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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★★ 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
★★★ 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
★★★ 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
★★★ 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
★★ 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
★★★ Where Should Pagination Tags Be Placed for Google to Recognize Them?
John Mueller reminded that pagination tags (rel=next and rel=prev) must be in the "Head" section of the source code for paginated content. If these indications are found in links (A tag) and therefore...
John Mueller May 02, 2018
★★★ Should You Split Your Content Across Multiple Pages to Improve Google Indexing?
John Mueller indicated during a hangout that it was not a good strategy to split content across multiple pages solely to increase the number of pages indexed by Google because, by doing so, you also r...
John Mueller May 02, 2018
★★★ Does the HTTPS SEO Boost Really Work the Same for Every Website?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that the "SEO boost" given when a website switches to HTTPS does not depend on the type of site or its topic, but is identical for all information sources......
John Mueller May 02, 2018
★★ Can You Really Harm a Competitor's Site with External Canonical Tags?
A method of performing negative SEO based on "canonical" tags issued from low-quality sites has resurfaced recently following an article on this subject. John Mueller has, for his part, indicated that...
John Mueller May 02, 2018
Should You Avoid Internal Links to Noindex Pages?
John Mueller explained on Twitter that there's no problem if a website creates many internal links to pages that are deindexed from the search engine......
John Mueller May 02, 2018
★★★ Should You Really Avoid Redirects in Hreflang Tags at All Costs?
John Mueller reminded us on Twitter that URLs specified in Hreflang tags should not be subject to 301, 302 or any other type of redirect. In other words, they must return a 200 code and not be redirec...
John Mueller Apr 23, 2018
★★ Does Google Really Count JavaScript Links for SEO?
John Mueller also indicated on Twitter that some JavaScript links, particularly those using "onclick" directives, could be poorly analyzed by Google and the link not taken into account....
John Mueller Apr 23, 2018
Should You Use Canonical Tags or Noindex to Handle Duplicate Content?
John Mueller indicated that Google only uses the pages it has in its index for a given site to establish an overall quality score for the information source (which seems quite logical). He also explai...
John Mueller Apr 23, 2018
Does Your Site's Mobile Traffic Influence Its Migration to Mobile First Index?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that the decision to migrate a site to the Mobile First Index was not dependent on the volume of mobile traffic on that site, but solely on whether the site is techni...
John Mueller Apr 23, 2018
★★★ Does Having an RSS Feed Actually Improve Your Google Rankings?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that having an RSS feed on your site does not help it rank better in the SERPs, neither in Google nor in Google News....
John Mueller Apr 16, 2018
★★★ Can a Single Misplaced Tag in Your <head> Invalidate Your Entire HTML Code in Google's Eyes?
During a recent Google event, John Mueller explained that if a tag that should normally be in the "body" is found in the "head" section of the source code, it may not be taken into account by the sear...
John Mueller Apr 16, 2018
★★★ Are Complex Tables Really Killing Your Featured Snippet Chances?
John Mueller indicated during a hangout that content displayed in the form of a large table or a long series of links was not optimized to appear as a featured snippet and, therefore, in the context o...
John Mueller Apr 16, 2018
★★★ Do Structured Data Really Influence Rankings in Google?
John Mueller reminded on Twitter that integrating structured data tags could be a good thing for Google's understanding of a web page's content, since they explain and "label" a certain number of conc...
John Mueller Apr 09, 2018
★★★ How Do You Effectively Manage Sitemaps When Your Site Exceeds 50,000 URLs?
In his "SEO Snippets" video series, John Mueller has just published one about Sitemaps and the Sitemap Index system that allows you to create such files when a website has more than 50,000 URLs....
John Mueller Apr 09, 2018
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