What does Google say about SEO?

How does Safe Search truly affect your SEO for adult content?

John Mueller Jun 11, 2021 ★★

Safe Search is designed to filter explicit adult content, not adult-oriented products or services like alcohol or casinos. If an alcohol site is being filtered, it's likely due to adult-themed images or poorly used specific meta tags.

Domain Age & History Content E-commerce AI & SEO Images & Videos

Why does it take so long for a site's global quality signals to update?

John Mueller Jun 11, 2021 ★★★

Google indexes and ranks pages individually, but certain signals, such as overall quality, require a comprehensive view of the site. Enhancing a single page benefits that page, but improving the perceived quality of the entire site takes time and nec...

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO

Does the order of words in your SEO title really matter?

John Mueller Jun 11, 2021 ★★

The order of words in a title can sometimes matter, sometimes not, depending on the context. SEO tools provide suggestions but should not be followed blindly. It's important to prioritize natural readability instead of forcing a word order that could...

Content AI & SEO

Is it true that Google prefers duplicate content over short content?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★★

When faced with the choice of having duplicate content versus having very little unique content, it's better to keep the duplicate content since it at least provides context to Google. With less content, Google lacks the context to understand what th...

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO

Does duplicate content really harm your SEO?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★★

Google does not calculate a ratio between duplicate content and unique content to penalize a site. Duplicate content on certain pages does not negatively impact the ranking of other pages on the site.

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO

Why doesn't Google penalize duplicate content?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★★

Google does not actively penalize duplicate content. When duplicate content exists across multiple pages, Google merely attempts to identify the most relevant page and display only that in the results, without penalizing the site.

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO

How Does Google Handle Duplicate Content Across Different Websites?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★

When the same product description appears on multiple different sites, Google uses other signals (like location) to determine which page to display. Having unique descriptions and titles helps Google better process each page independently.

Domain Age & History Content E-commerce AI & SEO Local Search International SEO

How does Google automatically recognize synonyms and gender variations in search algorithms?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★

Google's systems are designed to automatically recognize synonyms and word variations (such as gendered forms with dots or asterisks). Google tries to treat these variants as equivalent without needing any specific action.

AI & SEO

How do brand searches truly impact SEO?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★★

The fact that a website receives a lot of searches for its brand name does not automatically improve its ranking for other non-brand related queries. There is no transfer of thematic relevance based on the volume of brand searches.

AI & SEO

Is author authority really a game changer for SEO?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★

The authority of an author and E-A-T information mainly play a role for scientific or medical topics where it’s important to identify the source. For general topics and e-commerce, the author's impact is generally minimal.

Content E-commerce

Is it true that mobile-first indexing doesn't demand strict mobile optimization?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★★

Mobile-first indexing means that Google indexes using mobile content, but this does not imply that pages must be optimized for mobile. Google can index and rank non-mobile-friendly pages as long as all content remains accessible.

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Mobile SEO

Should you really worry about the Page Experience Update when it comes to rankings?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★★

The Page Experience Update is a ranking factor but not the dominant one. A site with a poor page experience can still rank well if it is particularly relevant to the query. This especially applies to brand searches.

Domain Age & History AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO

Is the URL Parameter Tool Really Reliable for Controlling Crawling?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★

The URL Parameter Tool in Search Console helps optimize crawling but does not guarantee that URLs with these parameters will never be crawled or indexed. Google may occasionally crawl them to check if the parameters are still correct.

Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Domain Name Search Console

How can you effectively differentiate between using robots.txt and noindex for your SEO?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★★

To exclude URLs, use robots.txt if the issue concerns crawling and budget efficiency, and use noindex or canonical if the issue pertains to indexing. These are two different approaches for different objectives.

Crawl & Indexing Domain Name

How can temporary links from your homepage enhance your SEO strategy?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★

Having temporary links from the homepage or important pages (for example, for new products) helps Google quickly discover these pages. The key is that there are permanent links somewhere on the site in the long term.

Domain Age & History E-commerce AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO Links & Backlinks

Do links from noindex pages truly hold any SEO value?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★

Links from noindex pages generally hold little value. Google can crawl these pages, but the interpretation of outbound links is subjective. If Google considers the page not to truly exist, the links may be ignored.

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Links & Backlinks

How does Google really generate sitelinks without structured data?

John Mueller Jun 10, 2021 ★★

The sitelinks displayed under a main result cannot be configured through structured data. They are automatically generated by Google based on titles, internal structure, and anchor texts. Optimizing these elements helps achieve better sitelinks.

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO Links & Backlinks Pagination & Structure

Should You Really Differentiate Between 404 and 410 Status Codes for SEO?

John Mueller Jun 07, 2021 ★★★

John Mueller indicated on Twitter that, while Search Console currently doesn't differentiate between 404 (URL not found) and 410 (Gone) status codes, this might change in the future, but he added that he's not entirely convinced of the usefulness of ...

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO Domain Name Social Media Search Console

Should You Really Customize Your SEO Strategy for Each Target Country?

John Mueller Jun 07, 2021 ★★★

A user asked John Mueller on Twitter whether, in the context of international SEO, each site (therefore each country) should be subject to a specific approach different from the others. In other words, should a site dedicated to France be subject to ...

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO Social Media International SEO

Is there really no limit to the number of HTML pages Google can index?

John Mueller Jun 07, 2021 ★★★

There is no maximum limit to the number of web pages with an HTML extension (static pages) that Google can index for a given website.

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing Domain Name