Daily Search Forum Recap: August 1, 2024

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.

We are seeing some massive Google search ranking volatility - is it the coming of the next core update? Google explained its search ranking updates to handle deepfakes. Google is testing a new pill format for sitelinks. Google Merchant Center has a section named "more found by Google." Google is testing knowledge panels videos section. There is this excellent deep five on how Google Search handles JavaScript.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

• Google Search Ranking Volatility Bursting At The Seams
  Google Search had an incredibly volatile month of July and it ended the month with a huge bang. The volatility in the Google Search results yesterday, July 31st, going into today, August 1st, is heavy. This may be Google testing a new Google search ranking algorithm update, maybe the expected core update, or maybe not...
• Google Explains Search Algorithm Updates Around Deepfakes
  In May, we reported that Google Search algorithms lowered the rankings of deepfake sites. Now, Google has gone into more detail on how this algorithm works and how you can manually remove deepfakes from Google Search.
• Google Tests Sitelinks Pill Formats On Desktop Search
  A few weeks ago, we saw Google testing pill formats, bubble formats, for sitelinks in the mobile search results. Now Google is testing that format on the desktop search results.
• Google Merchant Center More Found By Google Product Feed Report
  Google Merchant Center may have recently added to the product feed report the number of products found by Google, not by way of a feed you provided or manually submitted but automatically found through crawling or other means.
• Google Knowledge Panels Tests "Videos From" Section
  Google is testing a new section on knowledge panels named "videos from." This section can contain videos from the brand's social channels. This seems to be a larger extension of Google showing social posts from the brand's channels, maybe?
• Deep Dive On How Google Search Indexes JavaScript
  The folks at Vercel and MERJ put together a super deep dive on how Google Search handles indexing JavaScript. They analyzed over 100,000 Googlebot fetches across various sites to test and validate Google's SEO capabilities. In short, Google Search handles JavaScript incredibly well, almost as well as normal web pages.
• Google Family Day 100% Electric Bus
  Here is a photo of a Google electric bus that was used at the annual Google family day event to transport families to the GooglePlex. Yea, the bus was event dressed up for family day and you can see in the reflection of the bus, some of the bouncy devices and other items at Google Family Day.

Other Great Search Threads:

• Ahhh a nice touch on google when you search for a medal winner, Louise Parker Peiris on X
• Google Publisher Tag Ads Library just released an INP specific improvement Yielding on out of viewport ad slots insertions via SRA. Publishers can also decide to yield on every slot including the in-viewport ones by using the ad, Gilberto Cocchi on X
• Google is now testing out displaying a blue highlight for standard organic listings on *desktop* for the first time. This comes after various bits of test history for this feature, first appearing on mobile and displaying across differen, SERP Alert on X
• Upcoming LLMs will do a much better job. I once had a paper at NeurIPS rejected because one of the reviewers did a keyword match on a title, mistook my topic for something unrelated, rejected without even reading the, Mikhail Parakhin on X

Search Engine Land Stories:

• How to make the most of GA4 for SEO
• Google updates deepfakes search algorithms and controls and expands About this image
• 8 free tools for PPC reporting

Other Great Search Stories:

Analytics

• Google assures ad execs of revised third-party cookie controls but timeline is uncertain, Digiday
• When Attribution Is a Fool’s Errand, Zero-Click Marketing Is the Way, SparkToro

Industry & Business

• Reddit CEO says Microsoft needs to pay to search the site, The Verge
• Russia fines Google, TikTok over banned content, Reuters
• TikTok Spending Drove Microsoft’s Booming AI Business, The Information

Links & Content Marketing

• 3-Tiered Index Hints SEO Link Value, Practical Ecommerce
• Don’t Build a B2B Go-To-Market Strategy Without These 7 Components, TopRank
• What Is Anchor Text? An Overview + Best Practices, Semrush

Local & Maps

• Google Maps starts using AR to show you the history of Paris, 9to5Google
• New updates Maps and Waze: Stay informed on the go, Google Blog
• Recovery Times from Local SEO Mishaps: a Quick Summary, Local Visibility System
• China's Robotaxi Dreams Sparks Anxiety Over Losing Jobs to AI, Bloomberg
• Google listed my restaurant’s number as its British HQ, The Guardian

Mobile & Voice

• Future Apple Vision Pro may gain Tandem Micro OLED, AppleInsider
• A first look at Apple Intelligence and its (slightly) smarter Siri, The Verge

SEO

• AI Bots — Who is Blocking and Why?, Moz
• How Google handles JavaScript throughout the indexing process, Vercel
• How To Conduct a Content Audit For Your Website, Sitebulb
• Introducing the Agital - GSC Percentage Change Chrome Extension for SEOs, Go Fish Digital
• Reddit's SEO Growth: A Deep Dive into Reddit's Recent Surge in SEO Visibility, Amsive
• Track the 2024 Amazon Prime Day in Real-Time: SEO Insights & Trends, NewzDash
• What Is Noindex Used for? An Overview + Best Practices, Semrush

PPC

• Google ads push fake Google Authenticator site installing malware, Bleeping Computer
• Microsoft is dropping ads from Skype, Engadget
• Perplexity brings ads to AI search, revenue-sharing with publishers, Fast Company

Search Features

• How to access About This Image with Circle to Search or Google Lens, Google Blog

Other Search

• Google DeepMind's new Gemma 2 model outperforms larger LLMs with fewer parameters, The Decoder
• The AI Search War Has Begun, The Atlantic

Feedback:

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