How to Remove Date Stamps In Google Search

[vandread]

Google began some time ago to show data stamps at the beginning of the description snippets in Google Search for some sites, mainly blogs and forums.

I have read about a solution to use JavaScript to hide the dates in Google Search.

But what can you do if the data is part of the url? My theory is that the CTR of search engine users drops in relation to the data stamp that is shown in Google. A perfectly valid article about a timeless widget X for instance.

The last resort that I see at the moment is to change the url structure of the site. I really do not want to do this on the other hand and was hoping that anyone knew of another way to deal with those data stamps.

[tedster]

Google is apparently pulling those time/date stamps from a variety of places. There have been reports of the actual date in the page itself, the last updated date on the server, the last post or comment on a UGC page, and so on. I haven't verified all of those, but I do know they have been getting the dates quite wrong in some cases - off by YEARS.

If you've eliminated the other possibilities, then changing your URL structure might be the only option - and that's going to wreak such havoc with your search traffic (and for an extended period) that it may not be worth the trouble.

I think I might be a bit more philosophical about a "timeless" topic. If it truly is timeless, then many search users are also likely to know that too. Yes, it may cost just a few clicks, but that might be a better way to go than creating major disruption.

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

"posted on" anywhere on the page is picked up as are "written on", "published" and several others.

When you've cleaned those up on your blog post template move onto your sitemap and your rss feeds, they are on those as well.

I have experience removing some dates from wordpress, the page url doesn't seem to be an issue. While I see Google's point of view in wanting to report how fresh a blog post is there are a good many sites that use wordpress as a CMS (content management system) where the publish dates don't belong.

When you remove them from your site they will eventually be removed from the serps as well, it may take months for some pages but will start happening fairly quickly.

[vandread]

Guys, thanks for the answers.

Sgt_Kickaxe, you say that the page url does not seem to be a issue. I was wondering if you removed the time stamps from a blog that had the date in the url?

I have removed dates on the single pages a long time ago, just removed them on my index site as well. The sitemap posts the last updated date, as does the RSS feed.

Any other idea where Google might pull those information from if not the url? Google is definitely posting the post creation date in the SERPS, not the last updated date.