What does Google say about SEO?

Why do your Search Console data only tell part of the story?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

To analyze changes in the Search Console performance report, you need to dig deeper to find specific examples: identify pages or queries that have changed in ranking, impressions, or clicks. This helps to understand if the site is being displayed for...

Domain Age & History AI & SEO Web Performance Search Console

Should you stop optimizing for impressions and clicks in SEO?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★

One should not blindly concentrate on impressions, clicks, and rankings, but rather position their site according to their business objectives and provide value to users. The goal is to align the site with the right queries for the business.

AI & SEO

Is it true that mobile-first indexing completely overlooks your site's desktop version?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

When a site is switched to mobile-first indexing, Google uses only the mobile version for indexing and ranking, no matter where the traffic comes from (desktop or mobile). If the site is primarily desktop, one might create a desktop site without a si...

Crawl & Indexing Mobile SEO

Why does the mobile-first indexing verification delay cause temporary discrepancies in Google’s index?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★

There is always a delay in verifying the similarity between desktop and mobile versions because Google cannot verify everything simultaneously. For sites with rapidly changing content (like classifieds or news), Google should normally manage these te...

Content AI & SEO Mobile SEO

Should you show the same number of products on mobile and desktop for mobile-first indexing?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

On e-commerce category pages, if the desktop version displays 50 products and the mobile version only 10, this can pose a problem for mobile-first indexing. Google addressed this point in its latest blog post about mobile-first indexing. If the essen...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing Discover & News E-commerce Mobile SEO Local Search

Can a minor redesign really trigger a Page Layout penalty?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★

A minor redesign would not trigger a reevaluation of the layout (page layout). If a video with an ad is at the top of the page, Google should recognize it as a video landing page rather than assuming the video is an ad.

Domain Age & History AI & SEO Images & Videos Penalties & Spam

Is it true that CLS isn't a ranking factor yet—should you still optimize it?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

The CLS metric itself would not be the cause of a traffic drop because Google is not yet using Core Web Vitals as a ranking factor. An indirect impact through user experience would take time to manifest, not an immediate effect.

AI & SEO Web Performance

How does Google reassess a site's overall quality when the top pages remain well-ranked?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

When the top queries continue to be well-ranked but there is an overall decline, it suggests that algorithms are reassessing the general quality of the site downwards. Highly relevant pages continue to be displayed, but the site as a whole is conside...

Algorithms Domain Age & History AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO

Why do some pages take months to be reindexed after changes?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

Google does not guarantee any specific timeframe for crawling and indexing. It can take minutes, hours, days, or months depending on the website and modified pages. A critical page that is updated frequently will be indexed quickly, while a page unch...

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO

Should you really use sitemaps to speed up the indexing of your content?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

To help Google detect changes more quickly, changes need to be reported via a sitemap file. Most CMSs automatically generate sitemaps or feeds. The URL Inspection tool in Search Console can be used for urgent and exceptional cases, not for routine ch...

Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO Domain Name PDF & Files Search Console

Can an incomplete or outdated sitemap really harm your SEO?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

An incomplete or outdated sitemap likely does not affect search performance. The sitemap only helps with crawling slightly better; it does not change ranking. Google crawls the site normally even without a complete sitemap. The sitemap should be gene...

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Web Performance Search Console

Does each language version really need its own self-referencing canonical?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

For a multilingual site, all individual language versions must have a canonical tag pointing to themselves. If the English version is the canonical of the French version, Google may only process the English version and not index the French one, which...

Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO International SEO

Do HTML breadcrumbs really enhance crawling and internal linking?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

HTML breadcrumbs (not structured data) have an SEO effect because they create links between pages. On a site with multiple category levels, this connects products, subcategories, and main categories, which helps users navigate and improves crawling b...

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing Structured Data E-commerce AI & SEO Links & Backlinks Pagination & Structure

Does domain age and the choice of CMS really influence Google rankings?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

Website age is not a factor: Google does not favor either old or new sites systemically. The CMS used (WordPress, Wix, Blogger, etc.) does not matter: Google looks at the generated HTML pages. All modern CMSs produce reasonably good HTML by default.

Domain Age & History AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO Domain Name

Does Google really ignore hidden content instead of penalizing it?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★

If Google detects hidden content on a competing site, it may simply ignore it rather than penalize the entire site. Some negative aspects of a site do not mean it will rank lower if Google recognizes other qualities or can overlook the issues.

Content AI & SEO

Is it really necessary to be 'significantly better' to climb the SERPs?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

If several sites are very similar in quality and relevance, the ranking team will change nothing. To improve its ranking, a site must be made clearly the most relevant for targeted queries so that Google's team can clearly identify that it should be ...

AI & SEO

Do URL fragments really disrupt the indexing of JavaScript sites?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★

On JavaScript sites, if content is only loaded when the fragment is present, Google will likely not be able to index that content because fragments are removed during indexing. Only a very small number of historical sites still use fragments for inde...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing JavaScript & Technical SEO

Is it really necessary to list every keyword variation for Google to understand your content?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

Google tries to understand synonyms, equivalents, acronyms, and singular/plural forms to determine if a page is relevant for different versions of a keyword. It is not necessary to include every variation, synonym, or typo on the page: Google can und...

Domain Age & History AI & SEO

Paired AMP: Is it really the regular HTML that matters for indexing?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

In a paired AMP configuration (normal HTML page + linked AMP page), Google uses the normal HTML page for indexing. The AMP page is additional and can be displayed on mobile and appropriate devices, but indexing is based on the classic HTML version.

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

Does a sudden drop in traffic always signal a quality issue?

John Mueller Oct 15, 2020 ★★★

If there is a significant drop in traffic from one day to the next, it is more indicative of a quality issue than a technical problem. A technical issue would generally cause a subtle decline over several weeks during reprocessing for indexing. A sud...

Algorithms Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing E-commerce AI & SEO