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
Google’s John Muller Explains Geotargetting
During a recent Google Search Central SEO office-hours hangout, John Mueller, Google’s Search Advocate, demonstrates how websites may use subdirectories strategically to improve content for search results in specific countries. Other than seeking for hreflang implementation, Hazel Wwrong joins the webcast to question Mueller how Google identifies when page content is geotargeted.
Mueller responds by describing how Google looks for patterns in URLs that indicate the country for which a page is intended.
Google’s Page Experience Algorithm is All Set to Roll Out For Desktop Users
Google confirmed that its Page Experience algorithm upgrade for desktop search results is now being rolled out “slowly.” The update is expected to be completed by the end of March.
The Page Experience change, which was first handed out to mobile search results in November 2021, will be applied to desktop search by February 2022, according to an advance notice given in November 2021.
‘Discovered- Currently Not Indexed’ Cannot Last Forever: Says Google
The ‘Discovered – Currently, not indexed’ status in Search Console’s Index Coverage report can persist indefinitely, according to Google, because there’s no certainty that every page on the web will be indexed. This was stated during the February 18 Google Search Central SEO office-hours hangout. Davor Bobek joins the webcast to question Google’s Search Advocate John Mueller about the ‘Discovered – Currently not indexed’ statement and how long it will be shown.
Here’s How Google Crawls Pages With Infinite Scrolling
To a certain extent, Google can crawl web pages with infinite scrolling. During the Google Search Central SEO office hours hangout on February 18, this topic was discussed. Nick Jabbour joins the Livestream to pose a series of questions about paginated material to Google’s Search Advocate, John Mueller. One of the concerns is whether Googlebot has progressed to the point where it can handle infinite scrolling. The answer to this question is: Yes! In a nutshell, Googlebot can crawl and index infinite scrolling webpages.
John Muller Talks About User Comments on the Webpage and its SEO Value
Should visitors to your website be able to make comments? They may help with SEO if you can moderate them, according to Google. During the Google Search Central SEO office-hours hangout on February 18, Google’s Search Advocate John Mueller addressed this topic. Vahid Parsa, an SEO practitioner, joins the Livestream to ask Mueller a few questions, one of which concerns user comments and whether or not they are considered a ranking factor. It’s not correct to suggest that website comments are a ranking component because allowing users to submit comments will not improve your site’s ranking.
Google is informing Google Merchant Center users about a new Shopping experience scorecard that will be used to increase results in Google Shopping for merchants who provide a “great customer experience,” among other things. In other words, if you give excellent customer service, Google will reward you with greater ranks and increased visibility in Google Shopping.
The Shopping Experience Scorecard, according to the email, will be based on metrics including delivery time, shipping cost, return cost and return window.
Google to Strengthen the DMCA Penalty Algorithm
Google sent a document to the United States Copyright Office explaining how the DMCA update (also known as the Pirate update) has been reinforced by (1) capturing redirect schemes and (2) a site degraded by this demotion has an 89 per cent decline in Google search traffic on average. In the document, Google clearly says that the algorithm is a “demotion” signal that can cut visits to that site by 89 per cent on average – a massive figure. In addition, Google examines if sites use redirects from the infringing domain to a new domain in order to detect those players.
Excluding Keywords From Google Shopping Search May Not be Possible Now
Adding a minus sign before a word in the search field in Google Search has long allowed you to exclude it from your search. However, there have been multiple reports that this does not function in Google’s Shopping results.
In a few Google Web Search Help posts, Aishwarya Tapadar, a Google community manager, recently responded to multiple ongoing concerns about this, saying, “Thank you for taking the time to provide this feedback. It’s been forwarded to our Product teams!” In other words, Google will pass this information up the chain to evaluate if negative keywords or word exclusion can be implemented in Google Shopping Search.
PPC Related Updates and News
Google to Introduce Short Titles For Product Advertisements
In Google Merchant Center, advertisers may now further optimise their product titles. “Short title” is a new optional attribute that Google has added to Merchant Center. With this upgrade, you’ll be able to be more succinct and to the point with your product descriptions.
Microsoft Ads to Roll Out Dynamic Descriptions For Dynamic Search Ads
While Google and Microsoft Ads have a lot in common, Microsoft Ads recently debuted a new function. Microsoft has an advantage over the competition because this feature is not available in Google Ads. Microsoft Ads released Dynamic descriptions for Dynamic Search Ads on February 22. Advertisers can now display dynamic descriptions to viewers in addition to the dynamic headlines that are already available.
Google Ads is all Set to Launch Enhanced Conversations For Leads
Google is now officially launching increased conversions for leads, according to George Nguyen. Google has been improving conversion for the site for a year but only recently added it to leads. Google Ads’ Enhanced Conversions feature can “increase the accuracy of your conversion measurement and unleash more effective bidding,” according to Google. It works in conjunction with your existing conversion tags by securely delivering hashed first-party conversion data from your website to Google. Before submitting your first-party customer data, such as email addresses, to Google, the functionality applies a secure one-way hashing process called SHA256.
Social Media Updates And News
Youtube is all Set to add More Analytics Data on Views and Reviews
YouTube is exploring ways to give creators additional information about their videos’ performance, such as detailed reports on view and revenue sources. YouTube also intends to actively aid producers in producing fresh video ideas by offering trending reports. These capabilities are shown in a new video on YouTube’s Creator Insider channel, which gives a “preview” of how the reports will look when they’re released. Some of the reports are in the process of being written, while others are just ideas.
