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 may have hit Fortune Recommends with a search penalty of some kind. Google Merchant Center is testing new audience insights. Google is testing people's insights for discussions and forums results. Google is testing expandable knowledge panel cards. Google's John Mueller said it is tempting to optimize for tool metrics but there are no shortcuts. Plus, I go offline tonight through Saturday night again, anything you see from me then was pre-written and scheduled.
Search Engine Roundtable Stories:
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Did Google Hit Fortune Recommends With A Search Penalty Over Site Reputation Abuse?
Google may have hit Fortune Recommends with a search penalty, downgrading its Google search rankings. This may be related to the site reputation abuse policy, like it may have done previously to Forbes Advisor a few weeks ago and some other large publications. -
Google Merchant Center Audience Insights Beta
Google is testing new Audience Insights or audience analytics within the Google Merchant Center interface. This can show you your audience's regions, ages, gender, age group and more. -
Google Search People's Insights For Unprofessional Medical Advice
One of the complains with Google Search showing Reddit or other online forums all the time is that for medical questions, the answers can be dangerous and harmful. But at the same time, they can also provide help for people going through a rough time, to hear from others going through it. -
Google: It's Tempting To Optimize For Tool Metrics; There's No SEO Shortcuts
Google's John Mueller said he understands why some in our industry look to optimize for metrics within various SEO tool platforms, but he said there are not shortcuts in SEO and optimizing for those metrics won't directly lead to Google search ranking or SEO gains. -
Expandable Google Knowledge Panels On Desktop Search
Google now has the ability to expand sections of knowledge panels on the desktop search interface. So when you search for Elon Musk and want to see his children, Google needs to have a down arrow to show more that expands on desktop to show more. -
Google's CEO Sundar Pichai Making Bamboo Fan
Here is a photo of Sundar Pichai, Google's CEO, making a bamboo fan at the Google offices in Japan. At least that is what it looks like? Or maybe he was just gifted the fan?
Other Great Search Threads:
- Bing Copilot results within serp say, 'I’m afraid talking about elections is out of bounds for me!' for election-related searches. My query was 'Kamala Harris election news., Shameem Adhikarath on X
- Bing search results display a tooltip with the image source on the website thumbnail., Shameem Adhikarath on X
- Microsoft rebranding Copilot as ‘agents’? That’s panic mode. Let’s be real—Copilot’s a flop because Microsoft lacks the data, metadata, and enterprise security models to create real corporate intelligence. That is why C, Marc Benioff on X
- Since you added me here by name, after looking at your site a bit, I think you should focus on your business more before spending time on such technical issues., John Mueller on LinkedIn
Search Engine Land Stories:
- Google expands Travel Feeds in Search Ads
- Google Ads unveils Page-specific Assets for Performance Max
- Google Search to drop Sitelinks Search Box
- Search Engine Land Awards 2024: And the winners are…
Other Great Search Stories:
Analytics
- Audience Insights in Google Merchant Center, PPC News Feed
Industry & Business
- Baidu CEO says LLM hallucinations are now OK, The Register
- Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis on his Nobel Prize: ‘It feels like a watershed moment for AI’ , Financial Times (Sub)
- Google Search Dominance Is Under Siege. This AI Start-Up Is Taking Advantage., Barron's
- Honeywell signs deal with Google gen AI for industrials, CNBC
- Large solar project backed by Google opens in Buckholts, Yahoo
- News Corp's Dow Jones, NY Post Lawsuit Against AI Startup Perplexity, Variety
- Prabhakar Raghaven's "promotion" marks 4 years of issues at Google, Growth Memo
- Requiem for Raghavan, Edward Zitron
Links & Content Marketing
Local & Maps
- Find voting locations, Election Day results on Google Search and Maps, Google Blog
- Foursquare is killing its city guide app to focus on the check-in app Swarm, Engadget
- SMB Adoption 39%, End of SaaS Era, Teens, Search & AI, Local Dialog
Mobile & Voice
- Apple issues release candidates for iOS 18.1, macOS 15.1, AppleInsider
- Chrome for Android can now read you articles while you use other apps, Android Authority
- Gemini app simplification continues with ‘Ask Gemini’, 9to5Google
- iOS 18.1 launches next week with Apple Intelligence and AirPods Pro hearing tests and aids, Engadget
- Meta Glasses Are The Top Selling Product In Many Ray-Ban Stores, UploadVR
SEO
- Forbes Manipulating Google Search AGAIN, This time for E-Bikes, Mike Hardaker
- How Can My Brand Appear in Answers from ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Other AI/LLM Tools?, SparkToro
- How to Find Keywords for SEO (EP33), Compass Digital Strategies
PPC
- 10 Things I Wish I Knew Before Starting In PPC, PPC Hero
- Political Advertisers Spent $619M On Google And Meta, MediaPost
Search Features
Other Search
- How Google built the Open Buildings 2.5 Temporal Dataset, Google Blog
- New autonomous agents scale your team like never before, The Official Microsoft Blog
Feedback:
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