SNYCU Ep. 143 - July 29, 2020 - Light Version

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In this episode we discuss what SEOs are getting wrong about Google updates, how to properly implement technical changes, a compilation of busted page speed myths, a handy new WordPress feature, and more!

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In this episode:

Paid members also get the following:

  • Hmmmm...Is this what SEOs get wrong about Google updates?
  • Google's Performance Report and the AMP Test in GSC can now both detect if your AMP document is a Web Story
  • Bing announcement: Bing Webmaster Tools plugin for WordPress is available
  • Google’s advice when making these kind of technical changes: split things up, assess, and make adjustments
  • Is it better to create separate pages for product variations, or keep everything on one URL?
  • If you redirect an article to a new URL, you also need to redirect this…
  • Can JSON-LD structured data be implemented on AMP?
  • Bing Webmaster Tools has a new tester in beta
  • An interesting comment about user-generated links
  • Tips for keeping your forum content high quality
  • The latest version of WordPress comes with a handy item built in
  • Apple reveals their search ranking factors
  • Google’s top search result (hint: it’s Google!)
  • Possible increase in GMB suspensions?
  • My tl;dr summary of some awesome recent SEO and Local SEO articles

Algorithm Updates 

Possible algorithm update July 23

Most of the weather tracking tools are showing some type of spike in SERP fluctuations on July  23, 2020. At MHC, we have a small handful of clients with slight increases at this time and a couple with small decreases as well.

Search Engine Roundtable has a few site owners speaking of seeing changes as well. 

At this point, we have not seen enough movement to warrant us doing a thorough investigation of this update. We’ll let you know if things change.

MHC Announcements

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Google Announcements

Good news, Google has been listening to your feedback

John Mueller said in a webmaster help hangout that the Rich Results Testing Tool will be expanded due to the large amount of feedback from webmasters about wanting the Structured Data Testing Tool to remain. If you want to give your feedback to Google, you can tell John on Twitter (@JohnMu), or use the feedback button in Google Search Console.

Google SERP Changes

A Google test involving refinements

Google is running a new test on mobile devices that was spotted by Brodie Clark. If you do a search, scroll down and then scroll back up, Google will show search refinement options for your query. 

Lily Ray hypothesized on Twitter that this behaviour may indicate a searcher is having trouble finding what they are looking for. This gives searchers the ability to refine their organic results in order to provide the answer they’re actually looking for, and get results which better satisfy their query:

SEO Tips

Page speed SEO myths courtesy of Google

On this week's edition of “SEO Mythbusting”, Google's Martin Splitt discusses misconceptions about page speed with Eric Enge from Perficient Digital. We highly recommend having a watch of this video yourself, as Martin and Eric are really great on screen together.

Other Interesting News

A timeline of Google changes related to COVID-19

This is a huge list of all of the changes that Google has made in wake of COVID-19. It’s a big list, but goes to show how much we need to adapt in times of crisis. Lily also has the list in a Google Sheets doc in the thread below. 

Have you changed your SEO processes due to COVID-19?

Lily Ray has a great thread that reiterates some of the changes COVID-19 has brought upon SEO processes. It’s a great reminder that you need to be considering how your site reflects the pandemic and answers questions users have. Ie. how has the user changed, and are you adjusting for that change? Check out her recommendations below: 

Free upcoming event that’ll feature a Q&A with a Google employee

Monday, August 11th at 8am CEST you can join in on the Digital PR Summit half day digital event. It’ll feature about half a dozen speakers (as well as a Q&A with John Mueller on the topic of links) and will cover digital PR tips and insights to help you launch effective campaigns. It’s completely free but we’d suggest you register online to guarantee attendance. 

Local SEO - News from SterlingSky 

All's quiet in local rankings - we're still very appreciative of that. The grumbling from clients last week over flux seems to have been very limited and straightened itself out fairly quickly with no lasting impact.

Selecting your primary category on Google My Business – proceed with care

Krystal Taing of RioSEO takes a look at the special features that are available based on the business's primary category. She compiled data for some of the main types of business we look at on a regular basis. Complete with charts and information on which features are available for each category - this is a blog post to bookmark for future GMB setup reference!

New Google Screened categories available for Local Services Ads (LSA)

Colan Nielsen spotted quite a few new categories available for Google Screen Local Services Ads on Tuesday morning. Lawyer categories have expanded greatly to include personal injury, bankruptcy, family lawyers, and more. There are also Google Screened ads available for architect, tax specialist, and videographer. Tom Waddington gives us the details on the LocalU blog. SEL also confirmed this news, noting that, “After a successful trial run, Google has decided to formally roll out LSAs for professional services nationally.”

Google now offering fee-based business profile enhancement to Local Service Ad users

Mike Blumenthal outlines what we know about the new test. There are mixed reviews, with some excited about the "enhanced support" wording, but others worried about the "pay to play" connotations. It will be interesting to see if this feature sticks and continues to expand.

How can I get access to my GMB listing and remove the users that have claimed it?

Jessie Low of Whitespark explores a question from their "mailbag" series and gives tips and tactics for obtaining access to a previously claimed, and not accessible, Google My Business listing. She’ll first walk you through the various ways to gain access to the GMB listing, then reveal the proper methods to effectively manage user roles.

Does my negative review violate Google's guidelines?

Joy explores some of the negative reviews she's seen and fought for/against over the years and the outcome of those.... disagreements... with Google's support team. The TL:dr is, it's always worth asking for the removal, but the outcomes are fairly inconsistent.

Recommended Reading

Learn How to Improve Your Website’s E-A-T – Lily Ray
July 26, 2020

Lily Ray’s recent talk from the 2020 SEJ eSummit dives into E-A-T and Google’s ever evolving relationship with health related content. Although Google has only confirmed PageRank and links as signals that they use for ranking purposes, Lily mentions how Google also pays attention to other signals that align with E-A-T. And that’s where health related content comes in.  Watch her talk to find out more! 

 

Why SEOs are going to miss the Structured Data Testing Tool – Izzi Smith
https://searchengineland.com/why-seos-are-going-to-miss-the-structured-data-testing-tool-338126
July 23, 2020

This was published before Google’s announcement that they’d be expanding the Rich Result Testing Tool — you can read about that in the Announcements section of this newsletter episode. As Izzi points out, the reason so many SEOs and webmasters were upset that the Structured Data Testing Tool is being depreciated is because it gave us a really simple way to diagnose any problems with the Schema markup we were implementing. Learn all about the differences in this great article. 

 

How To Leverage Structured Data To Outrank Your Competitors – Laura Morelli
https://www.semrush.com/blog/how-to-leverage-structured-data-to-outrank-your-competitors/
July 24, 2020

SEMrush sat down with one of Google’s Webmaster Trends Analysts, Gary Illyes, to discuss structured data and a past case study that Google had a hand in. Back in 2017, Google collaborated with a Japanese IT giant to enhance their recipe pages via recipe structured data. The results yielded a 3x increase in page views!

Excellent read/listen on this one that’ll surely make you think twice about the influence of structured data.

Jobs

Want More?

Paid members also get the following:

  • Hmmmm...Is this what SEOs get wrong about Google updates?
  • Google's Performance Report and the AMP Test in GSC can now both detect if your AMP document is a Web Story
  • Bing announcement: Bing Webmaster Tools plugin for WordPress is available
  • Google’s advice when making these kind of technical changes: split things up, assess, and make adjustments
  • Is it better to create separate pages for product variations, or keep everything on one URL?
  • If you redirect an article to a new URL, you also need to redirect this…
  • Can JSON-LD structured data be implemented on AMP?
  • Bing Webmaster Tools has a new tester in beta
  • An interesting comment about user-generated links
  • Tips for keeping your forum content high quality
  • The latest version of WordPress comes with a handy item built in
  • Apple reveals their search ranking factors
  • Google’s top search result (hint: it’s Google!)
  • Possible increase in GMB suspensions?
  • My tl;dr summary of some awesome recent SEO and Local SEO articles

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Paul Macnamara - Offers SEO Consulting at PaulMacnamara.com

That's it for this episode! Stay tuned for our Youtube video (my channel is here). If you want to follow me on Facebook, here is my page.

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