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Google Reviews Update Heating Up Again

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Google Reviews Update Explode

Google’s April 2023 reviews update is now just almost two weeks since it started rolling out, and while the update seemed to have started slow, this past week, we’ve seen some significant movement and volatility. This weekend was no exception and we are seeing some big movement this weekend.

I assume it is related to the Google April 2023 reviews update but who knows, it can be a combination of that and something else.

As a reminder, the April 2023 reviews update kicked off on April 12th at noon. Early on, we saw some sites get hit hard but it wasn’t that widespread of an update. Then as we hit the second week of the update, we saw some tremors that seemed to have a more widespread net and impacted more sites than it did in week one. I posted an update in that story on April 20th that showed the renewed chatter and volatility.

Now, I figured I’d do a new post based on what I saw over the weekend. Again, I expect this update to be completed by Google any day now, so this might just be the tail end of this update.

SEO Chatter

Here is some new chatter since I last posted on April 20th from WebmasterWorld and social:

Today, I notice high traffic. Looks like it’s getting back to normal. Did anyone else notice anything different today?

I am seeing non-USA traffic back to normal. USA traffic has been unusually low since the Easter weekend and has never reverted. That is due to a large loss in traffic to some of my most important landing pages, despite no change in rank. Upon closer inspection of the SERPS I am finding that the results are returning a block of images, three ads, local results, a block of videos, and then the first organic site link. The 1st and 2nd place results are the same two sites over and over, one of which had dropped off the map for months but now is at #1 again for every search…there is definitely some sort of manipulation going on there. These are all searches that include a place name like “New York XYZ” “London XYZ” and “Dubai XYZ”. My ranking is still strong, but for most of these searches the image carousel has been stripped from all of the links, so it’s hard to stand out. These apparently slight changes have resulted in massive losses of traffic…up to 80% less traffic for each of the landing pages.

Absolutely massive drop in USA / Canada traffic starting 7 am sharp today (April 21st)…-35% at 2:30. Anyone else seeing this?

Yes, unfortunately, I’ve taken a beating today.

Google has taken a targetted hit out on exactly one of my site’s most trafficked landing pages…a 92% loss in traffic, despite no drop in rank over the last three months. The traffic for all of the similar/associated search terms has vanished in tandem, in some cases the clicks reported from GSC for a term went from 20 per day to zero and has stayed there since April 14th. The traffic to this page and these terms increased steadily for the last 9 months, and then just vanished all at once….the image below says it all.

60% loss on a huge website. Lost #1 positions to page 3. No clue what is going on.
Don’t see any penalties in search console. Freaking out right now.

We are back to full traffic of zombies, lawless #*$!s

I am seeing a huge divergence between impressions and clicks in GSC and in one case both dropped and clicks went to zero for the last ten days. Losing one term would not produce an 80%+ loss of traffic. It seems to be hitting some of my other landing pages to a lesser extent…20%-40% losses instead of 80%.

Google Tracking Tools

Here is what the tracking tools are showing over the past couple of weeks, notice the past week and then this weekend:

Semrush:

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RankRanger:

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SERPmetrics:

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Mozcast:

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Advanced Web Rankings:

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Accuranker:

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Cognitive SEO:

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Algoroo:

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So there does seem to be some steam at the end of this update. What are you all noticing?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.



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Google Core Update Done Followed By Intense Search Volatility, New Structured Data, Google Ads Head Steps Down & 20 Years Covering Search

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Google Core Update Done Followed By Intense Search Volatility, New Structured Data, Google Ads Head Steps Down & 20 Years Covering Search

Google’s November 2023 core update finally finished rolling out this week, and it was the longest core update rollout. Then, a day later, we saw more intense Google search ranking volatility and chatter. Google added new organization structured data and also added a new profile page and discussion forum structured data, both with Search Console and Rich Results test support. Google’s crawl rate setting is going away soon. Google Search Console went down a couple of times this week. Google spoke about the SEO value of bringing back 404 pages for links. Did you see the Google patent for what appears to be SGE? Microsoft is working to bring GPT-4 Turbo to Copilot and Bing Chat. Google Ads won’t allow personalized ads for consumer finance topics in February 2024. Google Local Service Ads has new impression metrics. Google Ads released its Ads API schedule for 2024. Google is testing Gray accepted labels in the search results. Google is testing line separators between sitelinks. Google is testing an interview label for news results. Google local photos is testing hearts and other emotion reactions. Google is testing removing the cache link from the search result listings. Google’s head of search ads, Jerry Dischler, is stepping down after 15 years. And I’ve been covering the search industry and search for 20 years now. 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.

Sponsored by BruceClay, who has been doing search marketing optimization since 1996 and also has an amazing SEO training platform.

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Generative Summaries For Search Results

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Google Professor Robot

Google has a published patent named “Generative summaries for search results” which is believed to be the patent behind the Search Generative Experience launch we saw earlier this year. This patent was filed on March 20, 2023 and approved on September 26, 2023 under the patent ID US11769017B1.

Juan Gonzalez Villa posted a thread on X breaking it down, which I will embed below so you can read it.

The abstract reads:

At least selectively utilizing a large language model (LLM) in generating a natural language (NL) based summary to be rendered in response to a query. In some implementations, in generating the NL based summary additional content is processed using the LLM. The additional content is in addition to query content of the query itself and, in generating the NL based summary, can be processed using the LLM and along with the query content—or even independent of the query content. Processing the additional content can, for example, mitigate occurrences of the NL based summary including inaccuracies and/or can mitigate occurrences of the NL based summary being over-specified and/or under-specified.

Here are Juan’s posts:

Nice write up Juan!

Forum discussion at X.



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Google Search Ranking Algorithm Volatility Today

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Google Algorithm Update

I am seeing some signs of some big Google Search ranking volatility and shuffling today. The November core update just finished, so Google would say it is not the core update but the November reviews update is still rolling out. Or maybe this new ranking volatility is unrelated to any confirmed update – I don’t know.

Many of the tracking tools spike this morning, which means they are seeing some big ranking volatility this morning. I am also seeing some increased chatter within the SEO community but it is early, so it is limited.

Let’s start with the tools today.

Google Search Volatility Tracking Tools

Semrush:

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SimilarWeb:

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SERPmetrics:

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Advanced Web Rankings:

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Cognitive SEO (seems stalled):

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Accuranker:

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Mozcast (normally updates later today):

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Algoroo:

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SERPstat:

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Wincher:

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So most of the tools are showing big changes in the Google Search results.

SEO Chatter

Here is the chatter I am seeing within the SEO community from this site and WebmasterWorld:

Very slow today…

Some wild Ride traffic-wise started the last hours.
I am getting bursts of traffic for a short period of time that makes the gained
traffic while the core update is running return again.
Appears like a fight of Google core algorithm and other ongoing algorithms is going on
and from time to time, some algorithm fires and activates and takes over
and returns the traffic, while other times, another algorithm takes control and smashes the traffic back to low and renders the Google core algorithm useless.
It’s heavy volatile.

and just as the update finished, the results are shuffled again. It’s so disgusting at this point.

I feel like the “December” update has already begun…

Our UK traffic and conversions plummeted within hours of the update finishing.

Yeah we took a big downturn last week, but thought it was Google Manipulation for Black Friday.

But since the update finished, it feels like our sites are offline, especially today.

What are you all seeing?

Is this the end of the reviews update or something new?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

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