Google has added a new search filter option to the advanced search page named "Reading level."
The purpose is to give users a way to find content based on their reading level. The options include:
- No reading level displayed
- annotate results with reading levels
- show only basic results
- show only intermediate results
- show only advanced results
Google has categorized web pages into three main categories i.e. basic, Intermediate and Advance. Users searching on Google can specify the option in 'Advance Search' and will be served pages based on their reading level preference. Advance search option is available just below and right hand side of Google search box.
The option is useful if you want to filter the search results according to your needs. For e.g. If you are a scientist and looking for some research material, you can always opt for the 'Advance' level reading. On the other hand, if i am looking for a simply written 'Pizza' making recipe, then i would like to read only 'Basic' level pages.
The other side of the coin could be that the website owners can find the reading level of their website as identified by Google. You just need to use the command
site:YourWebsite.com with this filter on and it will show the site's reading level. The option to be selected for this is
"annotate results with reading levels" as it marks the search results with their reading level.
For e.g. When i did this for our site www.am22tech.com, we found that 71% of our content is of intermediate reading level.
What this means is that if the Google user has opted to search only the intermediate level pages, then the Google would only search 71% of our site's pages for serving that user search.
For e.g. If Google has indexed 100 pages from our website and the user has opted for only basic level reading pages, our site will only be able to serve 24 good Basic level pages as per Google's search index. This means that Google will effectively leave and never serve the remaining 76 pages for this basic reading level query.
This is a very good tool exposed by Google for webmasters to optimize their web content according to the reading level of their audience.
The tool can easily point out the deficiency in your website/blog if it was not giving you returns as per your expectations. If your target audience is general public and your web/blog content is considered intermediate level content by Google, then obviously you are someone who is creating a comb for bald population!!