John Mueller

★★ Can commodity content really survive in Google search results?

For commodity content that anyone can reproduce (public domain poems, well-known quotes, etc.), it is crucial to provide significant unique value. Sites based solely on this type of content are in a p...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why does Google insist that sitemaps should never be your only safety net?

Sitemaps should provide supplementary information about a site, but should not be the primary means of content discovery. Internal linking is essential. Google must be able to discover all content by ...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Can Core Web Vitals Really Tank Your Rankings by 48 Positions?

Page Experience, including Core Web Vitals, is a subtle ranking signal that helps differentiate between content of similar quality. It should not cause drastic changes in positioning. A page should no...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Do you really need to pick one primary language per page if you're targeting multiple markets?

Google tries to understand a page's primary language to determine which search queries should display it. Pages intentionally mixing multiple languages make it harder for Google to rank the page corre...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does Google really ignore language URL parameters without warning?

If Google detects that a URL parameter (like hl=language) frequently leads to identical content or invalid content, its systems can learn to ignore this parameter. It is important to ensure that each ...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does improving page speed really boost your rankings as fast as everyone claims?

A rapid ranking improvement after boosting page speed (from 30 to 45-50 on PageSpeed Insights) within a few days is probably not due to speed. Speed metrics are measured via the Chrome User Experience...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why is one x-default enough for your entire multi-domain hreflang configuration?

In an hreflang configuration, even across multiple domains, there must be only one x-default. For each page, all hreflang annotations must match and clearly indicate which version to show based on cou...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you stop using the manual submission tool in Google Search Console?

Regularly using the 'Request indexing' function in Search Console is almost a sign that Google isn't yet convinced by your site. Even if you force indexation, there's no guarantee the page will appear...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is Google really refusing to index your pages even though they're crawled regularly and have no technical issues?

When a page is crawled multiple times but not indexed (excluding technical errors, noindex, or duplications), it's generally related to the perceived quality of the entire site or that specific sectio...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does Google really show you all the links that matter for your SEO in Search Console?

The links report in Search Console displays all known links to a site, whether important or not. This includes nofollow links, disavowed links, and links ignored by Google. The presence of a link in t...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you really avoid product structured data on category pages?

According to Google's policies, you should not implement multiple product schemas on a product listing page. Product structured data must apply to the main element of the page. On a category page with...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you really be using canonicals on your filtered internal search pages?

For internal search results pages with different sorts and filters, it is recommended to define a main sort order and use rel=canonical on filtered or sorted variants to point to the main version. Thi...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should you disable automatic links to boost your SEO performance?

Massively removing internally generated automatic links will probably have an impact on rankings, but it's impossible to predict whether that impact will be positive or negative. It's recommended to c...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Why does the schema.org validator contradict Google's tools?

The schema.org validator validates all the theoretical vocabulary of schema.org, while Google tools (Rich Results Test, Search Console) only validate the types of structured data that have a visible e...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why does Google refuse to index some of your pages?

Google doesn't automatically index all pages from every website. The 'Discovered, not crawled' or 'Crawled, not indexed' status lasting several weeks doesn't necessarily indicate a technical problem, ...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Can structured data really replace traditional internal linking strategy?

Internal linking is one of the most important SEO actions you can take on a site to guide Google and visitors toward important pages. Structured data does not replace normal HTML links. URLs in hrefla...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Can you host your XML sitemap on a different domain than your main website?

It is entirely possible to host sitemap files on a different domain. Two methods work: having both domains verified in Search Console, or submitting the sitemap via robots.txt with 'sitemap:' followed...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Do HTML5 <header> and <footer> tags really boost your SEO rankings?

In HTML5, you can use <header> and <footer> elements to semantically structure your page. Within these elements, you can have your own heading hierarchies. This allows for clean structure from a seman...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Is Google really cutting back on FAQ rich snippets in search results, and what does that mean for your SEO strategy?

Google has observed that many websites are adding FAQ markup to every page purely to occupy more space in search results. Google is therefore reducing the number of FAQ entries displayed in search res...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does the shift from 'Bad' to 'Medium' on Core Web Vitals really transform your Google rankings?

Google uses Core Web Vitals (not the 0-100 PageSpeed score) as a ranking factor, based on what real users actually experience. Google primarily focuses on the gap between 'reasonably OK' and 'very slo...

Mar 05, 2022 ⚡ Analysis available