Suppose you’re looking to buy a smartphone under ₹15,000, where would you go? Flipkart? Amazon? Maybe Croma or Reliance Digital?
Now, would you ever think of checking out NDTV for smartphone deals?
No? Exactly.
But for NDTV’s SEO team, this makes perfect sense. Apparently, the thinking is — we’re a reputed news site, so why not use that reputation to rank for high-volume tech keywords? After all, if you rank #1 for “Smartphones Under ₹15,000,” surely the traffic will flood in. But if that traffic doesn’t convert, they blame Google. Convenient, right?
All Started after NDTV Executive Editor Rant about Google ranking Algorithms
Recently, NDTV’s Executive Editor for Growth, Amit Chaturvedi, compared Google to a boss who never speaks, randomly changes your KPIs overnight, and punishes you without explanation. Dramatic, right? But also kind of funny. He wrote:
“Trying to please the world’s most powerful algorithm is like attempting to win Employee of the Month without knowing the rules.”
Amit Chaturvedi
Amit’s frustration is real, and many in SEO share it. Algorithms are tricky, and Google doesn’t always offer crystal-clear updates. But here’s the twist — NDTV is not your average blogger. It’s not a struggling local business trying to figure out SEO. This is a media giant, pulling 100+ million monthly visits from Google according to SEMrush. Even SimilarWeb puts them at a solid 65 million.
NDTV website traffic on SEMrush
Yet they’re ranting about Google’s tantrums?
Other Side of the Story: Google Was Helping NDTV Grow
Here’s what makes the rant ironic. Just last year, Google publicly showcased NDTV in a blog post, celebrating how they partnered through something called the GNI Real-Time News Quality Index Playbook. This gave NDTV real-time data on how users interacted with stories so they could tailor content for higher engagement. The result? A 24% increase in Google traffic.
So NDTV isn’t operating in the dark. They literally had a Google-built pipeline for optimizing content.
And now they’re saying, “We don’t know the rules”?
That’s like getting coached by the umpire and then complaining the game’s unfair.
So, What’s the Real Issue?
Amit says Google’s updates feel like passive-aggressive Slack messages — one day your article is flying, next day it vanishes. No memo, no notice. Just a “core update.” That’s rough, sure. But let’s look at what NDTV has been doing.
Almost 6k articles on Palak Tiwari, more than 5k articles on Poonam Pandey and so on
NDTV has thousands of articles on topics like “Palak Tiwari’s airport look” or Reddit posts turned into news with barely any added journalism. So when they say, “We want to be journalists, but Google won’t let us,” the SEO world can’t help but laugh a little.
Because what NDTV calls journalism… kinda looks like content farming wrapped in reputation.
Using Site Reputation to do “Keyword Stuffing”
Amit also complains about editorial meetings revolving around SEO, where SEO experts “sound like astrologers.” He says they’re always trying to predict the next Google move instead of focusing on meaningful stories. He even described growth as a “sugar rush — addictive, unsustainable, and occasionally nauseating.”
But here’s the thing — this “nauseating” growth is self-inflicted.
Instead of using its powerhouse newsroom to tell stories that matter, NDTV is chasing keywords like “Smartphones under ₹10,000” and “Salman Khan diet.”
NDTV content farming exposed
They’re using their journalistic reputation to grab commercial traffic, hoping Google doesn’t notice the bait-and-switch.
NDTV using their site reputation to target high volume commercial keywords
But Google does notice. Because its entire business model is user satisfaction. If users land on NDTV while searching for phones but end up bouncing back to Flipkart or Amazon — that’s a poor experience. And when Google sees that pattern, it does what it does best: downranks.
And then what happens? The SEO team cries foul. “Why are we not ranking anymore?”
Simple. Google gave you the traffic when it thought you were the best result. But if users don’t think so, reputation isn’t enough. You can’t trick user intent forever.
NDTV please hire a better SEO Agency
NDTV’s SEO team seems to be on a keyword scavenger hunt, turning anything remotely searchable into a page. Buying a smartwatch? Used car? A Flipkart sale? Forget product experts — we’ve got NDTV journalists moonlighting as shopping assistants!
If you’re NDTV, why stop here? Next headline:
“How To Choose A Life Partner Based on Smartphone Battery Life – Experts Reveal!”
NDTV
Bloggers vs. Big Media
Smaller publishers and bloggers — the very ones who get crushed by core updates — don’t have access to real-time engagement dashboards from Google. They don’t have full-time SEO teams or Google Playbooks. Yet they try to compete.
So when NDTV, with its massive resources, partners with Google for optimization and still plays victim, it feels less like a “rant” and more like a spoiled complaint.
“You’re the country’s biggest news website. You have reporters, staff, equipment. Why are you keyword stuffing? You’re snatching traffic from bloggers and crying when it stops.”
Journalism or Just Traffic?
Amit Chaturvedi ends with a plea:
“We want to write stories that matter AND stories that rank. If SEO is the new editor-in-chief, can we at least get the style guide?”
Amit Chaturvedi
That’s a fair ask. But maybe — just maybe — the real issue isn’t the style guide. It’s the intent. If NDTV wants to be a tech site, then be one. Build a separate vertical. Get a different domain. Create actual value.
