What does Google say about SEO? /
The Content category compiles all official Google statements regarding textual content creation, optimization, and evaluation in the context of search engine optimization. It encompasses fundamental aspects such as editorial quality, E-E-A-T criteria (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness), duplicate content issues, and thin content concerns. Google's positions on these topics are critical for understanding how algorithms assess the relevance and added value of web pages. This category also includes recommendations on structural elements like headings (H1, H2, Hn tags), meta descriptions, and semantic optimization. With the introduction of the Helpful Content system, Google has reinforced the importance of a user-first approach rather than a search engine-first methodology. SEO professionals will find here official guidance for creating content that meets algorithmic expectations while delivering genuine value to users, a balance that has become essential for achieving and maintaining strong rankings in search results. These declarations provide clarity on content strategies that align with Google's evolving quality standards and ranking factors.
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★★★ Should You Use HTML or XML Sitemap for Hreflang Tags?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that Hreflang tags are processed in the same way, whether they are integrated into the source code of pages or in XML Sitemap files....
John Mueller Jun 18, 2018
Do Customer Reviews and Surveys Really Impact Google's Ranking Algorithm?
John Mueller (yes, him again) explained in a hangout that Google's algorithm doesn't use data such as survey results, reviews, ratings, critiques, etc. to assess a page's relevance for a given query....
John Mueller Jun 18, 2018
Does Word Order in Title Tags Really Impact SEO Rankings?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that changing the word order in a Title tag does not, in his opinion, modify the page's ranking in search results....
John Mueller Jun 11, 2018
★★★ How Long Should You Really Wait After a Website Merger or Split?
John Mueller reminded us in a hangout that when multiple sites merge or "split" (one site broken into several different ones), it can take quite a long time for the search engine algorithms to fully p...
John Mueller Jun 11, 2018
★★★ Does Frequent Crawling Really Improve Your SEO Rankings?
John Mueller, once again, explained on Twitter that regular crawling of a site was not synonymous with better rankings and that, as a general rule, crawl frequency has no direct correlation with ranki...
John Mueller Jun 06, 2018
★★★ Should You Block Certain CSS or JavaScript Resources to Improve Your Site's SEO?
Once again, John Mueller explains in a hangout that he doesn't recommend blocking resources solely for Google, as this can affect how the search engine "sees" the page. And this can therefore modify i...
John Mueller Jun 06, 2018
★★★ Should You Really Worry About Crawl Budget for Your Website?
John Mueller indicated, again on Twitter, that the notion of "crawl budget" was often overestimated by webmasters. Focusing on this point can be effective for very large sites, not for smaller ones....
John Mueller Jun 06, 2018
★★★ Are PDF Files Penalized by Google for Not Being Mobile-Friendly?
John Mueller reminded us of an obvious fact on Twitter by explaining that a PDF document cannot be "mobile friendly" or at least that Google does not see them as such......
John Mueller Jun 06, 2018
★★ Subdomain or Subdirectory: Which Structure Should You Choose for Better SEO?
John Mueller, him again, confirmed in a hangout that Google treats subdomains (blog.example.com) and subdirectories (www.example.com/blog/) in the same way....
John Mueller May 28, 2018
★★★ Can You Really Use a Single robots.txt File to Declare Sitemaps for Multiple Different Domains?
Always John Mueller and always Twitter with the fact that a robots.txt file that would be identical and shared by several websites contains the addresses of several XML Sitemap files, one for each sit...
John Mueller May 28, 2018
★★★ Should You Duplicate Your Page Title in the Main Image's Alt Attribute?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that duplicating a page's title (Title tag) in the Alt attribute of that page's main image was not a problem in itself......
John Mueller May 28, 2018
★★★ Does the Number of Slashes in a URL Actually Affect Google Rankings?
John Mueller indicated, again on Twitter, that the number of slashes ("/") in a URL had no impact for Google and that the search engine does not count how many times this character appears for any ana...
John Mueller May 28, 2018
★★ How Do EAT Criteria Actually Influence Your Chances of Winning Featured Snippets?
John Mueller also indicated during a hangout that, to appear in a featured snippet, a website must meet "EAT" criteria (Expertise, Authority and Trustworthiness). In short, everything will depend prim...
John Mueller May 21, 2018
★★★ Does Fast Server Response Time Really Boost the Number of Pages Google Crawls?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that the faster a website's response time, the more pages search engine bots could crawl: "The faster we can crawl, the more we can crawl"......
John Mueller May 21, 2018
★★ Does Shared Hosting Really Hurt Your SEO Rankings?
John Mueller stated repeatedly on Twitter that using the same IP address for multiple websites (for example in the case of shared hosting) does not cause any problems in terms of "search". And that th...
John Mueller May 21, 2018
★★★ Should You Drop Standout and Editors' Picks Tags for Google News?
Google has indicated that, as part of the launch of the new version of Google News, the Editors' Picks feed and the Standout HTML tag - which allowed highlighting certain articles considered to be of ...
Google May 21, 2018
★★★ How Does Google's Two-Phase JavaScript Crawling Really Affect Your Rankings?
At the Google I/O event, Tom Greenaway, a search engine engineer, indicated that Google crawls JavaScript pages using a two-phase process (largely due to available machine resource management): a firs...
Google May 14, 2018
★★★ Why Is Google Still Using Chrome 41 to Index Your Pages?
John Mueller also indicated during the Google I/O event that, to render web pages when analyzing code, Google was using Chrome version 41, even though the browser was currently and officially at versi...
John Mueller May 14, 2018
★★ Should You Keep the Same URL or Create a 301 Redirect When Updating Content?
When an internet user asked about replacing old content with new content on a website, John Mueller explained that it's better to keep the same URL and change the content of that page rather than redi...
John Mueller May 09, 2018
★★★ Should You Use a 404 Instead of a 403 to Remove Pages from Google's Index?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that, to signal to Google that a page no longer exists and to see it disappear from the index, a 404 code (Page not Found) should be preferred over a 403 code (Forbid...
John Mueller May 09, 2018
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