SEARCHENGINES
Daily Search Forum Recap: January 28, 2022
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 Search Console has a bug with the performance report for image search clicks and impressions. Google is deprecating the Google My Business API in April. Google Ads is shutting off smart shopping and local campaigns and replacing them with performance max campaigns. Google is promoting Pointy from Google in Google Business Profiles. Google image search is tested a related colorized image theme. Google is testing search results without descriptions. And don’t forget to catch the weekly video recap.
Search Engine Roundtable Stories:
- Search News Buzz Video Recap: Google Algorithm Fluctuations, FLoC FLoPs, New Google Robots Tag & More
This week, we had another unconfirmed Google search ranking update on January 22nd. Google has admitted defeat with its FLoC cookieless proposal and is now going with Topics API. Google launched a new robots tag named… - Google Search Console Logging Bug May Result In Drop In Image Search Performance Data
Google has confirmed an issue with the Google Search Console Performance reports specific to image search. The issue is a logging issue that may result in your clicks and impressions data in those reports being lower than normal. Google said the issue began on Monday, January 24, 2022 and is still ongoing. - New Tools For Smart Shopping & Local Campaigns Being Replaced By Performance Max
Google has released a set of new tools and features to help advertisers when Google existing and future Smart Shopping campaigns and Local Campaigns get replaced by Performance Max campaigns. This includes a new migration tool and API migrations. - Google Tests Search Results Without Descriptions Again
Google has confirmed it has been testing Google Search result listings without any descriptions, again. Google first tested this in 2015 and is now testing it again for the past couple of weeks. Aishwarya Tapadar from Google confirmed this in a Google Web Search Help thread saying “this is a small experiment that will be ending in the next day or so.” - Google Images Tests Color Themed Related Images Design
The folks at 9to5Google spotted Google Image Search on mobile testing a related image design that takes on the color theme of the image result. So if the image is red, the related images below are in these red hue effect in the background. - Google Promotes Pointy From Google In Business Profiles
Google is promoting the Pointy from Google solution in Google Business Profiles dashboard, Colan Nielsen explained on Twitter. Google is placing this box that says “Help customers find products they need” by connecting your in-store product inventory with Google Search and Maps. - Google Deprecating The Google My Business API On April 20, 2022
Google will be deprecating the Google My Business API on April 30, 2022 and replacing it with new APIs in the Google federated model. So you will have to update any of the old APIs you may be using with the new ones within the next few months. - Messy Drinks From Googlers At Google
A while back, Satyajeet Salgar from Google posted a photo of his drink and snack while at the Google office when he was first returning to the office. I asked for more photos and that led to numerous
Other Great Search Threads:
Search Engine Land Stories:
Other Great Search Stories:
Analytics
Industry & Business
Links & Content Marketing
Local & Maps
Mobile & Voice
SEO
- 15 Podcasts to Boost Your SEO Game, Ahrefs
- 3 Steps to Define Your Target Audience for Your SEO Program, BruceClay
- Best Google Sheets Formulas for SEO, Shell Shockuk
- Getting Started In International SEO: A Quick Reference Guide, Search Engine Journal
- Google’s Quality Raters Guidelines: Worth Reading?, Internet Marketing Ninjas
- How to Use Google Autocomplete for SEO, Practical Ecommerce
- IndexWatch 2021: The SEO Losers In Google’s US Search Results, SISTRIX
- Local SEO Language Considerations for European Countries, SEO Clarity
- People Also Asked vs. Featured Snippets – 3 years of data, Kevin Indig
- SEO Office Hours: Late January Session Recaps & Key Takeaways, DeepCrawl
- Sistrix IndexWatch 2021: The SEO Losers In Google’s US Search Results, Amsive Digital
- The Top Tech SEO Strategies for 2022 and Beyond, Moz
- We Studied 81,000 Page Titles – Google Rewrote 61% Of Them, Zyppy
- What your C-suite team needs to know about SEO tests, SearchPilot
PPC
Other Search
Feedback:
Have feedback on this daily recap; let me know on Twitter @rustybrick or @seroundtable, you can follow us on Facebook and make sure to subscribe to the YouTube channel, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or just contact us the old fashion way.
SEARCHENGINES
Google Search Console Was Down Today

Google Search Console seems to be down right now. If you try to access it, you will get a 500 server error. I suspect Search Console will be back up shortly but right now, if it is down for you, you are not alone.
Update: At 8:52 am ET Google Search Console is back, the tool was offline for about 50 minutes.
Google’s Daniel Waisberg is 100% aware of the issue. He responded to some posts about the issue, saying, “we’re working on it.” John Mueller from Google is also reposting Daniel’s posts on X.
Here is what it looked like when you tried to access it while it was down:
Search Console went down at about 8 am ET and returned at 8:52 am ET.
Here are the posts on X from Daniel Waisberg of Google on this issue:
I was looking for a plug to charge my phone, so I had to unplug the server 🤷♂️
— Daniel Waisberg (@danielwaisberg) November 27, 2023
Joking aside, we’re working on it! 👨💻
— Daniel Waisberg (@danielwaisberg) November 27, 2023
Who knows, maybe we will have a new Search Console feature when it returns?
Here are some of the complaints:
Search Console its down atm.
— Juanan Carapapa (@Carapapeando) November 27, 2023
@rustybrick search console is down pic.twitter.com/Nm6P84WJld
— Daramel (@Daramel29) November 27, 2023
Is Google Search Console currently experiencing issues? It’s not functioning on my device.
Cc:- @JohnMu @searchliaison @googlesearchc @rustybrick pic.twitter.com/YHjXfSVn30
— Vijay Chauhan 📈 – SEO for Enterprise Businesses (@VijayChauhanSEO) November 27, 2023
In Spain too pic.twitter.com/d1Yiwef72k
— Rafa Martin 👽🖖 (@rafainatica) November 27, 2023
Someone kick the server in the corner @googlesearchc @JohnMu @danielwaisberg https://t.co/79IFVVFdTM
— Pedro Dias (@pedrodias) November 27, 2023
Anyone facing google search console 500 error 🤨🤨#DigitalMarketing #google #searchconsoleerror #500error #trend #news # pic.twitter.com/jWDscWcz1f
— Pankaj besarwal (@Iampankaj10) November 27, 2023
GSC this morning… talk about a case of the Mondays pic.twitter.com/6H3KUG2sd4
— Lily Ray 😏 (@lilyraynyc) November 27, 2023
Update: At 8:52 am ET Google Search Console is back, the tool was offline for about 50 minutes.
Should be all good now.
— Daniel Waisberg (@danielwaisberg) November 27, 2023
SEARCHENGINES
Google Testing New Flight Prices Rich Result?

Google may be testing a new type of rich result for flight prices. This test shows a section under the flight search snippet that contains the dates, trip details and price.
This was spotted by Antoine Eripret who was able to trigger this numerous times, over numerous days, while in Spain. Here is his screenshot he posted on X:
He also posted this video of this in action for me:
Recently Google told us not to put flight prices in titles because those prices change too quickly. Maybe Google is testing updating those prices in more real time through the use of structured data and is thus more confident to show them as rich results and not title elements?
I don’t think Google officially supports flight schema but maybe they will soon?
Forum discussion at X.
SEARCHENGINES
Google Merchant Center Automatically Creating Promotions

Google Merchant Center has been automatically creating and applying promotions to some of your products over the Black Friday holiday season. The truth is, Google has been doing this for some time, but more are noticing this now because there are a lot of discounts going around this season.
In fact, the new Merchant Center does a lot of things for you, automatically.
Rachel Lowell posted about this on X and shared this screenshot that shows “Your promotions are live on Google.” “Google found promotions on your website. You can remove this connection at any time,” Google added.
Greg Finn suggested, “If you’ve got BFCM sales setup – double, triple check those promos.”
Forum discussion at X.
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