French excellence (2016–2019) : 4 SEO contests

A structured French scene driven by players such as Wix (SEO Hero) and the Qwant search engine (Qwanturank, €50,000 in prizes and anti-spam testing).

Contests of the period

Cricetus

SEO contest 2016 · French excellence

2016

SEO Hero

SEO contest run by Wix, which staged search-ranking competition at scale.

2017

Qwanturank

Launched by the Qwant search engine: €50,000 in prizes and anti-spam testing.

2019

Algorithmic context

2016

  • AMP launches (February); Penguin 4.0 becomes part of the core algorithm in real time (September).
  • Mobile-first indexing is announced (November 2016).

2017

  • Penalty for intrusive mobile interstitials (January 2017).
  • “Fred” update (March 2017) aimed at monetisation-driven content.

2019

  • New sites move to mobile-first indexing by default (July 2019).
  • rel="sponsored" and rel="ugc" introduced (September); BERT rolls out in Search (October).

Lessons

  • Brands and engines adopt the format to test their algorithms and engage the community.
  • Prizes and anti-spam rules professionalise the competition.

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