Google My Business Suggest Edit Gets More Robust
We’ve been covering a couple of the changes to the suggest edit feature in Google Maps, Google Local, Google My Business, Google Places or whatever you want to call it. Amy Toman spotted many of these but now she is seeing more including more explanat…
Google News Showcase Search Console Filters & More Features
Google News Showcase was officially announced last October as an experience for publishers to show news in Google. Well, now it is expanding in many ways including paywalled content for free, a News Showcase panels from suggested publications, News Sho…
Google December 2020 Core Update Is Live – Here Is What We See Now
Google has launched the December 2020 Broad Core Update yesterday afternoon, this comes after SEOs eagerly awaiting an update since the May 2020 core update seven months ago. Some thought we might not get another core update in 2020 but we did.
Google Page Experience & Core Web Vitals Icon In Search Results
Remember Google said they would soon begin testing a visual indicator in the search results for the upcoming Google Page Experience Update? Well, we may be seeing Google testing this visual indicator or icon or label in the search results. It looks l…
Search Buzz Video Recap: Google December Core Update, Page Experience FAQ, News Showcase & 17 Year Anniversary
This week, I published the monthly Google Webmaster report, it is a good place to catch up and get a quick refresher on the month. Google has begun rolling out their third broad core update yesterday…
Google Maps Improves Messaging & Performance Insights Reports
As we have been expecting, Google has rolled out more ways for businesses to message and communicate with customers. Plus, Google is also rolling out more performance insights reports to see how customers are finding your business in Google Maps and Se…
Google Tests Half Line Break Design In Search Results
Google is testing yet another form of layouts for the Google Search results. Here Google is testing showing half of a line break of some sorts to separate out the top answers and features snippets and other sections.
Google Handles display:none & visibility:hidden The Same
A while back, JR Oakes asked Martin Splitt of Google if he can confirm if there is a difference between display:none and visibility:hidden in terms of Google’s ability to “see” the content in the container? Martin said he does not think there is a di…
Google Page Experience Update Ranking Factor Will Apply To Mobile Search Only
So yesterday, I accidentally published a story too quickly, around a new FAQ around Google’s Page Experience Update. One point in there that is new information is this line “using page experience as a signal for ranking will apply only to mobile Search…
December 2020 Google Webmaster Report
November was a pretty busy month where Google gave us a date for the launch of the page experience update and with that…
Google Core Web Vitals & Page Experience FAQs
Google posted an FAQ around Core Web Vitals and the upcoming Google Page Experience update. Google’s Cheney Tsai said the company has compiled some of the most frequently asked questions about Core Web Vitals and Page Experience.
Google Help Doc On Advanced Crawl Budget Management
Google has released a help document named large site owner’s guide to managing your crawl budget. It is an advanced help document on helping developers manage Googlebot crawls on their web site. It reminds me of the blog post Gary Illyes of Google wrot…
Google Discover Ads Has A New Format Option
Google announced a new Google Discover ads format to choose from. There is a new 4:5 portrait aspect ratio format that helps advertisers visually showcase their products and services more prominently with consumers as they scroll and it leads into the …
Poll: Most SEOs Would Ignore Spammy Links But Many Would Disavow Them
Lily Ray ran a poll (I am kicking myself for not seeing it to retweet it but it has over 500 results). The poll asked how would you handle a lot of really spammy links pointing to your clients sites. The response was most would ignore the links but m…
December 1 Google Search Ranking Algorithm Update
There may be another Google search ranking algorithm update rolling out again. This one started around Tuesday, December 1, 2020. Google has not confirmed this but there is chatter and the tracking tools are also showing an update.
New Google Maps Community Feed Within The Explore Tab
Google Maps has added a new social feature in the map software named the “community feed.” It can be found in the explorer tab within the Google Maps app on Android and iOS. It is a way for you to find out what the community is sharing about a specifi…
17 Years Covering The Search Industry
Today marks the 17th anniversary of starting this site, the Search Engine Roundtable. I’ve been writing about search for over 40% of my life – which is weird to think about. And I’ve been doing it consistently every workday, several times per day, even…
Google Merchant Center: Build Your Own Performance Reports
Google Merchant Center seems to be rolling out a new reporting feature that lets you build your own performance report. You should be able to access this in the Google Merchant Center under the “Performance” tab.
Google Local Panel Adjusts How To Suggest An Edit To Store Hours
Google has made a small tweak to the “suggest an edit” feature in the local panel results. Yes, you can still suggest an edit but now if you click on the arrow to expand the hours of that business or store, Google will let you suggest an edit specific…
Google: We Do Not Support Nested XML Sitemap Index Files
Ryan Siddle, an SEO, asked John Mueller of Google if Google supports nested XML sitemap index files. The answer is no, Google does not support it. But Google does have a help document on how to split up your large sitemap files.