What does Google say about SEO?

Is lazy loading really a game-changer for Google's page experience ranking factor?

Martin Splitt Sep 21, 2023 ★★

Google indicates that lazy loading (deferred loading) contributes to improving page experience. This optimization technique is recommended for website owners looking to enhance their site performance.

Domain Age & History Content AI & SEO Images & Videos Web Performance Search Console

Why Can Your Indexed URL Count Suddenly Skyrocket in Search Console?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

In the September SEO Office Hours, Gary Illyes explained why it's sometimes possible to observe a sudden spike in indexed URLs in Google Search. There are multiple reasons that can explain this, but Google's Webmaster Trends Analyst lists three main ...

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing Discover & News AI & SEO JavaScript & Technical SEO Links & Backlinks Domain Name Pagination & Structure Web Performance

Should You Avoid a Website Redesign for Fear of Losing Your SEO Traffic?

John Mueller Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

On the social network X, a user asked John Mueller if it was possible to prevent a drop in traffic and rankings after a website redesign, and how long it might take to return to normal. John Mueller not only indicated that it was impossible to preven...

Content AI & SEO Redirects Social Media

Does content quality really impact every single Google ranking system?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

Content quality affects practically all Google search systems: from sitemaps to crawling, ranking, indexing, index selection, and ranking. Different systems use quality differently, but they all use it.

Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Search Console

Does Google really prioritize high-quality pages when deciding what to crawl?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

The crawl scheduler makes predictions about the quality of pages to crawl and in what order. It establishes an ordered list of URLs to crawl, with higher-quality URLs being crawled with priority.

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Domain Name Pagination & Structure

Does page quality really determine how deeply Google crawls your website?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

When Google discovers a new page on a website, it examines the quality of the homepage or previous pages to predict whether it should crawl this new page or not.

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing

Does Google really filter certain topics during crawling and indexing?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★

At the crawling and indexing stage, Google is not particularly demanding about a page's subject matter (legal, technical, etc.). What matters is the quality of the content and how it is written, not the theme addressed.

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing

Can Google really crawl a page without indexing it if the content doesn't make sense?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★

If a page's content is gibberish or unintelligible, Google can crawl it but probably won't index it because the system cannot extract useful words or meaning from the page.

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO

Is duplicate content really safe for your SEO?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

It is normal to have duplicate content on a site and you should not worry too much about it. However, excessive duplication can accidentally harm the site because Google will be very enthusiastic about crawling all newly discovered URLs.

Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Domain Name

Should you really have humans review your machine-translated content before publishing?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★

For machine-translated content, it is strongly recommended to have translations reviewed by humans because machines make errors. Google itself uses machine translation but with human review.

Content AI & SEO International SEO

Does Google really give preferential treatment to new homepages?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★

For a new site, Google generally gives the benefit of the doubt to homepages and crawls them without bias or prior predictions. The homepage will likely be indexed unless the content is of very poor quality.

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO

Is Googlebot really that dumb, or is Google hiding something about how crawling actually works?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★

Googlebot is simply a wget or curl instance that fetches pages with no inherent intelligence. It's the crawl scheduling system that makes the smart decisions about what to crawl and when, based on quality signals.

Domain Age & History Crawl & Indexing Domain Name

Is Google really penalizing entire sections of your site based on quality patterns?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

Google can learn that certain URL patterns on a site contain lower-quality content and treat them differently. For example, a user-generated content section may be crawled less frequently if the overall quality is lower.

Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO Domain Name

Does moving low-quality UGC content really unlock your site's crawl potential?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★

SEOs have observed improvements in how Google crawls certain sections of their site after moving low-quality UGC content away from the main domain. Improving quality allows you to escape 'crawl prisons'.

Content Crawl & Indexing AI & SEO

Does update frequency really affect how often Google crawls your pages?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★

Two distinct signals drive crawl decisions: content quality (the most important) and page update frequency. Pages that rarely change, like legal notices, are crawled less frequently.

Domain Age & History Content Crawl & Indexing

Can affiliate links coexist with a high-quality SEO strategy?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

Affiliate links are not a problem if you create useful and original content, such as a genuine product review. Simply copy-pasting the description provided by the affiliate without added value is not considered useful content.

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Why does Google rely on links from 'normal websites' to evaluate your site's authority?

Gary Illyes Sep 19, 2023 ★★★

Links from normal websites (not profile pages or suspicious sites) are very useful for estimating a site's importance for indexation. The more natural links a site receives from legitimate websites, the more positive a signal it is.

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

Can Spelling Mistakes Actually Hurt Your SEO Rankings?

John Mueller Sep 12, 2023 ★★★

John Mueller, once again, states that Google is rather lenient with typos, provided that the overall quality of the site is up to par. This statement is a response to a question asked by an internet user who was concerned about potential penalties th...

Domain Age & History Content Discover & News AI & SEO International SEO

Should You Really Avoid Google Sites for Your SEO Strategy?

John Mueller Sep 12, 2023 ★★★

During the September 2023 SEO Office Hours, John Mueller stated that Google Sites were not the ideal solution for SEO. While sites created through this service can be indexed by Google, they can also pose some problems: "the URLs used in Google Sites...

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

Does Your Website's Language Affect Google Penalties?

John Mueller Sep 12, 2023 ★★★

John Mueller confirmed that Google can penalize any site, regardless of its language, adding that quality content is not a matter of language either: "manual actions and algorithm changes are independent of the authors' native language. People from a...

Algorithms Content AI & SEO International SEO