SEARCHENGINES
Google Featured Snippet Callouts, False Premises, MUM & More

Google has launched some improvements to featured snippets, about this result and the content advisories in Google Search. MUM now works with featured snippets to help Google understand the notion of consensus and then highlight words in the featured snippets, known as callouts.
I dug deep into this on Search Engine Land, so here is the short version.
Featured Snippet Callouts & MUM for General Consensous
Google featured snippet callouts, the word or words called out above the featured snippet in a larger font, now can be powered by MUM (which is a new and rare use of MUM in search) to check what other sources are saying about the topic. Google said, “our systems can check snippet callouts against other high-quality sources on the web, to see if there’s a general consensus for that callout, even if sources use different words or concepts to describe the same thing.” “We’ve found that this consensus-based technique has meaningfully improved the quality and helpfulness of featured snippet callouts,” Google told us.
Here is what it looks like:
And Pandu Nayak, Vice President of Search and Fellow, Google, told us that it is hard to game consensus here because featured snippets come from the top search results and those generally are not low quality.
Featured Snippet & People Also Ask False Premise Queries
False premise queries are when a specific query is for information about things that did not happen. Google will show you information that is accurate and remove the false part from the featured snippet in this case. In fact, Google said they have “reduced the triggering of featured snippets in these cases by 40% with this update.”
So if you ask [when did snoopy assassinate Abraham Lincoln] – snoopy did not do that but Google will tell you who did:
This also works for people also ask, because those are built using featured snippets.
About This Result
About this result which launched in February 2021 have been used more than 2.4 billion times Google said.
Google is expanding it to eight more languages including Portuguese (PT), French (FR), Italian (IT), German (DE), Dutch (NL), Spanish (ES), Japanese (JP), and Indonesian (ID), coming later this year.
Plus Google is expanding what it shows in the about this result, adding such as how widely a source is circulated, online reviews about a source or company, whether a company is owned by another entity, or even when our systems can’t �find much info about a source.
Content Advisories Expand
Content advisories launched in 2020, which tells searchers when Google is not so confident with the search results it is presenting. Well, Google is going to show more of that.
Google said it is expanding content advisories to searches where its systems “do not have high confidence in the overall quality of the results available for the search.” Google said this does not mean that there no helpful information is available, or that a pa�rticular result is low-quality. “These notices provide context about the whole set of results on the page, and you can always see the results for your query, even when the advisory is present,” Google added.
Here are some of the SEO takes on Twitter:
Big news. Google is now using MUM to improve features snippets based on understanding if there’s a consensus across multiple high-quality sources on the web. Its systems can check snippet callouts based on that. Also, AI models can understand when a FS isn’t helpful to display… https://t.co/t2OnAVOPaI
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) August 11, 2022
And more: Google is expanding “About this result” -> “We’re adding more context, such as how widely a source is circulated, online reviews about a source or company, whether a company is owned by another entity, or even when our systems can’t find much info about a source.” https://t.co/t2OnAVxeja
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) August 11, 2022
And Google is expanding content advisories based on the quality of the results: “We’re expanding content advisories to searches where our systems don’t have high confidence in the overall quality of the results available for the search.”
Check Barry’s post for more info: https://t.co/t2OnAVxeja
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) August 11, 2022
“our systems can now understand the notion of consensus, which is when multiple high-quality sources on the web all agree on the same fact. Our systems can check snippet callouts (…) against other high-quality sources on the web[…]” https://t.co/iaeJFS7FK3
— Pedro Dias (@pedrodias) August 11, 2022
The irresistible rising of MUM ⬇️⬇️ https://t.co/trHodHFwr6
— Gianluca Fiorelli (@gfiorelli1) August 11, 2022
Google will be using MUM to improve featured snippets.
⭐️MUM understands the notion of consensus (several high quality sources agree)
⭐️Google now checks “snippet callouts” – the words bolded at the top of a f.s. against other high quality sources to see if there is consensus. pic.twitter.com/WBIH52rFZ7— Dr. Marie Haynes🐧 (@Marie_Haynes) August 11, 2022
As an added point of interest, the Quality Raters’ Guidelines mention the importance of aligning with expert consensus in a few places. pic.twitter.com/2JfVSfiJdL
— Dr. Marie Haynes🐧 (@Marie_Haynes) August 11, 2022
For questions where there is no answer, AI is helping Google decide when there should *not* be a featured snippet. pic.twitter.com/vJGQWK4Lsp
— Dr. Marie Haynes🐧 (@Marie_Haynes) August 11, 2022
Forum discussion at Twitter.
Source: www.seroundtable.com
SEARCHENGINES
Google Hanukkah Decorations Are Live For 2023

Hanukkah (aka Chanukah) starts this coming Thursday night, December 7th. Google has added its Hanukkah decorations to the Google Search results interface to celebrate. Google does this every year and I expect to see the same rollout in the coming weeks for Christmas and Kawanzaa but for now, since Chanukah is in the coming days, we have the Hanukkah decorations live at Google Search.
Here is a screenshot of the Chanukah decorations as they look like on the mobile search results.
You can see it yourself by searching on Google for [chanukah], [hanukkah], but not yet [חֲנוּכָּה] or other spelling variations yet but it should soon. It looks better on mobile than it does on desktop results.
To see the past, the 2023 decorations, 2021 decorations, 2020 Chanukah decorations, 2019 Google holiday decorations, the 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010 and so on.
Happy Chanukah, everyone!
Forum discussion at X.
SEARCHENGINES
Google Pay Accepted Icons In Google Search Results

Google seems to be testing a Google Pay Accepted label or icon in the Google search results. This label has the super G logo followed by the words “Pay accepted” words next to search result snippets that support Google Pay and notate such in their structured data.
This was first spotted by Khushal Bherwani who shared some screenshots of this on X – here is one:
Here are some more screenshots:
Here is test and without test window for same query. pic.twitter.com/n9cYWBOsro
— Khushal Bherwani (@b4k_khushal) October 20, 2023
Brodie Clark also posted some screenshots after on X:
In continuation from the test from October, Google is now testing out a new Google Pay label associated with organic results. Last month, Google was testing Pay Accepted text, with this month changing it to Pay encrypted checkout. More details: https://t.co/MvFNoPmMDR pic.twitter.com/WDVVc4RbTO
— SERPs Up 🌊 (@SERPalerts) November 30, 2023
I tried to replicate this but I came up short.
This is not the first time Google had similar icons like this in its search results.
Forum discussion at X.
SEARCHENGINES
Google Discover Showing Older Content Since Follow Feature Arrived

Typically, Google Discover shows content that is less than a day old, but it can show content that is weeks, months, or even years old. However, typically, Google will show more recent content in the Discover feed. Well, that may have changed with the new Google follow feature.
Glenn Gabe, who is a very active Google Discover user, noticed that since the Follow feature rolled out, he has been seeing content that is weeks and months old way more often than before the follow feature rolled out. Glenn wrote on X that “this could also be playing a role. i.e. Google isn’t providing as much recent content, but instead, focusing on providing targeted content based on the topics you are following.”
It makes sense that if you follow a specific topic and if Google Discover only shows the most authoritative types of content, it might be hard for Google to find new content on that topic. So it does make sense that Google may show older content more often for that specific topic you follow.
Here are screenshots Glenn shared:
Have you noticed this in your Discover feed?
Forum discussion at X.
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