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.
We are seeing heated Google Search ranking volatility continue into this week, spiking a bit today. Bing Webmaster Tools released new AI reporting features. UK's CMA is requiring Google to share how its search ranking algorithm works and to enable data portability to third-party services. Google Ads updates its campaign status indicators. Google Ads has a new security summary screen to encourage better security.
Search Engine Roundtable Stories:
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Bing Webmaster Tools AI Reporting Adds Intents, Topics, Citation Share & Compare
Bing Webmaster Tools is rolling out a preview release of those new AI reporting features demonstrated at SEO Week in late April. These include Intents, Topics, Citation Share, and Compare within the AI reporting section. -
Google Search Ranking Volatility Continues Into This Week
I've been watching the chatter in the SEO industry, and honestly, it hasn't calmed down much since my last report for the period of June 8-12. The Google search results seem more heated today, and there appears to be an unconfirmed Google search ranking update underway. -
CMA: Google Must Share How Search Results Are Ranked & Data Portability
The Competition and Markets Authority in the UK has told Google it must be transparent on how it ranks search results in Google and it must enable users to port its data to other third-party search services. I can't imagine Google will ever share its full secret sauce on how it ranks its search results, and it is not the first time some political body has asked Google to do so, and it won't be the last. -
Google Ads Updates Its Campaign Status Interface
Google is rolling out a new look and feel for the Google Ads campaign status notifications and icons. The new statuses are no longer highlighted fully, instead they are just outlined in various colors. It makes it a bit less extreme to look at, and I am not sure if that is a good or bad change. -
Google Ads New Security Tasks Summary Tab
Google added a new summary tab to the access and security section that shows the security tasks you completed and what tasks you have not completed. Google continues to add more and more security features to the Google Ads advertiser platform in the wake of more and more security threats, including hijacking Google Ads accounts. -
Google NYC Rooftop Knicks & Spurs Watch Party
The other night, Googlers and friends, went up to the rooftop of the Google Pier 57 building to have a watch party of the Knicks vs Spurs finals game.
Other Great Search Threads:
- I'm facing this issue for past month on my WooCommerce site, "Indexed, though blocked by robots.txt", Reddit
- This one is an interesting case study: When you get a manual action on Google, what's the impact on GEO? This site's blog received a manual action on May 17 - check out the citations on AI Overviews and ChatGPT around the same time: (Same site @glenngabe shared last week), Lily Ray on X
- Google has begun **merging the multi-platform profiles** of a single creator, as announced by @ibbadr on "Search Profiles". Previously, each host-based `/cp/` URL (YouTube, X, Threads) served an **isolated** profile containing only content from that platform. Now, Damien Andell on X
- Just got another ChatGPT Ads Product update email, this seems mostly repetitive to the last announcement with some improvements?, Barry Schwartz on X
Search Engine Land Stories:
- Meta launches AI Mode in Facebook search to answer questions
- Bing Webmaster Tools updates AI reporting with Intents, Topics, Citation Share and Compare
- Google penalties: Why prevention is cheaper than recovery
- Google Ads shifts Demand Gen billing to CPM for some Discover campaigns
- Microsoft Ads expands LinkedIn targeting with job seniority filters
- How AI is merging paid and organic visibility
- How AI helped build hreflang XML sitemaps at scale
- Why next-question intent matters for AI search visibility
Other Great Search Stories:
AI & LLMs
- ChatGPT's market share slips below 50% for first time, TechCrunch
- Do AI Assistants Actually Render Your JavaScript when Grounding? We Put It to the Test., Search Engine World
- AI Visibility Strategy: How We Grew AI Share of Voice 35%, Brainlabs
- ChatGPT's Product Recommendations Change 80.2% When Search is Enabled vs Disabled (Study of 20,000 Responses), Visibility Labs
- CommonLID Update: New Tools, Growing Impact, Common Crawl Blog
- How to optimize for the agentic web: a guide for marketers, Semrush
- Microsoft explores DeepSeek for Copilot Cowork, Axios
- Selecting the right prompts for AIO / GEO tracking could use a human touch, Seer Interactive
Analytics
- X adds Google Tag Manager integration, Social Media Today
Industry & Business
- In December 2024, Google announced that its Willow quantum computing chip had completed a calculation in roughly five minutes that would have required the world's fastest classical supercomputer approximately 10 septillion years — longer than the current age of the universe by a factor of approximately a quadrillion — in what Google's quantum AI team called a demonstration that the chip had entered a 'beyond-classical' regime, Silicon Canals
- Kalshi Sued for Disclosing User Activity to Google, LinkedIn, Bloomberg
- Google and Apple pulled into Raskin’s ICE investigation, POLITICO
- JPMorgan, Google Records Sought in Probe Into Epstein’s New Mexico Ranch, Wall Street Journal
- Consumers Call Google Search Damages 'Palpably Obvious', Law360
- Exclusive: OpenAI Losses Increased Nearly 8X in 2025, With Spending Hitting $34 Billion, Ed Zitron
Links & Content Marketing
- Are Marketers Willing To Rewrite the AI Script?, Content Marketing Institute
- How to Adapt Enterprise Content Strategy for the AI Search Era, Skyword
Local & Maps
- Zillow says Google’s home listing ads are no traffic threat — yet, Inman Real Estate News
- How Yelp Continues to Protect Your Content in the Age of AI, Yelp Blog
Other Search
- Apple took Gemini out of Google, but can it take Google out of Gemini?, Macworld
- The Open Knowledge Format (OKF) from Google is a new layer for agents, Marie Haynes
- Wear OS 7 makes your smartwatch even smarter, Google Blog
- Android 17 has new features for productivity, gaming and security, Google Blog
- Google Home changes to Gemini news brief sparks confusion, 9To5Google
- Microsoft confirms Windows 11 Search will find your apps, not Bing results, even if you make typos, Windows Latest
PPC
- Billing Update for Demand Gen with VTC, PPC News Feed
- Automatic Customer List Labels Coming to Google Ads, PPC News Feed
- Takeaways on Google's New AI Ad Features, Practical Ecommerce
- Some AdMob publishers may see reduced match rates and eCPMs. We are working to resolve this., Google Ads Status Dashboard
Search Features
- AI Mode Is Coming to Your Chrome Toolbar, and Google Wants You to Pin It There, Windows Report
- How to Stop Google From Using Your Search Data to Train AI, TechPP
SEO
- 9 Marketing Trends I’m Seeing Firsthand in 2026 (With Data), Ahrefs
- Canonical Tags for SEO: Signals, Selection, and Implementation, Visively
- Is AI Killing Organic Search Attribution?, Joe Hall
- Why Your AI Search Prompt Library Is Letting You Down (And How to Fix It), Koozai
- Does optimizing for GEO really make sense?, Ilana Davis
- How to Manage 404 Pages Effectively, Bruce Clay
- Why Our Ecommerce Technical SEO Process Looks Different from Other Agencies’, Intergrowth
- What Is Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)? -, SearchLab Digital
- When Google Says “AI Optimization” Is Just SEO, What Does It Mean?, Ann Smarty
- Zero-Click Searches: Highest in the UK, Lowest in Germany, and France has the Most Efficient Searchers, SparkToro
Feedback:
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