We hope you are in good health. Here are some of the major SEO news updates of the week you need to know:
Search Related Updates and News from Major Search Engines
Is Googlebot Bothered By a Site’s Reliance on Javascript?
Google’s Search Advocate John Mueller asked a question during a recent Google Search Central SEO office-hours hangout, asking if it’s bad for a website to be dependent on JavaScript for fundamental functionality. Is it possible that this will have a detrimental impact on Googlebot’s crawling and indexing? Mueller said it’s probably fine, but he also suggested specific steps to ensure that neither Google nor users have any issues with the site.
On Monday, May 16th, Google Updated it’s Search Rankings
For the first time in a long time, we enjoyed a quiet weekend, but it didn’t last long. We detected many signals of a likely Google search ranking algorithm modification on Monday, May 16th, although Google has not verified it.
Google Displays a Video Thumbnail in the SERPs Without Embedding the Video?
On Twitter, Crystal Carter shared an example of Google displaying a video thumbnail for a fragment of her page that did not actually contain a video. As a result, if you go to the exact page, there is no video to watch. To be fair, there is an OG video tag in the source code with the video, but there is no visible video on the page that a user may play.
Education Q&A Rich Results are Now Available in Google Search Console Performance Reports
We know how Google now supports Education Q&A structured data in Google Search as Google rich results. Education Q&A is now showing up in Google Search Console’s search performance reports for some people who have installed it.
For Things to do & Review Summaries, Google Hotel Results Using Reviews
For years, Google has used Google Maps reviews to power very sophisticated search capabilities. Here are a few additional things that may or may not be new but that you should be aware of. Google, for example, uses hotel ratings to create lists of things to do and to display brief descriptions of those hotels.
Bing Autocomplete Search Bar Now Includes Trending, Related and People Also Ask!
Microsoft Bing is experimenting with displaying more information in the search bar drop-down menu for autocompleting search recommendations. Bing now displays trending searches, relevant searches, and user-initiated searches in that menu.
PPC Related Updates and News
Google Ads is Experimenting Replacing the Ad Label With a Sponsored one
Google Ads is once again experimenting with replacing the “ads” label with a “supported” designation. And, just so you know, Google replaced the “sponsored” label with an “ad” label in 2010 and hasn’t changed it since. Yes, we do occasionally see “sponsored” labels in Google Search, but not for regular search advertisements, which have been labeled “ads” for the UK and US areas for quite some time.
Social Media Updates and News
Spam Predominates in Facebook’s Most Popular Links
The most popular pieces for the second half of 2021 were revealed in Meta’s newest commonly viewed content report. The study also includes statistics on content that is shared frequently, a list of the most popular domains, and the most popular links, pages, and posts among US users. Meta is implementing a new system for reporting on the most popular articles. Meta was selected to present results based on both the old methodology and the new approach in this report. The top metrics used by Meta to create the widely watched content report were “content views” and “viewers.” The updated criterion for connections featured in the frequently seen links report is one of the most significant modifications. In order to be deemed a seen link, a link must now create a preview.
With Gifted Memberships, YouTube has added a new way to make money
With membership giving, a service similar to Twitch’s awarded subscriptions, YouTube allows creators another method to make money directly from their audience. This will enable viewers to purchase channel memberships for friends and family. For fans, it’s a way to show their support for their favorite creators while also contributing to the community. To begin, a beta version of Channel Memberships Gifting is being rolled out to a select set of artists, with additional channels to follow in the following months.
