Daily Search Forum Recap: January 15, 2024

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 says changing from www to non-www shouldn't cause big issues. Google's URL Inspection tool referring page seems like it can be from non-linked sources. Google Business Profiles hotels can show market comparison for pricing. Google Chrome following feed now works by topic, not publications. New moderators over took a large SEO Reddit forum.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

• Google: Changing WWW to Non-WWW Doesn't Change Much (For Ranking)
  Google's John Mueller said that changing from www to non-www for your domain shouldn't change much. I suspect he means that doing that wouldn't hurt or benefit your rankings that much and Google will likely pick up on the change and the rankings would not suffer much from the change.
• Google Chrome Following Feed Now Shows Content By Topic
  Google has updated its mobile Chrome following feed feature not just to show content from publications you follow but now also for topics you follow. So now you are getting a more diverse set of sites in your follow feed within Chrome.
• Google URL Inspection Tool Referring Page Returns Non-Linked URLs?
  A year ago I reported that the Google Search Console's URL inspection tool can show a nofollowed link as the referring page. But it also seems that the URL inspection tool can also show non-linked URLs as the referring page.
• Large SEO Reddit Community Taken Over By New Moderators
  A very large SEO Reddit community was taken over by new moderators over the past few days after the original and only moderator became inactive for a few weeks. Supposedly, the new moderators are deleting old SEO posts and have taken over the community.
• Google Hotels View Market Comparison Pricing Feature
  Google Business Profiles has a feature named view market comparison. Here Google is showing you how your hotel is priced against the competition in the area. It has a price comparison of your hotel rates and other properties.
• Google Boulder Swing
  Here is a recent photo from the Google Boulder, Colorado office. They have swing benches there as well. I found this photo on Instagram.

Other Great Search Threads:

• Google is testing a thumb image with dedicated aspect ratios (4:3) and a shaded background grey., Khushal Bherwani on X
• Is Twitter the #2 search engine? There is no real data about total worldwide search volumes out there, but let's call it 10B/day Most of these estimates don't include search volumes on non-specific search engines anyway. 500m = huge!! Le, Andy Beard on X
• Google recently announced GBP sites would be shut down on March 1 and redirected to the GBP listing instead. In aggregate http://business.site ranks for 8M+ queries across all of the subdomains (which are the SMB sites)., Glenn Gabe on X
• Google seems to have removed the logo in the right-hand panel | Google Business Profile (GBP) & Google Maps, Local Search Forum
• It's amazing how Bing Deep Search totally kills SEO and improves the web search ranking., Vitor de Lucca on X
• Just unifying systems internally. Please stay put., Mikhail Parakhin on X
• Brand new pages listed very quickly on Bing Search, WebmasterWorld
• Interested in SGE? Your newly-published content can show up in SGE very quickly, but images can sometimes lag (showing how images can be indexed slower -- which Google has always explained). My data-nosnippet post showed up in SGE a, Glenn Gabe on X

Search Engine Land Stories:

• Lawsuit: Meta placed ads next to content sexualizing minors
• The latest jobs in search marketing
• YouTube rolls out new Shorts editing tools
• Google Ads support is at an ‘all-time low’ – we asked Google why
• Google Business Profile performance insights: What you need to know
• 9 strategies for removing negative content from the web

Other Great Search Stories:

Analytics

• Unveiling Precision: Magento 2 Google Analytics Integration for GA4 Ecommerce Tracking through Google Tag Manager, Business Matters

Industry & Business

• Google may let you choose which of its services are linked, thanks to EU, Android Authority
• Web Page Framing Isn't Trespass to Chattels-Best Carpet Values v. Google, Eric Goldman
• Google’s latest layoffs are just the beginning, The Verge
• Baidu slides 10% after report links Ernie AI to Chinese military, Investing

Links & Content Marketing

• Importance of Content in SEO: Why it Matters + How to Create it, Semrush
• Content Marketing Market to Reach $2 Trillion by 2032 at 16.9% CAGR: Allied Market Research, Yahoo Finance
• Entries now open for PR Daily's Content Marketing Awards, PR Daily
• How to Find the Optimum Content-Marketing Mix, MarketingProfs

Local & Maps

• Is That Google Calling or is it a Scam?, Sterling Sky Inc
• Satnavs and Google Maps to be updated in readiness for driverless cars, The Guardian

Mobile & Voice

• Apple Vision Pro ordering process: iPhone or iPad with Face ID needed, 'valid, unexpired prescription' for optical inserts, 9to5Mac
• The best Apple Vision Pro productivity apps at launch, AppleInsider
• Google All But Confirms Canceling Its Own AR Glasses, UploadVR
• How to Buy Apple Vision Pro: $3,499 Device to Go On Sale Feb. 2, Bloomberg

SEO

• CRO Misconceptions Every SEO Should Know — Whiteboard Friday, Moz
• Google Weekend Ranking Mystery or… a Google bug?, ZipTie
• How to use data-nosnippet to block specific content from being used in a Google search snippet [Experiment], GSQI
• Product Page Optimization: 6 Successful Strategies To Try, Semrush
• SEO Ecommerce Category Pages: A Complete Optimization Guide, Semrush
• How to Write Product Descriptions [+Product Description Template], Semrush
• What is Organic Search?, Know Agency
• Bio To Schema: Why And How I Built My Custom GPT, Lidia Infante
• Ecommerce Product Page Optimization, Women in Tech SEO
• SEO Projects for Code Freeze, Stephanie Briggs
• The 29 Best GPTs for SEO in 2024, SEO AI
• The practical guide to SEO strategy for small business owners, Compass Digital Strategies

Other Search

• 20% of large Russian companies already use generative artificial intelligence, Yandex
• OpenAI Quietly Deletes Ban on Using ChatGPT for “Military and Warfare”, The Intercept
• How fashion brand MSGM used Pixel’s AI features in its latest collection, Google Blog
• ChatGPT’s FarmVille Moment, The Atlantic

Feedback:

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