analyze content and determine where it displays in search
• A loose collection of rules applied manually to discourage certain SEO practices
• A physical server system that stores and executes search commands based on specific criteria
• A set of standards put in place to penalize fraudulent or inappropriate websites
• A purpose-built program used to “crawl” and index websites

 

Which of the following was not an algorithm update in the traditional sense? (Check all that apply.)

• Brandy
• Austin
• Florida
• Universal
• Panda

 

SEOs have determined that Google uses over _____ ranking factors that go into ranking a website, and over _____ updates a year to their ranking and listing algorithms.

• 200, 500
• 50, 100
• 75, 60
• 100, 200
• 500, 1000

 

When dealing with algorithm penalties:

• A site can be affected by multiple updates at once, but more severe penalties will override smaller penalties
• One site can only be affected by one update at a time
• A site can be affected by multiple updates, but only if they occur near each other
• A site can be affected by more than one update, but no more than two at once
• All of the mentioned options are true
• A site can be affected by multiple updates from multiple time periods if issues are left uncorrected

 

Once a manual penalty has been applied to your site, the only way to see any improvement in your rankings is to wait for the next round of algorithm updates.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following “spammy” SEO practices did the Florida update target?

• Defining a site’s neighborhood by linking to other related sites
• Use of the same text repeatedly in backlink profile
• Repeating the same keyword in page title and on-page copy
• Baiting users to their site with one product only to sell them a different product in the end

 

Why do search engines need to adjust their algorithms frequently?

• Some webmasters over-optimize a site for a particular algorithm to increase the site’s rank despite whether or not it is relevant.
• They want to ensure the authority of sites created without a clear SEO strategy.
• All webmasters follow best practices when optimizing their websites for search engine ranking, and search engines need to make frequent updates to keep up with the latest best practices.
• Search engines face penalties if they do not frequently update their algorithms.

 

What does Google’s list of SEO best practices offer SEO professionals?

• It offers guidelines on how to ensure websites are optimized for search
• It provides guidelines for deceptive SEO strategies
• It provides guidelines for how to trick search engines into ranking a website first for a particular topic
• It offers guidelines on how to ensure websites are over-optimized for search

 

Which of the following are considered manipulative link practices? (Select all that apply.)

• Comment spam
• Link networks
• Paid links
• Aggressive exact match anchor text

 

What types of sites had better visibility after the Pigeon update?

• Directories and restaurant guides
• Recipe aggregators
• Online taxi services
• Blogs and restaurant menus

 

Which of the following statements is NOT true concerning the Panda update?

• It is not a one-time update. Panda updates continue to roll out from time to time.
• It was a one-time update that eliminated low quality websites from ranking well in search results
• It was designed to prevent sites with low quality content from ranking well in search results
• Panda updates roll out gradually over several months

 

What does Google’s Link Disavow tool do?

• Allows website owners to remove their links to other sites
• Allows websites to remove links to high quality sites that boost a site’s authority
• Rolls out the latest Penguin update to a site
• Allows website owners to remove spammy links

 

What is a “core algorithm update”?

• It permanently improves an existing algorithm by rewriting it entirely
• It temporarily improves an existing algorithm by replacing outdated parts
• It temporarily weakens an existing algorithm by deleting the beginning of its code
• It permanently improves an existing algorithm by replacing parts that are outdated

 

How was Google able to improve conversational searches with the Hummingbird update?

• It upgraded from recognizing just synonyms to also recognizing context
• It upgraded from recognizing just location to also recognize synonyms
• It upgraded by distinguishing between sound and conversation
• It upgraded from recognizing voices to also identifying intent

 

How did the Mobile update change search engine results?

• It applied a penalty to any site without a mobile-friendly version for users
• It had a severe, negative impact on desktop search engine results for websites
• It began analyzing how mobile-friendly a site is when ranking mobile results
• It minimized the importance of having a mobile-friendly site for users

 

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Introduction to Search Engine Optimization – SEO of Today, Tomorrow and Beyond

Graded Quiz • 30 min, Week 4

 

According to the course, which of the following have SEOs decided is no longer the most valid ranking factor?

• Optimized content
• Link profile
• Specific Keyword density
• Topic association
• Semantic analysis

 

An extended, natural term or phrase that appears on a page and increases relevancy is known as a:

• Long-tail keyword
• Synonym keyword
• Semantic relationship
• Dynamic keyword
• Focus keyword

 

Semantic analysis can be summarized as:

• Looking at how words are organized and cataloged on business sites
• Looking at how words are related to each other
• Looking at how keywords relate to paid search results
• Looking at how “focus” keywords are related to keyword trends on related sites
• Looking at how words are related to a registered domain name
• All of the above

 

Entity Association is when:

• Software tries to determine if a query can be matched to a specific individual or thing
• A gatekeeper program tries to determine if the user accessing a site is a real human or a bot
• All of the above
• Search engine providers attempt to match a specific individual to their fraudulent site(s)
• A search algorithm compares existing content with previously-penalized content
• Software tries to determine if a query can be matched to a paid, branded link

 

When considering the validity of a brand, search providers consider which factors?

• Active social media presence
• Valid contact information listed on homepage
• Search volume based on brand name
• Number of mentions around the web
• Engagement with search providers to increase marketing
• All of the above

 

Which of the following are ways Google algorithms are able to determine how useful documents on the web are to users?

• Keyword usage and over-optimization
• Keyword analysis and number of backlinks
• Topic modeling and association
• Analyzing the number of backlinks to the document

 

Topic Association is _______. (Select all that apply.)

• Used by search engines to improve location identification capabilities
• A method of linking to other websites based on their topic or theme
• Utilized by search engines to analyze the theme or topic of a site
• Used by search engines to determine relevancy and trustworthiness of a site

 

Keeping in mind how Topic Association affects search engine results, what is one way you can optimize content for a website to have it seen as more relevant to a particular topic?

• Determine a site’s keyword and then use words and phrases related to or synonymous with the focus keyword
• Determine a site’s keyword and use it repeatedly throughout the website
• Perform your own, thorough semantic analysis of the site
• String long tail keywords one after the other throughout the site regardless of how they make sense contextually

 

What are some ways you can help your brand grow online? (Select all that apply.)

• Develop social presence
• Create great content
• Don’t put resources into offline efforts
• Acquire links from trusted sites

 

Which of the following are true statements regarding why brands are carrying more importance in Google’s relevancy algorithm? (Select all that apply.)

• Users appear to be more satisfied with search results when they see brands they recognize
• Google does not appear to favor brands or associated entities with its relevancy algorithm
• Searchers’ familiarity with certain brands means they are biased towards them
• Smaller brands bring a greater variety of users to sites