The week of November 10, 2017 was especially focused on some interesting changes in local search, a great Whiteboard Friday from Rand Fishkin, some announcements from Facebook and more.
Google Product Comparison Change
Google is testing a new toggle for product search where the intent is clearly to compare two products. The toggle will highlight the differences. A handy feature for comparing large lists of similar information though not great if the specs of your product don’t look great.
JavaScript Links Pass PageRank
Google’s John Mueller cleared up the confusion of an often asked question, “Do JavaScript links pass weight?” Logically the answer is:
We’ve talked about this often :). Yes, a link is a link, regardless of how it comes to the page. It wouldn’t really work otherwise :).
— John ☆.o(≧▽≦)o.☆ (@JohnMu) October 31, 2017
Though for some reason I’d still prefer good old HTML if I can have it.
Google @ Pubcon
Danny Goodwin wrote up a good summary for Search Engine Journal of six key points from the Google keynote at Pubcon including when to disavow, how to approach crawl budget and that Google uses post-clicks data in rankings (this is a big one).
Sites Not Ready Kept In Desktop Index
Google’s Gary Illyes announced that Google isn’t moving sites to the mobile-first index who aren’t ready for it … YET. I wouldn’t hit the snooze button for much longer though folks … we’ve had a lot of warning.
Class C IPs Help Rankings
In a study done by GoodROI they found what we all kinda suspected, that links from different Class-C IP addresses are weighted higher than the same links on the same class. Google hates the conversation because it implies an unnatural acquisition of links but still interesting.
Google Maps Lists Added To Desktop
Back in February Google Maps announced a new map feature allowing users to save and share lists on mobile. This feature is being rolled out to desktop.
And perhaps even more useful was the announcement by Google that they have added a feature to business listings that estimates wait times at restaurants and can tell you when they’re at their shortest.
It’s come and gone a few times but Barry Schwartz reported over at Search Engine Rountable that Google’s restoring of the ad balance tool is here to stay. The tool lets publishers control the total number of ads they show to users.
Bing Holiday Hub
Bing Ads has created what they’re referring to as a hub. Here you’ll find some interesting data, webcasts and resources focused on providing the data and strategies for the holiday season. I’ve taken a peek through it and there’s some interesting stuff there.
Google has made a fairly significant change to Data Studio. Users can now select specific AdWords accounts for data letting managers create reports for different accounts. Basically – we can see the collective information but also now see data specific to an individual client.
Facebook has introduced a polling feature. Users can add a poll to their post and even use GIFs as the representative answers. Personally I like it and think it’ll provide some interesting posts and also some useful targeting data.
Facebook Introduces Messenger Chat Plugin
It’s a closed beta for now but Facebook has announced a highly requested feature for their messenger app in version 2.2. Users can now add messenger chat to their site facilitating site visitor Facebook interaction akin to the standard chat you’re used to seeing on site but via the Facebook messenger system giving more data to the site owner (and might I suggest some very good targeting capabilities down the road).
Facebook Targeting Without Visits
Susan Wenograd wrote a great piece for Search Engine journal on different targeting techniques for Facebook, none of which are remarketing or require site visitor data. There are some very interesting ideas in there so a recommended read.
Image Optimization
Yours truly was included in an image optimization roundup over on Cloudinary. There’s a lot of good advice on how to reduce any downside of images on a website and keep their load times light. Very handy read for pretty much everyone and not just the part I wrote. 🙂
Google Gives Us User Intent
Rand Fishkin did an awesome Whiteboard Friday that assists watchers in understanding what I consider to be one of the core elements of ranking in an AI-controlled world … using the results themselves to focus your content and optimization strategy. That is to say, looking at the types of content that rank to better understand what the user intent is for a query (or at least what Google believes it to be) so you can be inspired to produce that. A highly recommended watch.