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 Passage Based Ranking Causing Minimal Impact So Far
I see a ton, absolutely a ton, of confusion in the SEO industry around the Google launch of passage based ranking. A reminder, according to Google, passage based ranking launched in the US English results in the afternoon of February 10th PST time. But honestly, I do not see any signs of any update rolling out after that time, not until much later. - Google Search Console Core Web Vitals Boundaries Changed On February 17th
Google made a small change to how it plots the core web vitals data in Google Search Console. The change goes into effect on February 17, 2021 and using less than as a boundary, Google is using less than or equal to. - Google To Facebook: Australian Publishers Choose To Appear In Google Search
Yesterday, Facebook took a bold move and announced it's banning Australians from sharing and viewing news and all users from sharing from and viewing Australian news pages. But one thing it added was why Google may decide to take a different step. - Google Can Process JavaScript Redirects But Be Concerned About Other Search Engines
Google's Gary Illyes said that Google Search can process JavaScript redirects but Google still does not recommend using JavaScript redirects because other search engines might not pick up on it. - Google: WhoisGuard Does Not Impact SEO & Rankings
Google's John Mueller said on Reddit "no" WhoisGuard, the NameCheap domain privacy setting, does not impact your SEO or rankings on Google. Google does not care if you use domain privacy settings or not when you register your domain name. - Google Image Search Tests Explore More Compass Icon
Google Image Search seems to be testing a compass icon in the image search results that trigger a search refinement feature. When you click on it, it takes you to a section to "explore more" images by showing you related searches. - Google NYC Wall: Keep On Going, You Are Almost There
Danny Sullivan shared a photo on Twitter from his photo archives of one of his visits at the Google NYC office. You can see they painted on the wall a message about COVID. To "keep on going, you are a
Other Great Search Forum Threads:
- Google is live reporting the scores of a tennis match #google #mobile #serp https://t.co/4amZFxGf1r, Valentin Pletzer on Twitter
- How does the story 🎞️ go with...thin content 📄🤔? Join @Aurora_Morales and her co-hosts, Organica 🌱 & Monetized 💰, as they discuss: 🦾 Auto-generated content ➿ Duplicate content ↔️ Thin affil, Google Search Central on Twitter
- I don’t see many of those so I thought it might be worth sharing: a Google Discover card (iOS) with no image #google #discover https://t.co/nWySeTNuCU", Valentin Pletzer on Twitter
- I suspect that's partially because the web is a pretty mature medium in the meantime, and regularly doing in-depth reviews takes a lot of time that you'd like to get paid for somehow. Who can afford to review 20, John Mueller on Twitter
- Today's #GoogleDoodle celebrates a woman who helped revolutionize medicine: Dr. Marie Thomas, one of the 1st female doctors in all of Indonesia! 🇮🇩 Learn how she made history as the 1st Indonesian woman to specialize, Google Doodles on Twitter
- Ah that's normal, nothing to worry about, Martin Splitt on Twitter
- Relative URLs are technically ok for rel-canonical link elements. However, practically speaking, if you want an exact URL to be seen as rel-canonical, I'd try to specify that so that it's independent of the, John Mueller on Twitter
- We are aware of an issue where affected users are unable to access Google Analytics. We are working to restore access and will share an update as soon as possible., Google Analytics on Twitter
- When people see this Doodle, I hope that they feel seen, heard and empowered."—@MonicaAhanonu, guest artist for today's #GoogleDoodle 🎨 Thank you for bringing this project to life, Monica! → https://t.co/SQB2XxAIy1, Google Doodles on Twitter
Search Engine Land Stories:
- 6 tips to win local with paid search
- Your thoughts on Google paying to link to news publishers; Wednesday’s daily brief
- Google’s search choice screen had virtually no effect on search market share, perhaps by design
Other Great Search Stories:
Analytics
- Google Analytics down and unavailable for some users, 9to5Google
- Oribi raises $15.5 million to challenge Google Analytics with no-code marketing insights, VentureBeat
Industry & Business
- News Corp and Google Agree To Global Partnership On News, News Corp
- Google to Reorganize AI Teams in Wake of Researcher’s Departure, Bloomberg
Links & Content Marketing
Local & Maps
- All aboard: More ways to pay for parking and transit, Google Blog
- Google shutting down standalone Crisis Map website, 9to5Google
Mobile & Voice
SEO
- How is a Knowledge Panel for an Entity Triggered?, SEO By The Sea
- Moving From Keyword Optimization to Program Optimization, Merkle
- One year on, has BERT really changed search forever?, DAC
- Presenting: The Essential Local SEO Strategy Guide, Moz
- SEO strategies for B2B eCommerce companies, Vertical Leap
- Why Marketers Are Adding Schema Markup to Their Websites, Schema App Tools
- eCommerce in 2021: Google‘s Winners and their Strategies, Search Metrics
PPC
