GOOGLE

What is Technical SEO?

Published

4 years ago

September 10, 2020

Technical SEO is not easy, but in this article, we will explain what aspects you should pay attention to on a basic level website that even non-experts will do.

What is Technical SEO?
Technical SEO refers to improving the technical aspects of the site in order to increase the ranking of the target pages in search engines. Making a website faster to crawl, easier, and understandable for search engines is the basis of technical optimization.

Why should you technically optimize your site?
Google and other search engines want to provide their users with the best results for their queries. That’s why Google’s bots crawl and evaluate web pages based on a number of factors. Some factors, such as how fast a page loads, depends on the user’s experience. Other factors help search engine bots understand what your pages are about. This is what structured data does, among others. Therefore, by improving the technical aspects, you help search engines crawl and understand your site. If you do this well, you can be rewarded with higher rankings and even rich results.

The opposite is also true: If you make serious technical mistakes on your site, they will return you bad results.

However, it is a wrong idea to just focus on the technical details of a website to please search engines. A website should be fast, clear, and easy to use for your users in the first place. Fortunately, building a strong technical foundation often results in a better experience for both users and search engines.

What are the features of a technically optimized website?
A technically sound website is fast for users and easy to crawl for search engine bots. A proper technical setup helps search engines understand what a site is all about and prevents confusion caused by duplicate content (duplicate content), for example. Moreover, it does not send visitors or search engines to dead ends with broken links. Here, we will briefly dive into some of the key features of a technically optimized website.

1. Website Speed
Web pages need to load fast these days. People are impatient and don’t want to wait for a page to open. Research conducted in 2016 showed that 53% of mobile website visitors will leave the site if a web page is not opened within three seconds. So if your website is slow, people get angry and switch to another website and you miss all that traffic.

Google knows that slow web pages offer less than optimal experience. For this reason, they prefer web pages that load faster. So, a slow web page will go further down in the search results than its faster equivalent, resulting in even less traffic.

Wondering if your website is fast enough? Read on how to easily test your site speed. Most tests will give you clues on what needs improvement.

2. Easy crawlability for search engines
Search engines use bots to crawl your website. These browser bots follow links to discover content on your site.

But there are more ways to guide bots. For example, if you don’t want them to go there, you can prevent them from browsing certain content. You can also allow them to crawl a page, but tell them not to show that page in search results or follow links on that page.

Robots.txt file
You can give bots instructions on your site using the robots.txt file. It is a powerful tool that should be used carefully. As we mentioned in the beginning, a small error can prevent robots from crawling (important parts) of your site. Sometimes people unintentionally block their site’s CSS and JS files in the robot.txt file. These files contain code that tells browsers how your site should look and how it works. If these files are blocked, search engines cannot find if your site is working properly.

As a result, we recommend that you really research robots.txt if you want to know how it works. Or better yet, let an SEO expert handle it for you!

Meta Tags
Meta tags are a piece of code that you won’t see as a visitor on the page. This is at the top of a page’s source code. Crawl bots read this section when crawling a page. It contains information about what to find on the page or what to do with it.

If you want search engine robots to crawl a page but exclude it from search results for any reason, you can tell them with the robots meta tag. It can also instruct them to crawl a page, with the robots meta tag

GOOGLE

Google Warns About Misuse of Its Indexing API

Published

1 week ago

September 12, 2024

Max

Google Warns About Misuse of Its Indexing API

Google has updated its Indexing API documentation with a clear warning about spam detection and the possible consequences of misuse.

Warning Against API Misuse The new message in the guide says:

“All submissions through the Indexing API are checked for spam. Any misuse, like using multiple accounts or going over the usage limits, could lead to access being taken away.”

This warning is aimed at people trying to abuse the system by exceeding the API’s limits or breaking Google’s rules.

What Is the Indexing API? The Indexing API allows websites to tell Google when job posting or livestream video pages are added or removed. It helps websites with fast-changing content get their pages crawled and indexed quickly.

But it seems some users have been trying to abuse this by using multiple accounts to get more access.

Impact of the Update Google is now closely watching how people use the Indexing API. If someone breaks the rules, they might lose access to the tool, which could make it harder for them to keep their search results updated for time-sensitive content.

How To Stay Compliant To use the Indexing API properly, follow these rules:

Don’t go over the usage limits, and if you need more, ask Google instead of using multiple accounts.
Use the API only for job postings or livestream videos, and make sure your data is correct.
Follow all of Google’s API guidelines and spam policies.
Use sitemaps along with the API, not as a replacement.

Remember, the Indexing API isn’t a shortcut to faster indexing. Follow the rules to keep your access.

GOOGLE

This Week in Search News: Simple and Easy-to-Read Update

Published

3 months ago

June 30, 2024

Entireweb News Bot

This Week in Search News: Simple and Easy-to-Read Update

Here’s what happened in the world of Google and search engines this week:

1. Google’s June 2024 Spam Update

Google finished rolling out its June 2024 spam update over a period of seven days. This update aims to reduce spammy content in search results.

2. Changes to Google Search Interface

Google has removed the continuous scroll feature for search results. Instead, it’s back to the old system of pages.

3. New Features and Tests

Link Cards: Google is testing link cards at the top of AI-generated overviews.
Health Overviews: There are more AI-generated health overviews showing up in search results.
Local Panels: Google is testing AI overviews in local information panels.

4. Search Rankings and Quality

Improving Rankings: Google said it can improve its search ranking system but will only do so on a large scale.
Measuring Quality: Google’s Elizabeth Tucker shared how they measure search quality.

5. Advice for Content Creators

Brand Names in Reviews: Google advises not to avoid mentioning brand names in review content.
Fixing 404 Pages: Google explained when it’s important to fix 404 error pages.

6. New Search Features in Google Chrome

Google Chrome for mobile devices has added several new search features to enhance user experience.

7. New Tests and Features in Google Search

Credit Card Widget: Google is testing a new widget for credit card information in search results.
Sliding Search Results: When making a new search query, the results might slide to the right.

8. Bing’s New Feature

Bing is now using AI to write “People Also Ask” questions in search results.

9. Local Search Ranking Factors

Menu items and popular times might be factors that influence local search rankings on Google.

10. Google Ads Updates

Query Matching and Brand Controls: Google Ads updated its query matching and brand controls, and advertisers are happy with these changes.
Lead Credits: Google will automate lead credits for Local Service Ads. Google says this is a good change, but some advertisers are worried.
tROAS Insights Box: Google Ads is testing a new insights box for tROAS (Target Return on Ad Spend) in Performance Max and Standard Shopping campaigns.
WordPress Tag Code: There is a new conversion code for Google Ads on WordPress sites.

These updates highlight how Google and other search engines are continuously evolving to improve user experience and provide better advertising tools.

AI

Exploring the Evolution of Language Translation: A Comparative Analysis of AI Chatbots and Google Translate

Published

7 months ago

February 26, 2024

Max

A Comparative Analysis of AI Chatbots and Google Translate

According to an article on PCMag, while Google Translate makes translating sentences into over 100 languages easy, regular users acknowledge that there’s still room for improvement.

In theory, large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT are expected to bring about a new era in language translation. These models consume vast amounts of text-based training data and real-time feedback from users worldwide, enabling them to quickly learn to generate coherent, human-like sentences in a wide range of languages.

However, despite the anticipation that ChatGPT would revolutionize translation, previous experiences have shown that such expectations are often inaccurate, posing challenges for translation accuracy. To put these claims to the test, PCMag conducted a blind test, asking fluent speakers of eight non-English languages to evaluate the translation results from various AI services.

The test compared ChatGPT (both the free and paid versions) to Google Translate, as well as to other competing chatbots such as Microsoft Copilot and Google Gemini. The evaluation involved comparing the translation quality for two test paragraphs across different languages, including Polish, French, Korean, Spanish, Arabic, Tagalog, and Amharic.

In the first test conducted in June 2023, participants consistently favored AI chatbots over Google Translate. ChatGPT, Google Bard (now Gemini), and Microsoft Bing outperformed Google Translate, with ChatGPT receiving the highest praise. ChatGPT demonstrated superior performance in converting colloquialisms, while Google Translate often provided literal translations that lacked cultural nuance.

For instance, ChatGPT accurately translated colloquial expressions like “blow off steam,” whereas Google Translate produced more literal translations that failed to resonate across cultures. Participants appreciated ChatGPT’s ability to maintain consistent levels of formality and its consideration of gender options in translations.

The success of AI chatbots like ChatGPT can be attributed to reinforcement learning with human feedback (RLHF), which allows these models to learn from human preferences and produce culturally appropriate translations, particularly for non-native speakers. However, it’s essential to note that while AI chatbots outperformed Google Translate, they still had limitations and occasional inaccuracies.

In a subsequent test, PCMag evaluated different versions of ChatGPT, including the free and paid versions, as well as language-specific AI agents from OpenAI’s GPTStore. The paid version of ChatGPT, known as ChatGPT Plus, consistently delivered the best translations across various languages. However, Google Translate also showed improvement, performing surprisingly well compared to previous tests.

Overall, while ChatGPT Plus emerged as the preferred choice for translation, Google Translate demonstrated notable improvement, challenging the notion that AI chatbots are always superior to traditional translation tools.

Source: https://www.pcmag.com/articles/google-translate-vs-chatgpt-which-is-the-best-language-translator