What does Google say about SEO? /
Google Search Console stands as the essential tool for SEO professionals seeking to optimize their website's organic visibility. This free platform delivers invaluable data on organic performance, indexation status, technical errors, and user behavior in search results. Official Google statements regarding Search Console are critical for properly interpreting coverage reports, performance data, URL inspection tools, and sitemap management features. SEO practitioners rely on these official positions to diagnose indexation issues, identify optimization opportunities, and monitor organic traffic evolution. Mastering functionalities like Core Web Vitals reports, structured data validation, internal and external link analysis, and page experience signals has become essential for modern SEO strategies. Understanding official recommendations helps avoid metric misinterpretation, optimize crawl budget efficiently, and make strategic decisions based on reliable data to sustainably improve SERP rankings. Whether troubleshooting mobile usability issues, monitoring manual actions, or analyzing search queries that drive traffic, Search Console insights combined with Google's official guidance provide the foundation for data-driven SEO decision-making and continuous performance improvement in an ever-evolving search landscape.
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★★★ Should you always request reindexing through the URL Inspection Tool?
If you have modified a page and want to ask Google to reindex it, use the Request Indexing feature in the URL Inspection Tool. You can also click on View Crawled Page to check the HTML version indexed...
Daniel Waisberg Oct 06, 2020
★★★ Do You Really Need to Resubmit Your XML Sitemap After Every Indexing Request in Search Console?
John Mueller explained that if you request indexing in Search Console via the URL inspection tool, this has no impact on your site's XML Sitemap file and this file will not be reconsidered / read as a...
John Mueller Oct 05, 2020
★★ How can you leverage the new news filter in Search Console to boost your performance?
A new filter for news has been added to the Search Console performance report. This filter allows users to gain insights into the performance of news content in the Google Search News tab....
John Mueller Sep 29, 2020
★★ Do the default sitemaps in WordPress Core really change the game for SEO?
Sitemaps are now part of the WordPress core. This means that any site using WordPress can submit a default sitemap file. Sitemaps are widely supported by search engines and help in crawling and indexi...
John Mueller Sep 29, 2020
★★ Search Console Insights: Has Google finally unified Analytics and Search Console for SEOs?
Search Console Insights is a new beta tool that combines data from Google Analytics and Search Console in an easy-to-understand format for content creators. Its goal is to assist website owners in enh...
John Mueller Sep 29, 2020
★★★ Should you really migrate to domain properties in Search Console?
Google recommends using domain properties in Search Console whenever possible. A domain property provides insights for all variations of a domain, making it easier to get a comprehensive view of a web...
John Mueller Sep 29, 2020
★★★ Does Google Cloud Hosting Really Boost Your SEO Performance?
John Mueller reminded us that hosting your site on Google Cloud servers offers no SEO advantage whatsoever. Additionally, he explained, in response to a study that seemed to suggest otherwise, that sh...
John Mueller Sep 28, 2020
★★ Is it true that Search Console only analyzes a portion of your site’s pages?
The aggregated reports in Search Console (mobile usability, structured data, speed) are based on a sample of site pages, not on all indexed pages. The size of this sample may decrease without indicati...
John Mueller Sep 25, 2020
★★★ Should you stop tweeting at Google and start using the 'Submit Feedback' button in Search Console?
Google strongly encourages the use of the 'Submit Feedback' button in Search Console instead of Twitter. Feedback through this channel provides quantitative data that is genuinely taken into account t...
Martin Splitt Sep 23, 2020
★★★ Should You Focus Exclusively on Core Web Vitals to Optimize Web Performance for SEO?
John Mueller indicated on Twitter that "webperf" (Web performance, page load times, etc.) was often a complex topic, but that for SEO, Google stuck to Core Web Vitals and that the 3 criteria of these ...
John Mueller Sep 21, 2020
★★ Does Google Tag Manager affect your content to the point of impacting your SEO?
If the 'container tag' refers to Google Tag Manager, Google processes it during the page rendering. GTM can add, modify, or remove content via JavaScript. Using URL Inspection allows you to see the re...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
Why does Search Console only show partial data for the News section at launch?
Data for the News section in Search Console (for News mode in Search, not Google News App) only goes back to around July 2020, which is when data collection began. For older sites, this view will be l...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★ Why is Google planning to remove the 'crawl anomaly' category from Search Console?
Google is working on removing the generic 'crawl anomaly' category in Search Console. Instead of grouping various issues, the data will be reclassified into more specific and useful categories. This c...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★★ Could your meta tags be hiding from Google without you even knowing?
Some third-party scripts inject tags (e.g. iframe) at the top of the <head>, which can lead Google to believe that the <head> is prematurely closed. Result: robots metatag, canonical, hreflang may be ...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★ Is your site migration stuck in 'pending' status in Search Console? Find out why!
A site move displayed as 'pending' in Search Console for months after submission signals no problem. This status simply indicates that Google is keeping track of the move. There is no 'completed' stat...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★★ Are Google’s manual penalties always visible in Search Console?
If a manual action has been taken by Google's Webspam team, it will almost always be visible in Search Console. There are a few rare edge cases where this would not be displayed, but for a normal site...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★ Should you really choose the 410 code over 404 for quick deindexing of a page?
The 410 (Gone) code removes pages from the index slightly faster than the 404, but in the long term, the difference is theoretical and negligible. For urgent removal, using the removal tool in Search ...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★★ Do Images in XML Sitemaps Count Toward the 50,000 URL Limit?
We know that XML Sitemap files are limited to 50,000 URLs. We also know that for each page URL, we can indicate the URLs of the main images it contains. But do these image URLs count as part of the 50...
John Mueller Sep 09, 2020
★★ Why are crawl stats a completely useless indicator for assessing the performance of your content?
To determine if content is underperforming, check the Performance Report in Search Console rather than the crawl stats. If you're getting a lot of impressions but few clicks, the content may need to b...
Martin Splitt Sep 09, 2020
★★ Should you reconfigure Search Console every time you migrate from www to non-www?
When changing a prefix (www/non-www), you must verify the new property if the verification is prefix-based. Domain verification avoids this problem. Search Console is not required for the website's op...
John Mueller Sep 04, 2020
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