This week’s news roundup reviews a Google business profile violation update, a court victory for Google in the E.U., and Google’s Search Advocate, John Mueller, explains why some characteristics many publishers believed were indicative of website quality don’t affect rankings.
We’ll also look at news from around the web, including recent changes to Google`s crawler documentation and how A.I. Overviews show more often to signed-in users.
Google Says Grammar and HTML Aren’t Ranking Factors
John Mueller addressed a commonly asked question regarding the importance of correct grammar and valid HTML as indicators of site quality.
John’s explanation that neither affects rankings might surprise many website owners.
Key takeaways:
- Muller revealed that Google does not consider certain characteristics that many publishers believed were important for site quality to be ranking factors.
- Those characteristics are typos and valid HTML
- Mueller says validating a website’s HTML is trivial for ranking.
- Although Google doesn’t consider the characteristics for ranking, Mueller said you should still ensure one of them is correct.
Google Updates Restrictions For Business Profile Violations
Google has updated its business profile violation restrictions to tackle fake or solicited reviews.
The update might come as a relief to many honest business owners, as those who use fake reviews to promote their businesses may be sanctioned.
Key takeaways:
- Google’s latest business profile policy violation now says website owners who use fake or incentivized reviews will face three new sanctions.
- Google said that if business owners violate its Fake Engagement policy, their profile will be restricted.
- Google will allow businesses to appeal sanctions.
Google Wins Appeal in E.U. Ad Abuse Monopoly Trial
Google has won its appeal in an E.U. court against a €1.49bn fine imposed by the E.U. Commission, which accused the tech giant of market dominance abuse.
The win comes as Google faces multiple cases in the U.S. and the E.U. for creating and maintaining an advertising monopoly and violating antitrust laws.
Key takeaways:
- The E.U. court overturned a ruling against Google of acting as an ad broker and market dominance.
- The court ruled that because the E.U. Commission “committed errors in its assessment” and failed to consider “all the relevant circumstances,” it could not prove that Google had abused its dominant position.
- E.U. Commission said in response to the ruling, it would “reflect on possible next steps.”
- Google responded to the ruling by saying: “We are pleased that the court has recognized errors in the original decision and annulled the fine.”
From Around The Web
Google Revamps Entire Crawler Documentation
Search Engine Journal staff writer Roger Montii covers Google’s recent Crawler documentation update.
The revamped Crawler documentation contains significant changes, including shrinking the main overview page and adding content to three new pages to increase information density.
Key takeaways:
- Google changed its documentation because the overview page had become too big, and any additional crawler information would increase it further.
- Google split the overview page into subtopic pages to increase space on the overviews page for general information and allow crawler content to grow.
- Roger Montii says: “Spinning off subtopics into their own pages is a brilliant solution to the problem of how best to serve users.”
New data: Google AI Overviews appear more often to signed-in users
Search Engine Land writer Danny Goodwin reports on a recent BrightEdge AI Overviews study on how often it triggers for signed-in users compared to signed-out.
The report says AI Overviews’ percentage appearance varies by industry and identifies which triggers it the most.
Key takeaways:
- The report shows AI overviews can disrupt the percentage of organic traffic a site receives.
- Different industries trigger AI overviews more than others.
- E-commerce queries trigger AI overviews most often but 90% less for signed-out users.
- BrightEdge tells Danny Goodwin: “Our larger customers (Fortune 100 brands) receive more referral traffic from SearchGPT than Perplexity.”
When he is not writing content, Terry can be found on his boat in Italy or chilling in his villa in Spain.
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