Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.
Search Engine Roundtable Stories:
- Google: Heading & Titles Help A Little With Pagination But Links Help Best
How does Google understand what pages are in a set of pagination? Well, with the rel prev and next no longer being supported, Google has given other advice. Google's John Mueller was asked about this in a video hangout last week, and while he said having page numbers in your titles and headers help a little, your internal navigation links matter more. - Google: Indexing Search Result Pages Is A Watering Down Indexed Pages Issue
Google's John Mueller responded to a comment about Google's guidelines around "Use the robots.txt file on your web server to manage your crawling budget by preventing crawling of infinite spaces such as search result pages." He said this is less about spam and more about " watering down your indexed content with useless pages that compete with each other." - Google Search Relations Team Grounded During Coronavirus But Will Help Remotely
We reported last week that Googlers are being encouraged to work from home and many cancelled speaking events. It seems like Google has grounded international travel for its employees. John Mueller from the Google Search Relations team (formerly Search Quality Analysts) said on Twitter "Various people depend on us." - Google's Holi Easter Egg: Splatter Color All Over Google Search
Google has a new easter egg in search, this one is for the Holi festivities. All you need to do is search for [holi] in Google search (desktop or mobile), then click on the powder bowls in the knowledge panel and then start clicking (or tapping) away at the Google search results page. - Google People Also Ask Sees Large Reduction
Both RankRanger and Moz are reporting large reductions in how often the people also ask box shows up in Google search. RankRanger shows a 12 point drop and Moz is showing a 6 point drop (they measure these differently). - Google Banana Peel Wet Floor Sign
Here is a photo from the Google London office of one of the wet floor signs. The sign is in the shape of a banana peel and warns that the floors are wet, do not slip and fall.
Other Great Search Forum Threads:
- #SMX Munich 2020 will be postponed, a virtual edition will be held on the planned dates next week. Please find more information here: https://t.co/4aLrAEZ2S1, SMX Munich on Twitter
- DuckDuckGo Starts Sharing Tracker Radar List of Companies Tracking You, WebmasterWorld
- Facebook Tests Cross Posting from Facebook to Instagram, WebmasterWorld
- Last week: There are so many people chatting in the office, it's hard to get work done. This week: Is there an app that makes office-chatter noises? It's hard to get work done when it's so quiet while working from home, John Mueller on Twitter
Search Engine Land Stories:
- Reddit’s new ‘Trending Takeover’ ad unit lets brands appear on top of Popular feed, Search tab
- Case Study: How UGC increased organic traffic 228%
- Find your PPC A-game in 2020
- Google Search is showing YouTube Music links on album queries
- 13 stories of women who are shaping the SEO field
- Google My Business tells businesses affected by the coronavirus to update listings
- Video: Fili Wiese, an SEO that use to worked in Google search quality
- Google people also ask boxes not showing as often now?
Other Great Search Stories:
Analytics
- Coronavirus' Impact on Digital Analytics, Seer Interactive
- How to Analyze Enhanced Ecommerce Data in Google Analytics, Seer Interactive
- How to Check Your Blog's Traffic For FREE With Google Analytics, Andy Gibson
- Stop Wasting Time: Review Your Website Analytics, Content Marketing Institute
Industry & Business
Local & Maps
Mobile & Voice
- Coronavirus-Related Google Assistant Actions Blocked and Removed, Voicebot
- Google Assistant 'Updates' revamp appearing for more users, 9to5Google
- Google Assistant now supports sensors, water purifiers and more, Mobile Syrup
SEO
- A brief history of Google's algorithm updates, Yoast
- Google Switching Fully to Mobile-First Indexing, SISTRIX
- Six steps to a successful content strategy, Builtvisible
- SEO and the Coronavirus "update", I Love SEO
- What Are 'Soft 404' Errors and Will They Affect My Rankings?, Hallam
PPC
- 3 Automated Solutions To Pair CRM & Google Ads Data for High Quality Reporting, Seer Interactive
- Google’s Vint Cerf voices support for common criteria for political ad targeting, TechCrunch
- Introducing Display & Video 360 API v1, Google Ads Developer Blog
- Sneak Preview: Google Ads Benchmarks for YOUR Industry, WordStream
Search Features
- Google warns against Chrome extensions on Microsoft Edge, 9to5Google
- Search Preference Menus: No Auctions Please, SpreadPrivacy
