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Google/SERP Updates:

Google I/O – Search your world, any way and anywhere

Google I/O is an annual developer conference held by Google in Mountain View, California. “I/O” stands for Input/Output. The event was held on May 11th and included some cool updates coming to search. Primarily, they highlighted:

• Google Lens features (which is used 8 billion times per month):
  • Multi-search, using a combination of an image and a query to develop a more complex multi-modal search. 
  • Scene exploration which will add A/R info overlays to an entire view from your camera.
• Representation in search
  • Google is working with Harvard Professor Dr. Ellis Monk to better consider skin tone in how search products are built. 
  • Examples are the improvement of facial recognition regardless of skin tone and skin tone filter options for race-related queries.
  • Google will introduce new inclusive schema for creators to label their content with attributes like skin tone, hair color, and hair texture
• Remove more PII from search results including phone numbers, home addresses, and email addresses.
• New Google Search Console Reports for Video Indexing.

Google added dev documentation for valid metadata last Tuesday – h/t Dave Smart

Hat tip to Dave Smart who saw that Google added official dev documentation on guidance for which metadata is valid to include in your page’s head section and which metadata to avoid. In other words, don’t still iFrames in your head section.

Google’s Digital Marketing Certification Course SEO Advice Includes Word Count & Keyword Density – Barry Schwartz

Google has released a Google certification course for SEOs via Coursera. The course received some justified criticism initially due to the inclusion of a section that recommended that content should exceed 300 words and have a ‘keyword’ density of less than the industry standard of 2%. The problem is that that’s not how Google works in 2022 and it’s bad advice to officially come from a Google course. The search team distanced themselves from the course and the section of the course was quickly removed.

Twitter Threads/Tweets:

Setting up a Landing Page report in GA4 – Krista Seiden

Google evangelist and product expert Krista Seiden shared an easy 10-step Twitter thread on creating a landing page report in GA4 that provides similar info as the standard landing page report in Univeral Analytics.

The Value of Website Accessibility: Building Human First Experiences (Resources) with Ashley Berman Hale, Jamie Indigo, and Jess Peck via Deepcrawl

Ashley, Jamie, and Jess conducted an excellent webinar detailing a range of resources for improving website accessibility. They explained why web devs and SEOs need to consider how the tech can create a bad experience for those with disabilities. They provided solutions including tools, tactics, and people to help improve a wide range of common accessibility issues that exist across the web.

General SEO:

Entities and E-A-T: The role of entities in authority and trust  – Olaf Kopp via Search Engine Land

Olaf Kopp shared the role that he believes E-A-T plays in Google’s attempt to build entities and grow the knowledge graph. He focuses on the nature of digital relationships across content, links, and PR. He specifically addresses the importance of digitally establishing strong relationships with people and organizations associated with your desired topic to build authority, expertise, and trustworthiness as an entity.

He expanded his thoughts in a great follow up podcast with Marie Haynes via Search News You Can Use.

Tool mentioned: The Google Natural Language API Testing Tool

The Link-Earning Stack Every SEO Should Strive For – Amanda Milligan

Amanda discusses the specific purposes for various link-building campaigns reframed as part of a stack. She breaks it down into 4 categories: 

• Passive link earning, 
• Targeted link earning, 
• Site authority link earning, 
• And niche link earning.

How to Use Keyword Mapping to Future-Proof Your Site Structure – Adriana Stein via Screaming Frog

Adriana Stein shared her process for mapping keywords to search intent and in turn, connecting it to how you structure your website. She shows the step-by-step tactics she uses and even provides a helpful spreadsheet to map your pages to your keywords.

40+ SEO Podcasts Every SEO Should Follow by Olga Zarzeczna

Do you listen to SEO podcasts? Olga collected an amazing list of great shows for you to improve your SEO skills. Each show has a different type of approach to SEO. We appreciate her shout-out to the Rankable podcast.

Some of our favorites?

• Edge of the Web with Erin Sparks
• Crawling Mondays with Aleyda Solis
• Search Off the Record with John, Gary, and Martin
• SEO Rant with Mordy Oberstein
• Women in Tech SEO with Sarah McDowell and Areej Abuali

Technical SEO Articles:

14 Common SEO Issues Publishers Face on News Websites – Optimization Tips – Benjamin Beckwith – Deepcrawl

With time-sensitive articles, and a top stories rich snippet that they’re competing for, news publishers encounter some unique challenges in SEO. Benjamin Beckwith put together his list of common issues for the Deepcrawl blog including:

1. Category page optimization
2. Over and underutilization of tagging
3. Lack of evergreen content
4. Wrong articles ranking due to content syndication 
5. Cannibalization of articles due to annual listicles
6. Poor crawl paths to old content
7. Lack of RSS feeds
8. Parameters on internal links
9. XML sitemaps 
10. Org name mismatch 
11. AMP vs non-AMP page setup
12. Missing meta tags for Google Discover 
13. Cumulative layout shifts
14. Incorrect paywall setup

Core Web Vitals Study 2022 – Philip Petrescu – Advanced Web Ranking

Philip investigated how websites were doing with their Core Web Vitals. Were they starting to hit the standards? What was preventing websites from loading quickly and providing a good user experience?

He found:

• The higher the ranking in Google, the lower the LCP metric is.
• Only 39% of analyzed web pages passed the Core Web Vitals metrics.
• 80% of the pages that pass Core Web Vitals on Desktop also pass them on Mobile.
• Video is by far the biggest reason that the LCP of websites loads slowly.
• The Core Web Vitals is a ranking factor, but it’s not as important as links, content, or search intent.

As part of Google I/O, Phil Walton provided a deep dive strategy session for improving website LCP

• Ensure the LCP starts loading as early as possible
• Ensure that it can render as soon it’s finished loading
• Reduce the load time of the resource without sacrificing quality
• Deliver the initial HTML as soon as possible

Search Console Crawl Stats URL Parameters – Oliver H.G. Mason

In Google Search Console, you can find ambiguous URL Parameters for each of the issues that you can be alerted to. Oliver has cleverly connected the param number with the specific issue for your perusal.

Crawl Report Documentation from Google