Product Reviews, Local Update, Search Console, Bugs & More

Normally the month of December is not that busy because people take off for the holidays and such. But the past month was really not that calm at all. We had huge Google ranking volatility most of the past month, we had a confirmed three-week rollout of the December product reviews update, Google confirmed a local update and much more.

Google Search Console went down and offline for many SEOs, earlier Google accidentally sent incorrect redirect errors that threw SEOs for a loop, and Google also by accident posted a new announcement bar in Search Console. Google updated several reports in Search Console and added GA 4 support.

Google also had a serving issue in Google Search, the Log4j security issue came out, we had tons of other SEO news as well – scan those below.

Google moved the local pack up and map box to the right and also released a number of other local features – scan those below. Plus, we had Google roll out more full width designs, the new top stories layout and test an edge to edge design – plus many more user interface changes to share below.

So it was busy, very busy, like the December 2021 Google webmaster report.

Here is what you may have missed this past month:

Google Algorithm Updates:

Google Product Reviews Update:
Google Local Update:
Google Search Console:
Google SEO:
Google Links:
Google Local & Maps:
Google User Interface:

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.