SEARCHENGINES
Google Layoffs, DOJ Sues Google, Search Console Content Ideas & Google Optimize Going Away, Yahoo Search Comeback

As I mentioned briefly last week, Google announced mass layoffs last week, and I discuss what I know so far about it. There are also reports that Google is pushing advertisers to use third-party resellers and not their internal staff. The DOJ sued Google again to break up its ad business. Microsoft announced its earnings, showing how Bing’s search ad growth continues to slow. Bing also may have had a search ranking algorithm update. Google Search Console content ideas beta feature may go away in March. Google Search Console Insights has an achievements section. Google confirmed a bug with some preferred languages in Google Search, and they blame mobile-first indexing. Google Ads had an outage on Monday morning that caused huge headaches. Google has no preferences between connected structured data and not connected structured data. Google will parse the image elements even when those elements are enclosed within other elements. Google published a new case study after 18 months, this one from Vimeo on video SEO. Google said generating tons of fake URLs on a site won’t cause SEO issues. Google Business Profiles now supports cars for sale inventory for US dealerships. Bing is testing infinite scroll. Google is testing two justifications in the local results. Google is also testing a new trusted store badge. Bing has a new menu for image search that uses a drop-down and adds explore and collect. Account-level negative keywords are now available on Google Ads. Google will sunset Google Optimize on September 30th. And it seems like Yahoo Search may be making a comeback to Search – that would be exciting. And if you want to help sponsor those vlogs, go to patreon.com/barryschwartz. That was the search news this week at the Search Engine Roundtable.
SPONSOR: This week’s video recap is sponsored by Duda, the Professional Website Builder You Can Call Your Own.
Make sure to subscribe to our video feed or subscribe directly on iTunes, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or your favorite podcast player to be notified of these updates and download the video in the background. Here is the YouTube version of the feed:
For the original iTunes version, click here.
Search Topics of Discussion:
Please do subscribe on YouTube or subscribe via iTunes or on your favorite RSS reader. Don’t forget to comment below with the right answer and good luck!
SEARCHENGINES
Google Bard Launched, Bing Chat Image Creation, Generative AI Policies & More SEO/SEM News

The Google broad core update for March is not done yet, and we see tremors. Google started to roll out Bard, and while it is fast and has a sleek interface, it was a bit underwhelming when compared to Bing Chat. In fact, Bard is unlikely to link to sources and content creators too often. Even Bing’s CEO at Microsoft said Bard is “pretty far behind” Bing Chat. Bing is testing Chat answer boxes in the search results. Bing Chat is also integrating its Bing Image Creator tool, and it started to work a few days after it was announced. Microsoft is relaxing restrictions on balanced mode before other modes. Microsoft Bing said there is no site blacklist for the Bing Chat sidebar in Edge. Google posted its generative AI policies, will they apply to Search? Google updated the Google Search Status dashboard to include ranking updates. Google Search Console’s URL inspection tool added if a video embed URL page uses indexifembedded. Google said URLs are not removed until after Google processes the robots.txt file and then after the specific URL is processed by Google. Bing Webmaster Tools may be missing a week of data. Google is testing highlighting snippets in the Google Explore search feature. Google Business Profiles displays wrong and dangerously incorrect service pricing for some businesses. Google is testing showing only one star in the local pack. Google Local Service Ads industry and service selector was updated. Some Google Ads campaigns may suffer significantly if they don’t upgrade to Google Analytics 4 by July 1. Microsoft Advertising launched target shoppers by browsing categories with keyword boosters. And if you want to help sponsor those vlogs, go to patreon.com/barryschwartz. That was the search news this week at the Search Engine Roundtable.
SPONSOR: This week’s video recap is sponsored by Duda, the Professional Website Builder You Can Call Your Own. You can register for the webinar with Bing and AI, where I will be hosting along with others over here.
Make sure to subscribe to our video feed or subscribe directly on iTunes, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or your favorite podcast player to be notified of these updates and download the video in the background. Here is the YouTube version of the feed:
For the original iTunes version, click here.
Search Topics of Discussion:
Please do subscribe on YouTube or subscribe via iTunes or on your favorite RSS reader. Don’t forget to comment below with the right answer and good luck!
SEARCHENGINES
Google Mars Space Office Design At Belo Horizonte, Brazil

Did you know that the Google office in Belo Horizonte, Brazil has a room that looks to me designed to look like planet Mars? I could be wrong but look at the volcanic rock-like carpets and bubble thing hanging from the ceiling.
This was posted by Google’s Daniel Waisberg from the Search Central Live Belo Horizonte on Twitter. The full size image is on Twitter, by the way.
This post is part of our daily Search Photo of the Day column, where we find fun and interesting photos related to the search industry and share them with our readers.
SEARCHENGINES
Microsoft Advertising Target Shoppers By Browsing Categories With Keyword Boosters

The Microsoft Advertising team announced its PromoteIQ launched a new way to target your ads, by targeting shoppers based on the categories they browse with the ability to also use keywords as a booster for campaign bids.
Nicole Farley explained on Search Engine Land, “this latest development in category-based targeting with keyword leveraging is supposed to maximize revenue and sales for both retailers and advertisers, while also delivering an exceptional experience for shoppers. Interested advertisers should test the new.”
Unlike traditional keyword targeting, “which requires advertisers to research and build an exhaustive list of keywords per campaign,” Microsoft said. With this new targeting shoppers by what they browse, “advertisers only need to test and retain a few high-performing keywords,” Microsoft added.
Microsoft said that in their tests, “campaigns that boost bids by keyword whilst targeting by category exhibit 320% higher click-through-rate (CTR) than the campaigns without boosting bids by keyword.” “Meanwhile, retailers saw benefits from this solution by achieving 8x higher revenue per thousand impressions (RPM),” Microsoft added.
Forum discussion at Twitter.
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