We may have had another unconfirmed Google Search ranking update around July 11th, which I will call the 7-Eleven update. It has been an unusual time since the completion of the June 2026 spam update, where I was on the verge of covering a few unconfrimed updates but it seems the chatter in the SEO community is at an all time low.
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. Google Image Search turned 25 years old and with that...
Google Image Search turned 25 years old and to celebrate, Google revamped the Google Image Search home page. Instead of a clean image search box, Google added an image gallery and placed a search bar at the top of the page.
Google AI Overviews can now generate AI images based on your questions, directly in the AI Overview response in Google Search. Google wrote, "To help bring those unique ideas to life, we’re bringing image generation directly into AI Overviews in Search."
OpenAI added more features to ChatGPT Ads Manager, the ability to exclude your ads from showing based on geo-location and/or audience lists. ChatGPT Ads Manager continues to rapidly add new advertising features to its ad platform.
Google has confirmed that it is testing the hide and show sponsored results within the Google Shopping search results interface. Google launched the hide/show sponsored results in the main search results last October and is now testing this feature within Google Shopping.
Google's John Mueller noted that if your A/B tests are "significantly different" from one and the other, then that "could be visible in search results too." He also said, "Depending on your setup, what might happen is that one or the other version is used for indexing."
Google announced it is no longer allowing the advertisement of prediction markets contracts and related products ads in Michigan and New York. Plus, Google also expanded Google Shopping ads and free listings eligibility to more countries.