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 had a brief serving outage with Google Search this morning. Google AI Shopping is pushing more products. Google AI Mode has see more button for shopping results. Google Business Profiles verification flow should be used with caution. Anthropic updates its crawler documentation.
Search Engine Roundtable Stories:
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Google Search Brief Serving Issue This Morning
Google had a brief issue with serving search results this morning, February 25th. Google documented the issue at around 1:30 am ET on Wednesday, February 25th and said it was resolved a minute later. -
Careful With Google Business Profile Verification Flow
Some time ago, Google updated the flow for the Google Business Profile verification. And the issue is, if you fill it out wrong, it can have consequences for that Google business listing in the future. -
Anthropic Updates Crawler Docs: ClaudeBot, Claude-User & SearchBot
Anthropic updates its crawler documentation explaining what its crawlers do, and what blocking them will result in. Anthropic has three primary bots and they include ClaudeBot, Claude-User and Claude-SearchBot. -
Google AI Shopping Pushing Show More Products
Google's AI Shopping tab is now pushing shoppers and searchers to find more products. The prompt responses to your queries can display "Show more products" and other links to get you to view more products. -
Google AI Mode See More Button
Google is showing a "See more" button in some of the AI Mode results. This has been happening for almost the past month on desktop and probably mobile. It seems to come up more often for shopping related results, to load more products from the Google Shopping Graph. -
Table Tennis Program At Google
Google launched some sort of table tennis program at the Google offices in London. The Art of Ping Pong posted some photos of people playing ping pong at the office and posted the images on Instagram.
Other Great Search Threads:
- Google has added on Google Search’s iOS app a new “Games from Google” section., Radu Oncescu on X
- We decided to make another video warning our readers about Frankenstein recipes if you end up in AI Mode. While making our video our findings were simply horrifying. Google needs to do way better than this! Shout out to @rustybrick, Inspired Taste on X
- Yep, I see this in Chrome Canary now. There's a plus button right in the omnibox that's similar to the one in AI Mode. You can add tabs, files, choose models, etc., and then jump to AI Mode in the Gemini sidebar. More ways to get us, Glenn Gabe on X
Search Engine Land Stories:
- Google Ad Grants now lets nonprofits optimize for shop visits
- Merchant Center becomes a central video hub as Google auto-imports content
- How to keep your content fresh in the age of AI
- AAO: Why assistive agent optimization is the next evolution of SEO
- The perfect local business contact page built for Google and conversions
- How to write paid search ads that outperform your competitors
Other Great Search Stories:
AI & LLMs
- Anthropic Drops Flagship Safety Pledge, TIME
- Implicit Queries in AI Search, DEJAN
- Tech Firms Aren’t Just Encouraging Their Workers to Use AI. They’re Enforcing It., Wall Street Journal
- What Influences Brand Visibility in AI Search? A Practical Guide for 2026, Onely
Analytics
Industry & Business
- Exclusive: As AI threatens search, Profound raises $96 million to help brands stay visible, Fortune
- Google Bets Big on a Novel Technology—Iron Batteries, Barron's
- Profound raises $96M Series C at $1B valuation to build the marketing platform for the AI era, Profound
- We’re expanding our Texas presence with a new data center and clean energy in Wilbarger County., Google Blog
Links & Content Marketing
- Best Practices Are Meaningless Without Audience Research, SparkToro
- Building an internal linking recommender using Python, SERP API, and semantic similarity, Oncrawl
- The Importance of Blogging in an Increasingly AI-Driven Landscape, JumpFly
Local & Maps
- Google Maps 'limited view' heavily restricts signed-out usage, 9to5Google
- The Russians Turning to Google Maps in Search of Missing Soldiers, The New Yorker
SEO
- GSC Index Coverage Extractor: Download All Your Index Reports at Once, Jose Luis Hernando
- Getting started in SEO without the sales pitch, Koozai
- How to Optimize for Google AI Mode: The Enterprise Technical Guide, Onely
- How to Track Competitor Rankings in AI Search, Onely
- SEO Tips for Dynamic Content and Dynamic Sites, Onely
- The 7-Step Guide to Better Healthcare SEO, WordStream
- Google Search Console: Impressions Jump From 10K to 150K While Clicks Drop. What’s Happening?, Net Content SEO
PPC
- AI web and zero UI: What your brand should do when the web stops asking you to click, Microsoft Advertising
- Shop Visits Now Trackable as Account Goal in Google Ad Grants, PPC Expo
- Shopify Shows Ads on Behalf of Its Merchants in ChatGPT, The Information
- Want Human Google Ads Support? You Have to Authorize Them to Make Changes to Your Account Now to Get It, PPCChat
Search Features
- Google Discover Architecture: Clusters, Classifiers, OG Tags, NAIADES - What SDK Telemetry Reveals, Metehan
- Google Search now supports Wix Booking services, 9to5Google
- Google turned Chrome's address bar into a full AI prompt box, Phandroid
- Naver Expands AI Powered Search With Image And Multi Source Features, International Search News
- What extraction method is Google using to build grounding snippets?, DEJAN
Other Search
- Google apologises for Baftas alert to 'see more' on racial slur, BBC
- ChatGPT Narrows Naver’s Grip On AI Korean Search, International Search News
Feedback:
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