Yes, it does.

To judge the quality of their findings properly you'd have to perform the same research yourself.

Judging some factors surrounding the content is quickly done, and generally a good approximation for the quality of the content itself.

How obnoxious is the website, how tasteful is the design? Is the copyright year in the footer up-to-date (terrible signal if the year is wrong)?

A crass analogy, but I'll not take health advice from someone with brown stains on their pants either.