Google Doesn’t Know When Super Bowl 2015 Starts (Yet!)

Go ahead, ask Google [when does the super bowl start] or [what time does the super bowl start] and Google will give you the date and time for last year’s Super Bowl. Last year’s Super Bowl was on Sunday, February 2nd at 6:30 p.m. ET. This year, it is on Sunday, February 1st.

This query has been the target of publications for years, in order to rank well for it so they can gain clicks, impressions and ultimately ad revenue. It has been notorious for SEO efforts by publications and Google knows it, but year-after-year, the issue persists.

Danny Sullivan documented how publications are targeting the Super Bowl start time for ranking purposes for years.

It is interesting that the correct Google Answer is not provided in these queries but rather only a knowledge graph pulled Google Answer that shows content from a publisher with the wrong information.

When you search [when is the super bowl], Google is able to give the correct answer:

But not when you search for [when does the super bowl start] or [what time does the super bowl start] as illustrated above and here:

Google will likely adjust their quick answers shortly to incorporate more like-queries around the start date of the Super Bowl.

Bing gets it right more often, but not for this query: