Google SEO
Search Engine Land is your premier source for Google SEO news, strategies, and in-depth content.
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Google’s search algorithms evolve constantly, and staying ahead of these updates is key to maintaining and improving your website’s rankings. Whether it’s changes to core web vitals, guides to E-E-A-T, or advancements in AI-driven search like generative AI features in Google Search, understanding these shifts can give you a competitive edge.
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Google adds two new Googlebot crawlers: GoogleOther-Image and GoogleOther-Video
Google said these new crawlers are to "better support crawling of binary data that may be used for research and development."
Google rolls out AI Overviews in US with more countries coming soon
AI Overview link cards get a higher click through rate than normal web search results but Google won't break out click data in Search Consoles for content creators.
Technical SEO tips to master Google core updates
Make sure your site checks all the technical aspects of SEO, including website structure, URL optimization, page speed, and crawlability.
Surviving and thriving in the new Google
Navigating March 2024 updates for content creation, link building, and SEO success
Google begins enforcement of site reputation abuse policy with portions of sites being delisted
Sites like CNN, USA Today, LA Times and others are seeing their rented subdomains and subfolders dropping in rankings after they were hit by manual actions.
Google disavow link tool will go away at some point
John Mueller said, "At some point, I'm sure we'll remove it," referring to the disavow link tool in Google Search Console.
Google March 2024 core update rollout is now complete
The first core update of 2024 finished rolling out on April 19 - this was a pretty big one but it overlapped with other big changes leading to a 45% reduction in unhelpful content.
Google Publisher Center to stop allowing you to add publications
Instead, Google will automatically add eligible publishers and will eventually remove those publishers not eligible.
Google structured data carousels (beta) clarified for summary pages
Google also added the feature availability for this carousel beta.
Google did not drop Web Stories from image results
Google issued a correction plus explained Search Console had a reporting bug with Web Stories in Image Search.
Google adds 3D model markup for product structured data
Now when you have multiple images, this markup can help Google known which image the 3D image references.
Google March 2024 spam update done rolling out
The spam update took nearly 15 days to complete. Google's core update is still rolling out, so we're not done yet. Remain seated and buckled.
Google to replace perspectives filter with forums filter
The perspectives carousels, clusters and traditional web page listings will remain.
Google updates its page experience docs to clarify ranking signals
Core Web Vitals are a ranking signal but not other page experience signals.
What we’re seeing a week into the Google March 2024 core and spam updates
Ranking volatility hit on Friday and Saturday, with limited reversals on Monday after a storm of manual actions last Thursday.
Google Interaction to Next Paint coming to Core Web Vitals this Tuesday
Don't confuse this with the Google Core Update - they are two very different things.
Google issues search ranking penalties through manual actions
Check your properties within Google Search Console for manual actions to see if your were impacted.
Google Search Console recipe rich result report adds two new properties
Google added recipeInstructions and recipeIngredient and thus you may see an increase in warnings for recipe items.
Google Search turned off some event rich results
Google says you may see a drop in clicks and impressions for your event search appearance reported metrics in your performance report.
Google releasing massive search quality enhancements in March 2024 core update and multiple spam updates
The Google helpful content update is now part of the core update; all of this leading to a 40% reduction in unhelpful content within search.
How to optimize Google Core Web Vitals with real user data
Collecting data on visitor experiences on your website can help you pass Google’s Core Web Vitals assessment and the new Interaction to Next Paint metric.
New Google structured data carousels (beta)
Google has new documentation on what it also called host carousels within Google Search.
Google Chrome updates search suggestions
Google Chrome will now show you what others are searching for in the search box and search suggestions will show more image thumbnails.
Google removes option to see more local results in the search results
It is unclear if this was intentionally removed or if this is a bug that Google will fix soon.
Article complaining about being outranked on Google being outranked by Reddit
Google responds that it wants to do better with ranking smaller sites amongst larger sites, only to see that article being outranked by a larger site.
How to improve and monitor Interaction to Next Paint
What you need to know about Interaction to Next Paint, Google’s new Core Web Vitals metric.
Google adds support for product variants and clarifies return fees
The new product variants has three new properties; hasVariant, variesBy and productGroupID.
Google wants you to label AI-generated images used in Merchant Center
"Don't remove embedded metadata tags such as trainedAlgorithmicMedia from such images," Google wrote.
Google’s new search experiences in the European Economic Area
Due to the DMA, Google has launched new rich results, aggregator units, refinement chips and flight results.
Featured snippets disappear from the Google search results
Did Google intentionally remove the featured snippets or is this a new bug?
Google drops Web Stories from image results, Google Discover carousel view and more
Google changed where Web Stories show in Google Search and Google Discover - a long time coming...
Google revamps SEO Starter Guide to focus on a starter audience
The Google SEO starter guide also has been significantly cut down and shortened. Here's what's changed and why.
Google Search officially retires cache link
Google might add links to the Wayback Machine in place of the cache link.
Google Search resolves indexing issue after 7 days
Starting at around 11:30 pm ET Monday, January 31, some sites noticed indexing issues with Google Search.
Google Core Web Vitals to add Interaction to Next Paint on March 12
We now know the specific date as to when Google will replace FID with INP as a Core Web Vitals metric.
Secrets of a $10 million SEO success story
Whether you're a business owner, marketer or entrepreneur, this webinar will fuel your journey toward success.
Google performance reports updates how it counts clicks and impressions for job listing and detail pages
No changes were made to Google Search, this is just a reporting change.
Google confirms a search ranking bug where sites disappear from search results over the weekend
"We're aware of a very narrow issue that caused temporary fluctuations in search results for a small number of websites. The issue has since been resolved, and the sites should no longer be seeing its effects," a Google spokesperson told Search Engine Land.
Google to cut thousands of search quality rater jobs after dropping contract with Appen
Appen says the termination notice goes into affect on March 19, 2024.