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Daily Search Forum Recap: August 23, 2024

Published

3 months ago

August 24, 2024

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Google Analytics is not showing data from yesterday or today right now, hopefully it will be fixed soon. There is a sad story of a site that filed for bankruptcy the day before the August core update, and then saw their rankings improve. Google Search Console updated its documentation on the search appearances. Bing Image search is testing new refinement cards. Google is testing a new local pack design and user experience. Google said many noindexes and nofollows don’t mean low quality. Google is migrating all to the new Google Merchant Center Next in September. And I posted the SEO video recap today.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

Google Analytics Missing Data From Yesterday/Data

There are a ton of complaints and a lot of concern around Google Analytics missing data in the normal overview report for yesterday and today. I see it also, I am seeing no data from this site and others in my GA4 reports for yesterday or today – although the real time reports work.

Hardbacon Announced Closure Day Before August Core Update, Then Sees Traffic Surge

There are many sad stories around sites getting hit by Google algorithm updates, such as core updates and of course the September 2023 helpful content update. But Hardbacon, a financial and budgeting company, was hit hard by those Google updates, then announced the company would file for bankruptcy the day before the August 2024 core update.

Google: Many Noindex & Nofollows Do Not Signal Site Quality Issues

Martin Splitt from Google said on the latest SEO office hours that having lots of nofollow or noindex tags or attributes on your site does not signal to Google that you have quality issues with your site or many low quality pages.

Google Search Local Pack UX Update

Google has updated the local pack, the local results box, in the Google Search results. Now when you click on the results in the local pack, the map slides to the left, behind the local pack listings. Then the detail local listing slides to the right.

Google Migrating All To Merchant Center Next By Next Month

Google announced that all merchants will be migrated (or as Google put it “upgrading”) from the old Google Merchant Center to Google Merchant Center Next by September (next month). We knew this was coming, we covered the upgrade emails back in July but here is the official announcement.

Bing Images Search Refinement Cards

Microsoft now has these refinement cards or boxes directly in the Bing Image Search results interface. In these cards, Bing will show you a refinement option for your query with example photos you might find for that refined search query.

Google Search Console Search Appearances Documentation Updated

Google has greatly expanded and clarified its documentation around how Search Appearances work within the Google Search Console reports. Google wrote on X, “We improved our documentation on Search Appearances supported in Search Console.” Daniel Waisberg from Google said, “I’ve been asked about this 1000 times, hope you’re all happy now.”

Dooglers Fighting It Out

Here is Jeff and Luna, Dooglers, or Google dogs, at the Google London office in 2020, fighting it out for this dog toy that looks like an Oreo cookie.

Search News Buzz Video Recap: Google Ranking Bug Fixed, August Core Update Swings, AI Overviews, Google Ads Bug & More

Google’s larger search ranking bug was fixed four days after the issue was confirmed. Google’s August core update continues to roll out, some hit by the helpful content update are seeing some surges, but Google says wait until the update is complete…