Intro
SNYCU Podcast
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News about Google’s Algorithms
Google SERP Changes
SEO Tips
Other Interesting News
Local SEO - Google SERP Changes
Recommended Reading
Recommended Reading (Local SEO)
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Ep. 203 - Sept. 30, 2021 - Light Version

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In this episode, we discuss recent algorithmic spikes, a great reminder for robots.txt, a lesson on canonicals, several changes in the SERPs, new guidance for ecommerce sites, and lots more!

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The following topics are covered in the premium version of this episode:

Full algorithm update news
Robots.txt reminder
The value of self-referencing canonicals
How to perfect your First Input Delay
How to treat category pages showing products as sponsored
Great way to find accidentally indexed pages
A must read for ecommerce sites
Using Google Images to improve your ranking
Are you seeing 404s in Google Search Console that aren’t linked to your site?
Opinion: would title tags/H1s with negative starting words influence behaviour?
A closer look at Google’s ranking signals
New identity attribute in Google My Business
Our tl;dr summary of some awesome recent SEO articles

You’ll also have access to all past episodes, including this one.

News about Google’s Algorithms

Over the past 2-3 weeks Barry has suggested that there have been a number of unannounced algorithm updates, mostly occurring over the weekend. Up until this point we have not been seeing the same amount of play in the SERPs and on sites that we monitor. However, this week we can confirm that we are seeing plenty of volatility.

Premium members can look at what we have been seeing.

Google SERP Changes

Approximate price ranges surfacing on ecommerce category pages

Brodie has spotted this test whereby Google will display the number of products and the approximate price range for products within the category. This test seems to be mainly for items within a paginated sequence (in this instance Brodie suggests it’s a listicle) and primarily for HTML results on mobile. He also spotted plenty of Product Schema tags which may be influencing things too.

Another example of the test I shared yesterday. Google is generating an approx. price range based on the listicle content. This page actually has 29 individual Product Schema tags, with the source being less clear (more likely to be from HTML). More info: https://t.co/j6IUtkSa1z pic.twitter.com/Yh9Y2AgRaZ

— Brodie Clark (@brodieseo) September 28, 2021

SEO Tips

Do you need to understand Google’s algorithms to be a good SEO?

In short, you absolutely should (or at least try to) have an understanding of Google’s algorithms. At MHC, we spend a significant amount of time analyzing Google’s algorithms and include our findings in each of our newsletters.

An algorithm is a way of solving a problem. Every one of the thousands of patents Google has attempt's to save problems. They show the problem, old prior art ways of solving it, new patented ways of solving it and an analysis of how it does. You need to understand algorithms.

— Bill Slawski ⚓ (@bill_slawski) September 23, 2021

While good SEO includes a multitude of factors, you really want to understand what Google is doing with search and what they reward. After all, you can’t optimize for something you don’t know about!

Google Search Console often shows the canonical URL but not always

The original question was more geared towards Google My Business UTM links but this topic is more of a universal concept. John says that Google doesn’t use special case URLs (say, for UTM tagged URLs) but instead looks at URLs as individuals. For the most part, Google Search Console shows data for the canonical URL but this isn’t always the case. As Glenn points out, sometimes the displayed URL can appear instead and it’s generally situation dependent.

Important to understand (& can be confusing). *For the most part*, GSC shows data for the canonical url, but it can show for the *displayed url*. That's why GMB urls w/utm parameters do show up in GSC, but other urls with parameters don't. So it totally depends on the situation. https://t.co/FRHthAoDOO

— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) September 23, 2021

Other Interesting News

John gives a reminder on technical lingo

It’s easy to confuse technical terms like title tag, alt tag etc. But John here with the reminder that when referring to a title tag, you mean title element as tag is the code snippet. When saying alt tag you really mean alt attribute or alt text. Easy to confuse, but good to know! Thanks for the refresher John.

For sake of completeness :), it's "title element" (the "tag" is just <title>) and "alt attribute" on images (though alt-text is ok too). Links can also have a title attribute, and there are title meta tags (used in open-graph, eg for FB, Twitter).

— 🧀 John 🧀 (@JohnMu) September 24, 2021

Local SEO - Google SERP Changes

The ‘updated today’ label has officially launched

Brodie has spotted the updated today label present in the map pack/local finder for all users. Previously a test, it looks like it will now appear when any product stock or inventory changes are made. Have you spotted it yet?

Latest in Local SEO: the 'updated today' label has now launched for all users in the map pack/local finder.

This was a test from last month, which appears to trigger once inventory/stock was last updated (h/t @CarrieHill).

Timeline updated: https://t.co/j6IUtkSa1z pic.twitter.com/PPzkRSylDe

— Brodie Clark (@brodieseo) September 28, 2021

Recommended Reading (Local SEO)

Whitespark’s Super Fantastic Guide to Optimizing Google My Business – Jessie Low
https://whitespark.ca/blog/whitesparks-guide-to-optimizing-google-my-business/
June 6, 2021

This really is the ultimate guide to GMB profiles and we strongly recommend any beginner read the full thing! It has amazing detail throughout the guide and there is step by step information from start to finish on how you can create, setup, and use your listing. Also, this guide doesn’t end once you’ve set things up, but also goes over common features you can use to help promote and run your business more effectively.

How to Use Images to Increase Leads [2 Local SEO Case Studies] – Joy Hawkins
https://www.sterlingsky.ca/images-increase-leads/
September 27, 2021

Sterling Sky has compiled two nice case studies to show how images can be used to increase leads. This article links to all the studies they have conducted on image testing and tracking. If you’re a local business who hasn’t quite figured out how to optimize your images then we recommend you give this article a read.

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