Update Picard - Google Core Algo Update - Jan 2020

[Brett_Tabke]

Google Announced today that it is rolling out a Main Algo Update - Via the following blog post.

Unfortunately, the post is not so much about an update, but another diatribe against website owners and content producers. They continue to insinuate that if you lost traffic, you have violated the webmaster guidelines.

They haven’t violated our webmaster guidelines nor been subjected to a manual or algorithmic action, as can happen to pages that do violate those guidelines.

[webmasters.googleblog.com...]

None of the analytics rank watchers have yet to go off in any meaningful way. Most assume the the first algo update of the year is to correct issues with the last update of the previous year. Going all the way back to the Florida, Google often has a way of messing with the algo late in the year and correcting it in the spring. Some have speculated that the fall updates are intended to drive PPC traffic around Christmas shopping and January/Feb updates roll that back to fix results because of irrelevant shopping heavy results.

[glakes]

Thanks for posting this Brett. It gives some meaning to the mess we are seeing in Google's SERPS.

Twitter announcement at: [twitter.com...]

Later today, we are releasing a broad core algorithm update, as we do several times per year. It is called the January 2020 Core Update. Our guidance about such updates remains as we’ve covered before. Please see this blog post for more about that:

Google's post links to what Brett posted.

[StupidIntelligent]

Looks more like a design update rather than a ranking.

[Shepherd]

Nothing but the usual mediocrity in my purview...

[dannysullivan]

Unfortunately, the post is not so much aboutan update, but another diatribe against website owners and content producers. They continue to insinuate that if you lost traffic, you have violated the webmaster guidelines.

It literally doesn't say that about the January 2020 Core Update -- or any core update, which is what the post is about. It literally says the complete opposite:

There’s nothing wrong with pages that may perform less well in a core update. They haven’t violated our webmaster guidelines nor been subjected to a manual or algorithmic action, as can happen to pages that do violate those guidelines.

[notoriusbean]

Why is it being referred to as the Picard update?

[glakes]

Why is it being referred to as the Picard update?

The algo update coincides with the CBS streaming show Star Trek - Picard release?

Regarding Google's algo update:

My initial observation is traffic continues to rise while conversions (product sales) continue to fall. If Google were matching user intent properly, the number of conversions would not be moving in the opposite direction of total traffic. SERP trackers I've looked at are not picking up on this algo update either. Have to wait a couple days to see where this all goes...

[brotherhood of LAN]

Why is it being referred to as the Picard update?

I think Brett / this site began the whole naming convention of updates

[samwest]

Looks more like a design update rather than a ranking.

Design updates usually turn conversions upside down.

[mosxu]

My business is not even exposed to 10% of the buyers searching for my product and all I get is remains. Why is that Picard?

[notoriusbean]

Has anyone noticed any changes in your geographical distribution lately?

Namely, our audience is typically 90-95% from US, UK, and Canada, with the remaining ~5-7% coming from India and Australia. About a week ago, we started noticing some traffic fluctuations. The three English countries together dropped about 10% and India traffic doubled - making the new distribution (more or less) 85% US/UK/CAN, 10% India, and 5% Australia.

It has recovered a bit so today the distribution is about 90% US/UK/CAN, 6% India, and 3% Australia. The US/UK/Canada traffic is still lower than where it was at a week ago though.

I'm wondering if this, 1) is real traffic, and/or 2) has anything to do with the algorithm update.

Here's an image of the distribution changes over the last month: [i.imgur.com...]

[blend27]

@glakes --The algo update coincides with the CBS streaming show Star Trek - Picard release?

U could of just said 'Star Trek', 4real... :), I have a whole DVD Collection of those already, and with no commercials...

p.s. Yes, there is a SPACE between Star and Trek... at least here
Imagine if it was named Seven of Nine, but then again both got assimilated by who else?... BORG

[glakes]

@blend27

If I just mentioned Star Trek, then those unfamiliar with Captain Picard wouldn't have understood. Could have been Captains Kirk, Sisko, Archer or Janeway with no disrespect to Captain Pike.

If you have the whole Picard collection on DVD, then you must have one good source. The first episode airs January 23, and CBS locked in a season two even before the first episode airs or should I say streams.

@mosxu

My business is not even exposed to 10% of the buyers searching for my product and all I get is remains. Why is that Picard?

Those searching for our products have been beamed to another location - likely planet Amazon.

It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose - Jean Luc Picard (July 10, 1989 Peak Performance Episode)

[blend27]

-If-
Fun Fact: There were only 2 bold Captains so far, and they were shaved for a reason...

[The_Fox]

Nothing so far on the radar. Guess it'll take some time to spread out. This cold is making me anxious. :|

[tangor]

These updates ae for g's benefit. Anyone disagree?

Meanwhile, relaxation in the 4th quarter is mandatory, else g will LOSE all players in the long run ... ie: three quarters of vapid/vaporous action with a fourth that has SOME ROI ... Or ... 25% of your annual investment occurs in the final quarter of the year.

Those who do not play this game to extreme do a bit better year round (there ARE other search engines, just sayin')

g remains the big player in the ad market and driver of traffic, so we continue to play ... as long as possible!

chuckles on the announcement: reads like something a lawyer would write! All kinds of promises without anything actually ACTIONABLE.

Par for the course.

[tangor]

Meanwhile, stay the course!

[glakes]

@blend27

If Google's oppressive updates continue, I think I'll have a bald head as well from all the stress. No razor needed.

SERP trackers are on fire. Strap yourselves in and enjoy the ride...

[koalapandaeu]

Haven't had a single google visitor since the evening of january 13th. This comes in the backdrop of improving visits and sales that my site had between mid december and now. Ouch.

[RedBar]

At the moment I am definitely seeing overall improvements, as well as my own sites, in several English language non-USA Google.com SERPs, the USA results seem to be even more skewed towards localisation with hardly any "foreign" sites listed.

[seomotionz]

@RedBar Improvements or not. But I am sure viewing that it is not getting any worse. Anyway, its google we are talking about. So, lets just not assume anything too early. Good luck to you and all.

[RedBar]

So, lets just not assume anything too early.

I completely agree however I have to say that, as a major Indian widget manufacturer, that at the moment the G.co.in SERPs are looking better however, but still with several "unable to supply" US companies listed.

They are "unable to supply" since they are actually US importers of my Indian widgets, this is ridiculous, G really needs to sort out the anomally of importers, exporters and local suppliers ... they do it for their USA SERPs.

[seomotionz]

G really needs to sort out the anomally of importers, exporters and local suppliers ... they do it for their USA SERPs

@RedBar Google needs to sort out many such things.

[MayankParmar]

Not seeing any changes.

[Cralamarre]

Today's traffic is down slightly from yesterday but still on par with what it was last week, so I think I'm just looking for changes where there really are none.

[Jeppa33]

Seeing some positive changes at last. Saw a continuous decline in my rankings for the last couple of months. Based in Netherlands.

[blend27]

Far, far away from converting traffic on 3 eCommerce sites.

Back to my Prometheus class ship - which is really one of those fancy gaming chairs.

[aradii]

Firs of all sorry for my bad English, I have a website in Persian language and last night suddenly I saw my site dropped 10 places for my most important keyword(nothing changed for other keywords), any suggestion guys? I hope my site regain the position after somedays

[aristotle]

When I first saw the title of this thread, I thought that the word "Picard" referred to some kind of methodology that google had incorporated into its algorithm to try to improve the SERPs. I vaguely remember the name "Picard" as a mathematician or scientist. I also remember the Star Trek character Picard but didn't think of him at the time.

Anyway, I looked up "picard" and found that: Jean-Félix Picard was a 17th -century French astronomer. He is principally notable for his accurate measure of the size of the Earth, based on a careful survey of one degree of latitude along the Paris Meridian.

[NickMNS]

I vaguely remember the name "Picard" as a mathematician or scientist.

You may be thinking of Jaccard, which is a means of measuring similarity between two sets.
[en.wikipedia.org...]

Paul Jaccard (the person that developed the above index) was a Swiss professor of botany and plant physiology.