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I enjoyed this interview with Google’s head of Search Liz Reid on the ACCESS Podcast with Alex Heath and Ellis Hamburger. Watch this video on YouTube   Liz talked a lot about the future of Search. Here are the 5 most interesting parts. Will agents eventually do most of the activity on the web? Yes, […]

The December 2025 core update had a significant impact on a large number of sites. Each of the sites below that have done well are either long term clients, past clients or sites that I have done a site review for. While we can never say with certainty what changed as the result of a […]

Let me see if I can convince you! I’ve shared a bunch in this video and summarized my thoughts in the article below. Also, this is the second blog post I've written on this topic in the last week. There is much more information on user-data and how Google uses it in my previous blog […]

I found some interesting things from the latest document in the DOJ vs Google trial. Google has appealed the ruling that says they need to give proprietary information to competitors. Key takeaways: Google has been ordered to give information to competitors so as not to be an illegal monopoly. Google does not want to give […]

Historically, most readers of my content have not had to worry about spam updates. However, I think many of you have indeed been impacted by the August 26, 2025 spam update. Recently In VP , Head of Search's Liz Reid's interview with WSJ, she said Google has expanded their definition of spam: "We've expanded beyond […]

Today Google's Quality Rater Guidelines updated September 11, 2025 with some minor changes. I think some of these are worth noting however! Three examples were added to the guidelines that I believe are significant as they all instruct the raters to assess content that is an AI Overview. An example was added of an answer […]

The DOJ vs Google trial has finally wrapped up. The closing document is full of interesting insight into how Google’s algorithms work. While the final verdict of the trial is a separate story, the documents released gave us an unprecedented look inside Google's ranking systems. In this article, I’ll share what we learned. It is […]

Let’s take a look at some sites and pages that saw nice improvements following Google’s June 2025 Core Update. We’ll look at specific queries that improved and see if we can determine why Google’s new systems found them helpful. Is MUVERA behind the June core update changes? Updated Aug 5, 2025: I previously speculated that […]

As I write this, the June 2025 core update is rolling out. I highly suspect that this update will implement a new advancement Google has made in search called MUVERA. Update Aug 5, 2025: Google's Gary Illyes said he could not confirm MUVERA was being used in Search but that "we might have something like it." […]

You know that I love talking about vector search. I've had good success optimizing for vector search. Often though, that success does not last. I think I've realized why, and if this thought is true, it may turn out that doing a great job at optimizing for vector search could possibly do more harm than […]