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 My Business Call History Feature Now Showing Call Data
After months of Google teasing us with the preview call history section and showing us no data, now Google is showing call history data to some local businesses in the Google My Business console. John Smith shared a screen shot showing that he sees answered and missed calls, with caller ID information; i.e. name and phone number. - Google Search Console Changes Event Structured Data Reporting
Google said that starting on May 10, 2021 it has changed how it reports in some event structured data. Specifically, Google will now begin detecting Event entities at all hierarchy levels, not just at the root level, and errors in recommended properties are now flagged as warnings rather than errors. - Report: Google Showing People Also Ask Results More Often
Both Semrush and RankRanger are reporting an increase in the frequency Google shows the "people also ask" types of search featured in its search results. It is not a huge jump but up a few percentage points according to both trackers starting on May 6th. - Google: We Do Not Use The Trust Project Directly For Search Rankings
Back in 2017, Google announced that it was working with The Trust Project to help publishers use "eight trust indicators that newsrooms can add to their content." But Google's Danny Sullivan said that was the extent of it, and that Google does not use The Trust Project directly for how it ranks websites in its search results. - Google Bug Displayed Hidden Business Addresses In Google Local Shopping Search
Google notified some local businesses that specifically had set their business address not to show to the public, did end up being shown to some searchers by accident between the dates of October 2019 through April 2021 - yes, a full 18 months. Google said it fixed the issue and service area businesses going forward will not show their addresses. - Google My Business Insights Now Shows Bookings Reporting Data
If you go to your Google My Business account, click on the Insights tab and check out the new performance report insights reporting, you may see a new "bookings" tab to see if people booked reservations, appointments, etc with you via Google Maps or Google Search local. - Google eScooters
Google is once again sending some of the Google Partners electronic scooters, e-scooters. Dave Davies posted photos of the 2020 version last year and now the 2021 version is here and he posted photos
Other Great Search Forum Threads:
- A low Lighthouse score doesn't automatically mean your site has issues with crawling, indexing or ranking. However, it can point at a problem that results in both a low score and SEO issues. Dig in and find, John Mueller on Twitter
- Pro tip: Don't include special characters in your <h> tags, they might get pulled into featured snippets. 😛 https://t.co/Im9PyazUEJ, Lily Ray on Twitter
- My suggestion would be to test it before worrying about it. Generally speaking there's no problem* with that from Google Search's perspective. *) of course, like always, there are tons of opportunitie, Martin Splitt on Twitter
- The short version is that we try to avoid wasting our time on things that aren't what users want to find., John Mueller on Twitter
Search Engine Land Stories:
- Google call history report begins to show data in Google My Business
- Google events enhancement report updated to show more errors
- Yelp announces Custom Location Targeting, budget recommendations and more features to expand reach for local businesses
- 10 reasons to join us at SMX Advanced
- You can now submit HTML directly to Bing via API, surpassing BingBot; Monday’s daily brief
- Video: Justin Abrams on SEO customer success
Other Great Search Stories:
Analytics
- Analytics Implementation Risk Mitigation, Search Discovery
- Google Tag Manager Best Practices, Analytics Mania
- How to set up Site Search in Google Analytics, Builtvisible
- Page Experience and Core Web Vitals: A Quick Guide for CRO and SEO, Site Tuners
Industry & Business
- 3 lessons from Google's 2021 Q1 earnings, Kevin Indig
- Google Cofounder Sergey Brin Just Sold Alphabet Shares For The First Time Since 2017, Forbes
- Apple hires Facebook ads manager, 'Chaos Monkeys' author Antonio Garcia Martinez, AppleInsider
- Send money to loved ones abroad with Google Pay, Google Blog
Links & Content Marketing
Local & Maps
- COVID-19 Relief: Google Maps Testing New Feature to Help Users Find Hospital Beds, Medical Oxygen, News 18
- Call History Data Now Rolling Out To Google My Business Dashboard, Brodie Clark Consulting
Mobile & Voice
- Chrome 90 for iPhone rolling out with search, Dino widgets, 9to5Google
- Raise the visibility of your Web Stories, Google Blog
- 'Apple Car' may use AR for windshield heads-up display, AppleInsider
SEO
- 2021 SEO Career Path: SEO As A Career Option, Conductor
- 5 years of writing readable content with Yoast SEO, Yoast
- Adjusted timeline for SharedArrayBuffers, Chromium Blog
- What Is SMV (Schema.Org Markup Validator)?, Schema App
PPC
- How to Get Started on Microsoft Ads Audience Network, Search Engine Journal
- Stay Safe From App Tracking, New York Times
Other Search
