Busting Google's Black Box: Navigating Google Algorithms in a Post-Update World By Kristine Schachinger

#SMX #31A @schachin

Busting Google’s Black BoxNavigating Google Algorithms in a Post-Update World

[email protected]

#SMX #31A @schachin

Long Ago & Kind of Far Away There Were the Days of M.C.

(maybe not that long)

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In the Age of MC, there was this guy. He liked to do dinosaur impressions. No really.

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Matt Cutts.

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Some saw Matt like this …

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From Matt’s Blog

https://www.mattcutts.com/images/matt-cutts-jack3.jpg

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And others like this …

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But either way…

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People listened to what Matt said …

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Because he knew a lot.

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And shared a lot!

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Some called it information …Some called it disinformation …

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But … You still listened.

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Because some days …

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Zzzzzz …

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You woke up to this …

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And did this …

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(@#*(@#*()##!!!!

(@#*(@#*()##!!!!

(@#*(@#*()##!!!!

%#@!!!! %#@!!!!And said this…

Google*@#$&*#$&#*

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In the Age of MC, you would go to Google Blog, Matt’s blog or straight to Twitter to read the tweets…

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WAS THERE AN UPDATE???!!!

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WHAT DID MATT SAY????

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But that was then …

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Matt Cutts said “Bye Felicia”…ok he didn’t really say that… outloud

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So he probably did …

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So… what now?

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NEW GOOGLE SPOKESPEOPLEGary Illyes (@methode) & John Mueller (@johnmu)

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“I only high-five with my neck in impossible positions.” real Gary Illyes quote

image: http://golocalinteractive.com/wp-content/uploads/HighFive.jpg

GARYJOHN

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But they don’t play the same role …

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AND …Google no longer announces updates

on algos like Panda and Penguin because they have been

“rolled up” into the main algorithm(s)

SHHHHHH…. We are NINJA now!

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I’M REAL TIME! I am NOT Real Time, but I roll when I WANNA!

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And gone are the 200 ranking factors…actually been gone a long, long time

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So when this happens …

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Where do we start?

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Google in a (MOSTLY) Post-Update World

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#SMX #31A @schachinWhy did you get burned or more importantly did you get burned at all?

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Was there an update? Check Google Webmaster Blog, Gary & John on Twitter or Glenn Gabe’s Blog GSQI

Yes he is the other speaker on this panel ;)

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Presence of an UPDATE does not mean that is why your site is down …

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Know the site history…Is there a historical or current site issue that could

be the cause of an algorithmic downturn?

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YOU are now a detective!

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Site history is like a medical history

You are like a doctor, you don’t care how much they drank last night you just need them to be honest.

Because things like bad links can kill… Your site that is…

Know the Site History!

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Just because it walks like a duck & talks like a duck…..

QUACK!

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This looks like a penalty

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Still looks like a penalty

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When we check year over year

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It is not a penalty. It’s a seasonal business.

NEVER ASSUME! EVER.

It may walk like a duck & talk like a duck…

and not be a duck.

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Distance from "Perfect”* how close or far are we

to the points of the algorithms.

*Term coined by Portent

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Know Your Algorithms.

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What algos could be affecting the site?

• Internal (on-page, technical, etc)• Algo(s): Panda, Phantom, Penguin

• External (links, citations, etc)• Algo(s): Penguin

• Third Party (advertising etc)• Algo(s): Panda, Phantom

Process of deductive reasoning!NOTE there are the core algos, there are others.

Algorithms

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Panda

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Know Your Algorithms. Panda.

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KEEP in MIND Panda Rollouts were no longer announced after 4th Quarter 2015! Rolls out around every 3 months. (per Gary Illyes)

First Rollout was in 2016 Likely Feb 27th/28th through the first week in March.

Can be confused with Phantom, though results are similar.

Algorithms - Panda

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Panda focuses on content quality MOSTLYalso some site quality items.

Algorithms - Panda

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What is Panda content quality?• No “thin” Content

• Length DOES matter = Time, Effort, Amount• Exceptions do exist

• Be careful of Duplicate Content• Make sure you have proper canonicals

• No Duplicate Penalty, but there is a filter!• Make sure your titles/descriptions are unique

Algorithms - Panda

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•Content Clarity •Content Specificity (RELEVANCE)

•Content Length •Blogs 350-550 << These are arbitrary, BUT they are good guides

•Articles 750-950+ << These are arbitrary, BUT they are good guides

ESPECIALLY for sites that deal with news, information, or education (Entertainment especially gossip is an exception)

Note: Query Deserves Freshness (QDF) does not matter for all sites.

Algorithms - Panda

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What else?

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• Content Technical• Grammar / Spelling / Readability

• Site Architecture • Confirmed by John Mueller February 2017.

• Advertisements• Too many ads on a site can cause devaluations

• Site Load Time• Especially Time to First Byte (TFB)

• Needs to be under .80ms for best results

Algorithms - Panda

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Know Your Algorithms. Phantom.

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Quality Update (Phantom)“Panda Plus "with a wider quality focus including UI/XSummary: Google update that affected sites with low quality indicators.

Focus: Low Quality PagesTop Takeaways.

• Not typically confirmed by Google• Can change focus – kind of a catch-all of quality algos• Have to look for other indicators• Overlaps Panda in some areas• Affects Organic SERPs

Algorithms - Phantom

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PhantomQuality Update Issues (that are most likely Phantom)

• Appears to focus on items such as• Aggressive Ad Placements• Content • Crawl Issues• Deception (ads, affiliate links, etc.)• Thin Content • Bad UI/X• Interstitials

Algorithms - Phantom

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How do you know which is which?

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You don’t need to!It doesn’t matter.

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Know what is in the algo(s).Then attack your site

“Distance from Perfect”

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Distance from "Perfect”!GOOD DFP =

FUTURE PROOFING!

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Penguin

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Know Your Algorithms. Penguin.

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Algorithms - Penguin

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Penguin 2.0-3.x was angry!


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Penguin 4.0 (Real-time) Rollout: Approximately September 23, 2016 It also rolled out in several phases completing these rollouts the second week of October. If you never recovered, it would have happened by now.

Summary: This update was the first in more than 2 years. However, the new version of Penguin is very different from the old in there is no whole site website demotion, just granular links devaluation. In addition the links are being evaluated in “real time” and so changes to link profiles will be assessed quickly.


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Focus: Mostly links, but also other Web Spam Factors. Top Takeaways.

• Confirmed by Google • Updates are in “real time”

(not the instant they occur, but they are assessed rapidly)

Sites are no longer demoted in search, links are devalued. Links are devalued?This means their value (passed Page Rank) to the site is removed from the site’s scoring.

In the past, the entire site was demoted in the SERPs. This is no longer the case.


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If you did not recovered from a Penguin update, make sure you submitted a proper disavow and also “acquired” replacement links.

Without replacing the lost link values the site could be free of Penguin, but appear to be still demoted.


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Devaluations are much more granular • Query Set• Page Level• Section Level• NOT Site Level

This makes them harder to detect as their will be a slower decline in smaller sections of the site, rather than a distinct fall-off cliff as in previous rollouts. Also “real-time” application.


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Cliff vs. Slope


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Off-Site DevaluationsDevaluations can affect you if they hit other sites. If the sites that link to you have their links devalued, then that link juice cannot be passed.


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Disavows?According to Google, yes you should still use a disavow.

I don’t know you!


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Link Free for All?Manual Actions will take over for Penguin Devaluations, but experiment on those thresholds.


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According to Google. No machine learning in Penguin, no AI.


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Mobile Algorithms.

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Mobile Friendly.

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Mobile Site is a Must!Best to use responsive NOT M.

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A MUST!Mobile. Do. It.

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Mobile Algorithms. Ads & Interstitials.

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As of January 2017 Sites with Disruptive Interstitials

will be devalued!

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Maybe… so far roll out has been weak.

#SMX #31A @schachinhttp://www.thesempost.com/updated-google-quality-rater-guidelines-eat/d

Ads & Interstitials

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Interstitials THAT ARE Affected• Showing a popup that covers the main content, either immediately after the user

navigates to a page from the search results, or while they are looking through the page.

• Displaying a standalone interstitial that the user has to dismiss before accessing the main content.

• Using a layout where the above-the-fold portion of the page appears similar to a standalone interstitial, but the original content has been inclined underneath the fold.

http://searchengineland.com/interstitialgeddon-google-warns-will-crack-intrusive-interstitials-next-january-257252

Ads & Interstitials

#SMX #31A @schachinhttp://searchengineland.com/interstitialgeddon-google-warns-will-crack-intrusive-interstitials-next-january-257252

Ads & Interstitials

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Interstitials NOT Affected Those types are:• Interstitials that appear to be in response to a legal obligation, such as for cookie

usage or for age verification.• Login dialogs on sites where content is not publicly indexable. For example, this

would include private content such as email or unindexable content that is behind a paywall.

• Banners that use a reasonable amount of screen space and are easily dismissible. For example, the app install banners provided by Safari and Chrome are examples of banners that use a reasonable amount of screen space.

Ads & Interstitials

#SMX #31A @schachinhttp://searchengineland.com/interstitialgeddon-google-warns-will-crack-intrusive-interstitials-next-january-257252

Ads & Interstitials

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Applies to First Click from SERPS ONLY!

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Distance from Perfect.

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RECOVERY, FUTURE PROOFING, SEO = All the Same it’s DFP

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According to Google Content + Links = Top Two Ranking FactorsThird is RankBrain …

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Content Quality.

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• Expertise• Authority• Trust

FOCUS ON EAT!

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#SMX #31A @schachinhttps://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//insidesearch/howsearchworks/assets/searchqualityevaluatorguidelines.pdf

Quality Site Pages - Content

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From the Google Quality Rater’s Guide

https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//insidesearch/howsearchworks/assets/searchqualityevaluatorguidelines.pdf


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What does Google thinks makes good content?The EAT of the page.

• Is there expertise? • Expertise can = personal experience.

• Is there evidence of time? • Is there effort? • Is there skill?


#SMX #31A @schachinhttp://www.thesempost.com/updated-google-quality-rater-guidelines-eat/

Quality Site Pages

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YMYL – Your Money Or Your Life.

#SMX #31A @schachinhttp://www.thesempost.com/updated-google-quality-rater-guidelines-eat/

YMYL – Your Money Or Your Life

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Distance from Perfect.

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Technical. Not Just Make-Up.

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Content & Links are the top two ranking factors, but will add technical here

as the 2.5th

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Technical Can Do This!Technical Can Do This!

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What are we looking at?

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• Http vs. Https• Robots• Sitemaps• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s• Architecture• Navigation• Schema Tagging

Technical

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• Http vs. Https• Do the pages have mixed status? • If pages moved to https, did the URLs change everywhere? CDN? Tag Manager?

Analytics?

• Are the pages redirected?• Use the Aleyda Solis checklist for https migration

• Robots• Sitemaps• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s• Architecture• Navigation• Schema Tagging

TechnicalTechnical

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Technical SEO Audit – The Basics

• Http vs. Https• Robots.txt

• Can it be crawled? If not, googlebot goes away!• Is it written correctly? (test it) • Are you using it when they should be using no-index?

• Robots.txt blocks the page crawl, but not the URL indexing• Are you blocking CSS &/or JS?

• Must unblock! This can cause a site demotion.• Sitemaps• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s• Architecture• Navigation• Schema Tagging

TechnicalTechnical

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• Http vs. Https• Robots.txt• Sitemaps

• Do you have one? • Is it written correctly? (test it) • Check their sitemaps for

• Limits • Types (video, image, page, news < different XML) • Index Sitemaps (use them!)• TIP Google does not use priority or date modifiers

• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s• Architecture• Navigation• Schema Tagging

Technical

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• Http vs. Https• Robots.txt• Sitemaps• Canonicals

• Do you have them on the site?• Are they written correctly? • Do they follow the rules for writing canonicals?

• Redirects & 404s• Architecture• Navigation• Schema Tagging

Technical

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• Http vs. Https• Robots.txt• Sitemaps• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s

• Are they using 302 or 301? • Google says they don’t care, but …

• How many 404s? Are you bleeding links? Should they be 410?

• When redirecting links from removed pages topical matches are a MUST or the links passed could lose value

• Architecture• Navigation• Schema Tagging

Technical

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• Http vs. Https• Robots.txt• Sitemaps• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s• Architecture

• Is the structure vertical or horizontal?• TIP Google prefers wide and flat over deep and tall• Are you giving Google a proper content outline?

• Think 10th grade English Class• Are you specific, certain and clear?

• Navigation• Schema Tagging

Technical

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• Http vs. Https• Robots.txt• Sitemaps• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s• Architecture• Navigation

• Are you using proper navigation?• Are you constructing a contextual view of your site? • Are you throwing in the kitchen sink?

• TIP Users can only process 5-8 piece of information at a time• Going to be even more important in mobile first indexing.

• Schema Tagging

Technical

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• Http vs. Https• Robots.txt• Sitemaps• Canonicals• Redirects & 404s• Architecture• Navigation• Schema Tagging

• Just do it! Really. Microdata is Google preferred. • TIP Any data point can be used in the KG without copyright

violation.• Check Google Search Console for mark-up validity. • Make sure to add to your mobile site for mobile first!

Technical

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What else?

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Speed.

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Speed…. You know fast…. Like really fast…

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HOW DO WE TEST FAST?

WebpageTest.org and of courseGoogle Pagespeed Insights

Also there is information in Google Analytics.

Page Speed

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And Google …

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You want an 85 min – 90+ is bestPage Speed – Score over 85

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Mobile First Indexing

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#SMX #31A @schachinhttps://webmasters.googleblog.com/2016/11/mobile-first-indexing.html


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Mobile First Indexing• One Index • Mobile Crawler will be used for all sites• Mobile Content will be used for ranking

• Mobile SERPs• Desktop SERPs

• AMP NOT a factor in mobile first indexinghttps://webmasters.googleblog.com/2016/11/mobile-first-indexing.html


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Content you want to rank for MUST be in

your mobile site

https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2016/11/mobile-first-indexing.html


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If you do not have the content on your mobile site, the site cannot be found for it even in desktop.

This means they will rely more heavily on sitemaps to find content.

https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2016/11/mobile-first-indexing.html


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Mobile First Indexing Site Types• If you have a mobile m. site

• Make sure to verify this site in Google Search console

• If you have a responsive site• No changes needed

• If you have AMP only • You will be evaluated on your desktop content, but mobile friendly boost

https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2016/11/mobile-first-indexing.htmlhttp://www.thesempost.com/details-googles-mobile-first-indexing-change/


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UI Hidden Content. Unlike Desktop, content hidden in accordions and tabs will not be devalued in mobile first indexing.



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Schema. If you removed schema in mobile, it must be added back to your mobile site to get into the snippets



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Winning in the end = doing more than

your competitor

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• Panguin http://barracuda.digital/panguin-tool/• WebPageTest.org• Page Speed Insights (Google) https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/• Screaming Frog http://www.screamingfrog.co.uk/seo-spider/user-guide/configuration/• Deep Crawl https://www.deepcrawl.com/• Google Webmaster Guidelines https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769?hl=en• Google Search Console Help https://support.google.com/webmasters/?hl=en#topic=3309469• Aleyda Solis http(s) Migration http://www.aleydasolis.com/en/search-engine-optimization/http-https-migration-checklist-

Google-docs/

Resources

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Busting Google’s Black BoxNavigating Google Algorithms in a Post-Update World

[email protected]

Marketing

Busting Google's Black Box: Navigating Google Algorithms in a Post-Update World By Kristine Schachinger