Everything felt good this week. Positive late summer vibes bleeding directly into the digital world. Some super useful updates across Google’s search and web properties will help industrious SEOs and Content Marketers, while healthy business news from Pinterest and Yoast combine for a generally excellent time for everyone.
The News
Google released a search algorithm update designed to better understand searches that need fresh information. The update will help Google offer the most relevant, timely results for searches that benefit from fresh content. For example, if you search for “tax brackets” you probably care more about 2019’s brackets than those from previous years. According to Google, this update will bring significant change to featured snippets on fresh information queries. To take advantage of this update, start with a content audit. For anything that’s not evergreen, schedule regular updates and re-publishes. You might also take time reevaluating previous evergreen posts to see if they might now serve better as fresh content.
Google also shared some insight behind core updates. The big takeaway is that if you loose rank after a core update, focus on content improvements. Basically, don’t spend time trying to fix things specific to the update might have done, just focus on good content. Even more interesting, Google offered some clear advice on “good content,” and none of it is surprising. You need to provide original information, cover a topic thoroughly, refrain from clickbait, use an expert, fact check, spell check, look good on mobile, and more (but you get the point).
Chrome’s Lighthouse report now shares third-party resources that are slowing down your site. Useful insight when evaluating page speed and performance.
Content marketers take note, Pinterest is going strong with 261 million in revenue during Q2 2019, up +60% YoY. Impressive! If any section of your audience is currently on Pinterest, I can guarantee it will start growing. It’s time to create a Pinterest content strategy if you don’t already have one.
Google launched a new design for the preview box in image search. This design refresh pushes the preview box to the right side, adding more information about the image and related images. It’s a good change, greatly improving the digestibility of image search data.
A new study shows that more reviews lead to higher revenue for small businesses, and simply claiming listings on multiple sites can give small businesses a revenue boost. It’s a clear message for local SEOs, claim your listings and generate reviews. Even a small amount of work can make a big difference.
Yoast SEO 11.8 launched this week with an enhanced meta box, bug fixes, and improved Schema output.
The evergreen Googlebot is now active in Google Search Console testing tools. So what Googlebot sees is exactly what your testing tools see. Diagnosing technical SEO just got a whole lot more accurate!
Ranking Factors
