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: There Is Nothing To Optimize For With BERT
On Friday, Google said it launched the biggest change it made to search within Google in the past five years by releasing BERT. And as expected, Google said that you cannot optimize for BERT, just like you can't optimize for RankBrain. - Google To Stop Indexing Content Within Flash This Year
Google announced this morning that it will stop indexing content within Adobe Flash files, SWF files, this year. Google said "Google Search will stop supporting Flash later this year. In Web pages that contain Flash content, Google Search will ignore the Flash content. Google Search will stop indexing standalone SWF files." - Google's New How Google Search Works Video
Previously, I believe, the how search works video that was used on the How Search Works portal at Google was a video created by Matt Cutts on a whiteboard back in 2012. Google has updated that video to be more inline with 2019 standards. - Poll: 50% Of SEOs Have Bought Links In Past Five Years
Here is another fun poll Lily Ray posted on Twitter, asking if you or your company have bought links in the past five years. The results are literally 50/50. I retweeted it to help get more of a response last week and with over 1,000 responses, it is pretty funny to see SEOs split down the middle. - Google Changes Expandable Featured Snippet Look
Google has had expandable featured snippets officially for over a year now but Google seems to have recently been testing changing the design and layout of those. It is now showing less content in the expandable element. I should note - I personally cannot replicate this. - Microsoft Advertising Plants 100,000 Trees By 2020
The Microsoft Advertising team vowed to plant 100,000 trees by 2020. Here are photos they posted on Twitter of the Microsoft Advertising team in Madrid getting their hands dirty.
Other Great Search Forum Threads:
- We have that document since it's something that can happen - so that folks don't get thrown off when they see it. I'll see if we can make it clearer though., John Mueller on Twitter
- As mentioned in https://t.co/SUCRJBJfqs we recommend embedding images with img-tags for Google Images. (That image is linked in various ways & I'm kinda curious what you'd want to find for that query in Google, John Mueller on Twitter
- Here's a neat tool to end your day. A bookmarklet for download search console crawl data. Enjoy. https://t.co/qysVY7EMZW https://t.co/0SskKwpK05, Dominic Woodman on Twitter
- If you explicitly look for an old domain, we'll try to show it to you -- that's not unexpected., John Mueller on Twitter
- One doesn't simply submit a sitemap twice without changes. Submitting a sitemap file once when new or updated pages are listed is fine; nothing changes (it doesn't help) if you do it more often., Google Webmasters on Twitter
Search Engine Land Stories:
- Voice assistant study: Microsoft’s Cortana offers most answers, Google Assistant proves most accurate
- Amazon ad revenue tops $3.5 billion in third quarter, expecting strong holiday season
Other Great Search Stories:
Analytics
- How to Create a Custom Dimensions Report in Google Analytics (2019), Monster Insights
- What is Programmatic Marketing?, The Coloring In Department
Industry & Business
- How My Humanities Degree Prepared Me for a Career in Digital Marketing, Go Fish Digital
- Supporting 34 local news projects across North America, Google Blog
- Thanking all first responders, Google Blog
Local & Maps
- Autonomous vehicles to leverage HD maps from space, Automotive World
- Google won’t let Google Maps, Waze, and other apps use Pixel 4’s Smooth Display, The Verge
Mobile & Voice
- Google to Replace Bricked Google Home Units Affected by Firmware Updates, Voicebot
- Direct Google Assistant integration comes to Tile trackers, 9to5Google
- Google unceremoniously takes down AutoVoice Assistant action, but there's a workaround, Android Police
SEO
PPC
