John Mueller

★★★ Is Google Really Replacing FID with INP in Core Web Vitals—And What Does It Mean for Your Rankings?

Interaction to Next Paint (INP) will officially become a metric that is part of the Core Web Vitals....

Jul 18, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why is Google shutting down its mobile-friendly testing tool?

The mobile-friendly testing tool and its API will be removed from Search Console by the end of 2023....

Jul 18, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you worry about Google removing the mobile usability report from Search Console?

The mobile usability report will be removed from Search Console by the end of 2023....

Jul 18, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is Google really phasing out mobile-friendliness as a separate ranking signal?

Google is removing mobile-friendliness as a distinct ranking factor separate from Core Web Vitals....

Jul 18, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Do Core Web Vitals Really Impact Your Rankings in Google's Helpful Content System?

Google has clarified how Core Web Vitals are used in its helpful content ranking system....

Jul 18, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should You Really Avoid Changing Your 301 Redirects Too Frequently?

On Reddit, John Mueller explained that it is possible to cancel a permanent 301 redirect, but that he doesn't recommend doing this to redirect content elsewhere in the short term: "I would prefer that...

Jul 18, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does cutting your indexed pages really boost SEO, or is it just a myth?

For large sites, reducing indexable pages from 8 to 2 million doesn't guarantee improvement. You need to focus on genuinely improving overall site quality, not just cutting page count. Check the crawl...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is mobile-first indexing really the standard for every website on the web?

Almost all websites are now crawled and indexed with their mobile version. To verify, check the crawl statistics in Search Console. If the smartphone Googlebot is the most common crawler type, it's co...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ How long does Google actually remember old URLs after a site migration?

Google's systems can remember old URLs for a very long time after a migration. This isn't a problem as long as the old URLs redirect correctly. You generally cannot erase them from Google's memory; th...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you really mark every affiliate link with rel=nofollow or rel=sponsored?

Affiliate sites are acceptable. There is no special structured data to signal that a site is affiliate-based. Affiliate links must be marked with rel=nofollow or rel=sponsored so that search engines k...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should you really verify each subdomain separately in Search Console?

Subdomains and subdirectories can be verified separately in Search Console. If the main domain is verified, you can add these sub-sections without additional verification. Data can take a few days to ...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Does the disavow tool really delete toxic backlinks from Google's index?

The link disavow tool tells Google not to count links for ranking, but it doesn't remove them from the web or from Google's systems. Links from foreign language websites are perfectly acceptable and c...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Is Google really seeing your prices in US dollars by default?

Google crawls predominantly from the United States. If a site changes currency based on user location, Google will primarily see prices in US dollars. To display multiple currencies in search results,...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does a 403 error on mobile really block your entire site from being indexed by Google?

If Googlebot crawls a site with a mobile user agent and receives an HTTP 403 code, it signals there is nothing to index, so Google indexes nothing. The URL inspection tool in Search Console allows you...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should You Place Your Blog Posts in a /blog/ Subfolder or at the Root of Your Site?

On Reddit, John Mueller responded to a user who was wondering whether it was better to place their blog articles in a /blog/ directory or if it was possible to put them at the root. His response: "Goo...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Can Relevance Really Outweigh All Other SEO Ranking Factors?

On Mastodon, John Mueller clarified that no ranking factor can compensate for a lack of relevance or users' lack of interest in a website. As the Google employee states: "it's easy to forget that a si...

Jul 11, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★ Should you rethink your domain strategy now that .ai has become a generic ccTLD?

Google has changed how it treats the .ai top-level domain in Google Search. It is now considered a generic country code top-level domain (generic ccTLD)....

Jul 05, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Is Google's new spam report really a game-changer for SEOs?

The spam report has been redesigned and anti-spam policies in Search Essentials (formerly Webmaster Guidelines) have been updated to make it easier to report problematic search results....

Jul 05, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Why is Google documenting a new generic crawler and revealing its IP addresses?

Google has documented a new generic crawler, reorganized the Google crawlers page, and added the IP addresses used by these crawlers to the documentation....

Jul 05, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should you really stop using the ping endpoint to submit your sitemaps?

Google announced the upcoming deprecation of the ping endpoint for sitemaps, scheduled for the end of 2023, because the data received was not particularly useful. Sitemaps can still be submitted via S...

Jul 05, 2023 ⚡ Analysis available