John Mueller

★★★ Does Geographic Hosting Location Still Impact Your Site's SEO Rankings?

John Mueller indicated on Twitter that the geographic location of a server no longer matters to Google. To establish the target country of a site, the search engine primarily relies on the domain exte...

Jul 17, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Do Google and Bing Actually Share the Same Search Index?

John Mueller reminded us on Twitter - but did it really need to be said given how obvious the information is? - that Google doesn't share an index with Bing (or any other competing search engine). Rea...

Jul 10, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should You Really Avoid Massive 301 Redirects to Your Homepage?

John Mueller indicated on Twitter that 301 redirects should primarily be used as "1:1" replacements, meaning: one URL replaces another. Otherwise, it's better to leave the URL as a 404. If you impleme...

Jul 10, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Will Hidden Content in Accordions and Tabs Finally Carry the Same SEO Weight as Visible Text?

Following Gary Illyes a few weeks ago, John Mueller confirmed in a hangout that hidden but potentially visible content on a page (tabs, accordions, etc.) will be treated, when the Mobile First project...

Jul 10, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should you really index a site with thousands of pages gradually, or can you submit everything at once?

John Mueller indicated in a hangout that it poses no problem for Google's robots to crawl, all at once, a new site or a new section within a site, comprising hundreds of thousands of pages. The only p...

Jul 10, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does Embedding YouTube Videos Actually Improve Your Google Rankings?

John Mueller indicated on a webmaster forum that including a YouTube video on a web page does not increase its relevance score for the search engine. Adding videos plays no role in your Google ranking...

Jul 10, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does RankBrain really change the way we understand ambiguous queries?

RankBrain helps Google understand unknown or ambiguous queries by analyzing what the user might mean, adjusting search results accordingly....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you still declare a page's language to Google?

Google automatically determines the primary language of a page and does not need an explicit declaration. Avoid having English-other language parallel translations on the same page....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Do you really need to use 301 redirects to replace duplicate content?

Use 301 redirects to replace old content with new if you have a product or page that directly replaces another....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why does Google ignore your deep links if the app and web content don't match?

To properly link a web page to an app page, the content must match; otherwise, Google will not be able to establish this link and utilize the deep link....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Does the position of an internal link on the page really affect its SEO weight?

The position of internal links on a page (header, footer, main content) is of little relevance for SEO. It is essential that image links have alternative text to serve as anchor text....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should you really implement AMP on a full-fledged e-commerce site?

E-commerce sites in the Netherlands can implement AMP if they find it enhances certain sections of their site. AMP compatibility is assessed on a page-by-page basis and can be applied only to specific...

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Are mobile interstitials truly a factor in Google's ranking drop?

Currently, interstitials are only a concern on mobile devices. Google considers interstitials to be a factor of mobile incompatibility....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Does the canonical tag truly control facet navigation?

Using the canonical tag is a good approach for managing facet navigation and avoiding duplicate content. Check Google's resources for more advice on this topic....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Do social signals really influence natural rankings?

Social signals do not have a direct impact on SEO ranking. However, the traffic indirectly generated by social networks can influence visibility....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does content length really influence Google rankings?

Google does not have a specific content length criterion to determine ranking; it depends on the topic and type of content....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you really place a canonical tag on every page, even without duplication?

Each page should have a canonical tag pointing to itself to clarify the preferred URL for indexing, which is useful even in the absence of apparent duplicates....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you really write 'naturally' for Google or optimize your keywords?

It is recommended to write naturally and use the language your users employ. Google tries to understand keyword variants as synonyms but can sometimes recognize subtle differences....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does hidden content in mobile accordions really count as regular content for Google?

With mobile-first indexing, content hidden in tabs or dropdown menus on mobile is treated as regular content by Google, unlike hidden content on desktop which is less valued....

Jul 07, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Are Google's manual actions a death sentence for your site?

Manual actions are taken by Google's anti-spam team according to webmaster guidelines when violations are detected. In the event of a manual penalty, webmasters must make substantial changes to elimin...

Jun 30, 2017 ⚡ Analysis available