What does Google say about SEO?

Should You Stop Using the Canonical Tag for Pagination and Redirects?

Martin Splitt Aug 17, 2020 ★★★

Rachel Costello and Martin Splitt have published a very interesting video on web page canonicalization and therefore the "canonical" tag. They explain in particular that this tag was created primarily to avoid content duplication (internal or externa...

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

Does changing your navigation really impact your rankings?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

For a modified navigation structure, Google handles the change very smoothly if only the internal navigation changes without modifying the URLs. It's not akin to a complete restructuring requiring a total reanalysis. For an average-sized site, the tr...

AI & SEO Domain Name Pagination & Structure

Can you inject video tags via JavaScript without facing SEO penalties?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

Google fully accepts that video tags and their metadata (poster image, etc.) can be injected by JavaScript instead of being present in the source HTML. If the tag is visible in the rendered HTML (verifiable via the URL Inspection tool), that's suffic...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Images & Videos JavaScript & Technical SEO Domain Name Search Console

How does Google adapt AMP display based on the browser's technical capabilities?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

Google adapts the display of search results (including AMP) according to the capabilities of the browser being used. If a browser does not support all required features, Google displays a simplified version to ensure that the user can at least access...

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO Mobile SEO Local Search

Should You Really Include Modification Dates in Your XML Sitemaps?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

Google prefers to have a modification date in sitemaps to know whether to recrawl a page. If the date is old but correct, it's not a problem: Google will typically crawl it. The issue arises only when ALL dates are identical (e.g., sitemap generation...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Pagination & Structure Search Console

Are iframes really neutral for SEO, or should you be cautious about them?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

Integrating external content via iframe is not problematic as long as it does not make up the entirety of the page's content. Google can either attribute it to the main page (if rendered) or index it separately. Links within the iframe are treated as...

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

Is cross-domain duplicate content really harmless for your SEO?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

Having the same content in the same language across multiple domains (e.g., English content on .com and .pl) is not penalized. Google simply chooses a canonical URL. If the content differs slightly (localized header), both versions are indexed. For s...

Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO Domain Name Local Search International SEO

Can Google redirect your competitors' backlinks to your PDF?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

When the same PDF file exists on multiple servers, Google selects a canonical version and concentrates all signals (including links pointing to other versions) there. This can create situations where a link to a competitor's PDF appears to be pointin...

Crawl & Indexing Links & Backlinks PDF & Files

How does Google truly calculate the crawl budget for your site?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

The crawl budget depends on two main factors: 1) Google's need (overall site quality, actual frequency of content changes) which determines how much Google wants to crawl, and 2) the server's capacity (response time, server errors) which determines h...

Content Crawl & Indexing

Why does Google only index one language when your site switches through JavaScript?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

If the site's language is managed solely by JavaScript/cookies (same URL for all languages), Google can only index one language version because Googlebot does not follow language switchers or use cookies. To index multiple languages, each version mus...

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing JavaScript & Technical SEO Domain Name International SEO

Does using nofollow really stop Google from crawling your links?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

Nofollow, sponsored, and UGC attributes generally prevent the transfer of signals but do not ensure that Google won’t crawl the link. To fully block crawling, use robots.txt. An intermediate solution consists of redirecting these links through a dire...

Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Links & Backlinks

Does a hierarchical structure really boost SEO compared to a flat architecture?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

Transitioning from a flat structure (all links from the homepage) to a hierarchical structure (links grouped by categories) is totally acceptable. Google comprehends the context and relationships between pages better with a hierarchical structure, wh...

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

Why does Google keep 404 URLs in Search Console for years?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

404 URLs linger in Google's system for a long time (several years) because Google wants to make sure no signals are lost. Google continues to occasionally crawl these 404 pages to verify that nothing is missing. It's not problematic for them to appea...

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Domain Name Search Console

Is Google really cropping your recipe images if you fail to provide the right formats?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

For rich results related to recipes, if Google cannot find the required image formats (different width/height ratios for different displays), it may automatically crop the available images. It is essential to provide documented image variants for eac...

Domain Age & History AI & SEO Images & Videos PDF & Files

Is it really necessary to remove your old content to boost your SEO?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★★

Google primarily evaluates pages individually, not the total volume of content. Having 5,000 or 500 articles does not increase overall relevance. Removing low-quality content (e.g., duplicate agency news, thin articles) can improve crawling and perce...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing Discover & News AI & SEO

Should you limit the number of outbound links to the same domain to avoid a Google penalty?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

Having numerous outbound links to the same domain (e.g., Netflix for a movie list) is not problematic for Google as long as it adds value for the users. It is comparable to Amazon affiliate sites with many links to Amazon. Google does not penalize th...

AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO Links & Backlinks Domain Name

Why does Google take longer to index a simple title change?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

If only the title of a page changes (without modifying the main content), Google's systems may respond more slowly because they detect that the main content is unchanged. To enhance the processing speed, also modify the lastmod date in the sitemap wh...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing Search Console

Should you worry when the number of indexed pages fluctuates by 50% in just a few days?

Johannes Müller Aug 14, 2020 ★★

For large sites, it's normal for the number of indexed pages to fluctuate significantly (e.g., from 10,000 to 5,000 then 20,000). Google's systems continuously adjust to find the optimal indexing level. If no technical errors appear in Search Console...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing Search Console

Is the canonical tag really just a suggestion for Google?

Martin Splitt Aug 13, 2020 ★★★

The canonical tag is not a mandatory directive for Google, but rather a signal among others. Google utilizes multiple signals (content fingerprint, site structure, sitemaps, links) to identify duplicate content. Placing a canonical tag on non-identic...

Algorithms Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Links & Backlinks Domain Name Pagination & Structure Search Console

Is using the canonical tag as a redirection sabotaging your crawl budget?

Martin Splitt Aug 13, 2020 ★★★

The canonical tag does not replace a redirection. For an out-of-stock product, you should redirect to a relevant similar product for the user, or return a temporary 404. Using a canonical to point to a category page wastes crawl budget because Google...

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing E-commerce AI & SEO Redirects