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Google Search Console Anonymizes Tons Of Queries

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1 year ago

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A couple of weeks ago, Patrick Stock of Ahrefs released a bombshell report showing that on average about 50% of queries in Search Console are hidden, i.e. classified as anonymized. I reached out to Google, giving them a chance to respond to this, and the result led to Google updating its help document on anonymized queries and the export/API capabilities.

As an FYI, I covered this in some detail at Search Engine Land yesterday but this deserves a mention here and more attention from the SEO industry.

In short, Google updated this help document from saying “Very rare queries (called anonymized queries) are not shown in these results to protect the privacy of the user making the query” to saying “Some queries (called anonymized queries) are not shown in these results to protect the privacy of the user making the query.”

Google cannot call 50%, and in some cases over 80% of queries being hidden for some sites, “very rare,” as I pointed out to them. So Google updated the help document to be more reflective of what is true. But truth is, it should not say “some,” it is way more than “some.”

Google also added a section about “other limits on queries” that says “due to internal limitations, Search Console stores top data rows and not all data rows. As a result, not all queries beyond anonymized queries will be shown. Instead, the focus is on showing you the most important ones for your entire property.”

These changes went live on Friday, again, I knew about this then but I held the story for Monday so it is more visible and SEOs are more aware of this.

The Ahrefs study looked at 146,741 websites and about nine billion total clicks and it compared the total clicks by URL compared to the clicks by query reported in Google Search Console. It found that Google hid 46.08% of all query data, or as Google calls it, classified them as anonymized queries.

This site shows the total clicks at 1,016,076 but is only showing query data for 547,382, which is 46.13%. That is a ton, more than “very rare” and more than “some.” Here is the scatter plot from the Ahrefs study that shows how often this comes up for those 150,000 or so sites:

click for full size

You can see how this works on your own site because Patrick Stox made a Data Studio report that will show you. Here is the report, and here is what you do to replicate this:

  • In the top right, click the three dots and then click “Make a copy.”

  • In the dropdown for “New Data Source,” select the GSC data source for the site you’re interested in.

  • If the site isn’t available, select “Create data source.” Search for “Search Console” and click it.

  • Click the GSC property you want to use > click “Site Impression” > click “Web.” Then in the upper-right corner, click “Connect.”

  • In the upper-right corner, click “Add To Report.”

  • Click “Copy Report.”

These help doc changes are not a change in any new behavior from the reports, it is just Google admitting it is more than just “very rare.” John Mueller of Google confirmed that on Twitter:

Brodie Clark has a nice look at the before/after of the help doc:

Patrick Stox saw it coming:

And Glenn Gabe on how big this can be for some sites:

This is data in 2022 and I doubt it will get better but you need to be aware of this and check the Data Studio report to see how big of an issue it is for your sites.

Forum discussion at Twitter.



Source: www.seroundtable.com

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SEARCHENGINES

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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3 hours ago

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December 2, 2023

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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

Published

20 hours ago

on

December 1, 2023

By

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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SEARCHENGINES

Google Search Ranking Algorithm Volatility Today

Published

1 day ago

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November 30, 2023

By

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:

click for full size

SimilarWeb:

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SERPmetrics:

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Advanced Web Rankings:

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Cognitive SEO (seems stalled):

click for full size

Accuranker:

click for full size

Mozcast (normally updates later today):

click for full size

Algoroo:

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SERPstat:

click for full size

Wincher:

click for full size

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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