Google Updates and SERP Changes - April 2022

[goodroi]

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System: The following message was cut out of thread at: https://www.webmasterworld.com/google/5058707.htm [webmasterworld.com] by goodroi - 5:58 am on Apr 1, 2022 (utc -5)

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It's time for our April 2022 Google SEO discussion.

March SERPs changes appeared smaller, with no significant algorithm changes, and the fluctuations were noticed more locally by individual webmasters. Of course, Google continued to test and experiment throughout the month, with some announcements: See below.

For those of you that may have missed some of the announcements and changes, here are some of the stories from March.

Google Updates and SERP Changes - March 2022 [webmasterworld.com]

Google confirmed the Page Experience update for Desktop [webmasterworld.com] was completed in March.
Google has released a Product Review in Search Update [webmasterworld.com]
Short video on Requesting Removal of Content Under "Right To Be Forgotten" [webmasterworld.com]
Learning learning how to connect, visualize, and analyze Search Console Data using Google Data Studio [webmasterworld.com]
Google's Android Rolls Out Deletion of Last 15 Minutes of Your Search [webmasterworld.com]
Google's John Mueller confirms it doesn't use the keywords meta tag for ranking. This is old news, of course, but it goes on to indicate what contributes to ranking. [webmasterworld.com]
An interesting discussion on SEO Tools for Web Developers [webmasterworld.com]
Google says, "we’ve decreased the number of irrelevant results by over 50pct" [webmasterworld.com]
There's now more context to Structured Data issues now in Search Console [webmasterworld.com]
Google Adds "Highly Cited" Labels for News Sources [webmasterworld.com]

Enough catching up, so let's get on with the latest SERPs observations for April.

[RedBar]

@Dooku - Yep, Startpage looking good at the moment for me.

Insofar as my main sites are concerned they've all been very consistent this month and within their expected ranges however, if previous years are anything to go by with Easter holidays, that from today anything can happen therefore I'll not get overly-concerned until w/c 25th April.

[KaseyM]

Big drop yesterday into this morning.

Can't be coincidental I noticed all that spam in my sector last night.

[BigKat]

Whether it was the product review update, or some other update slipped in within the last few weeks, the garbage traffic Google is now sending isn't even worth any analysis. Paid ads have been devalued even more by Google's recent updates to the point where I was able to gain approval to reduce our max CPC to $0.01. Ultimately I want to eliminate all spending on Google, and a dramatic reduction in ad spend is one giant victory for me to achieve if it sticks.

With the above in mind, spam (which includes Google's own spam boxes that filter off traffic) has overtaken the SERPS. Legitimate businesses that want to compete in this environment will have to either make their own websites "spammy" or create new "spammy" websites that Google is now rewarding. Not worth my effort as it's crystal clear Google is ranking spam sites to force legitimate websites to pay for views.

[Steve UK 1975]

Hello everyone,

Has anyone noticed problems with indexing on G recently?

I've submitted posts for indexing. Linked to them from posts that are already indexed and ranking.

Then they get indexed..And then a day later they are deindexed (according to search console).

Yet when I check these posts in live Google search I find them. Some are starting to get impressions and clicks in the Search Console reports!

So there seems to be 2 issues, both of them related to indexing:

Slow or none existent indexing
Errors/discrepancies between GSC and the live Google Index.

Anyone else noticed this?

[ichthyous]

Yesterday a big increase in traffic across the board...USA, UK, search, direct. Today, right back down again. USA down 60% at 1pm. Search -28%, my home page is -47%. Clearly Google is now implementing a massive, on the fly theft of traffic via shifting overstuffed page layouts.

I am seeing a roughly 'one day on, two days off' pattern which leaves much of the week a write-off. This is while my ranking has mysteriously recovered much of what it lost last year...one year after the big declines started. Can't wait to see what June will bring.

[ichthyous]

Legitimate businesses that want to compete in this environment will have to either make their own websites "spammy" or create new "spammy" websites that Google is now rewarding. Not worth my effort as it's crystal clear Google is ranking spam sites to force legitimate websites to pay for views.

I am not seeing the spam you all are seeing at all. The problem in my niche is that Google has decided that informational "how-to" articles should be the only thing that ranks now for many searches. They have decided the intent and that's that. Even worse when you factor in that the first organic listing is far, far down the page after all of the other excerpts, boxes, videos, tweets, etc that google is inserting on the page. Any site with commercial intent is being forced to pay.

[javelin]

@Steve Uk
Not seeing any issues with getting indexed and I publish multiple times per week, my site is not product driven. What Ive noticed is if a page can rank in the top 100 then it usually sticks. If not it can roll off, back on, maybe off again is Google plays with things sometimes.

If a page is giving you trouble, edit it and refocus the content. I would only do this after a little time has gone by. Some pages are just slower than others depending on a lot of things.

[BigKat]

The problem in my niche is that Google has decided that informational "how-to" articles should be the only thing that ranks now for many searches.

Might just be in how we define "spam." How are these "how to" articles monetized? Might be similar to the "top 10" or "Best of" stuff I'm seeing which I broadly define as spam. These are not hardcore spam pages with 100% copied and/or spun content, but offer little information beyond what the manufacturer and/or sellers have posted along with slight modifications to the images they provide.

[ichthyous]

@BigKat Correct...but in my niche I see decent quality but very large sites putting up this content. There are no sites with commercial intent left, only the same silly how-to and best-of articles over and over. That is 100% intentional on Google's part.

After yesterday's one day 49% increase in USA traffic, today a 54% drop in USA traffic by 6:30pm. Anyone care to wager whether USA traffic will suddenly shoot upward this evening? This is the new norm...forget being found in the USA market during daytime hours most days of the week. Soon, every day of the week and at all hours.

[BigKat]

There are no sites with commercial intent left, only the same silly how-to and best-of articles over and over.

This is why I asked how the sites/landing pages are monetized. I'm still seeing top/best of affiliate marketers ranking high, despite an expected demotion from the alleged "product review" update. Maybe they are still ranking high because either (1) our industry is rather small and/or (2) they are benefiting from Google's algo continually exempting Amazon related sites from being demoted. The best of/top of sites are basically re-written text from other sellers (mostly Amazon) with their images slightly modified to make them "unique." How to pages in the SERPS aren't as common for us as the how to Youtube videos Google is displaying. Then I see some pages with UGC (old forum threads, blogs with comments) monetized with Adsense. Of the paid shopping ads being generated, they are mostly the same Chinese products sold under different names/brands with slight angle adjustments to the photographed product, color changes, etc. to dupe consumers into thinking they are different products when they're not. Actual sellers, including those who truly stock and/or manufacture product, are largely gone from the SERPS. We do have pretty good coverage in the image block though. LOL I'm sure Google will target that next...

[ichthyous]

Atrocious traffic again today...USA - 43% and UK down 65% at 1:30pm. Granted, it's a holiday weekend, but I never had drops like that on any holiday for 15 years and the rest of Europe seems to be normal. If the pattern holds...2-3 days of abysmal traffic and then one inexplicably strong day. Is anyone else seeing this?

[Dooku]

but offer little information beyond what the manufacturer and/or sellers have posted along with slight modifications to the images they provide

If the G product review update actually did what it was supposed to do than 98% of all those "Best 15 ...." and "how to..." websites should have been wiped out. For example if you search for "Best mirrorless camera" the serp is full of the usual listicles starting with techradar and even NY-times(!?). And people who actually review, test and show you ALL the functionality and even quirks of any product like cameralabs.com must feel they are only rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic!

[Markedd]

@Dooku Wasn't TheWirecutter acquired by NYT? Probably that's what you saw. And also, weren't they popular for this reason, that they actually test their devices? Even the mighty have fallen? In any case, to actually have the products and test them requires mountains of energy, money and passion. Also, to accept that the money won't always be proportional to work. And it does seem that the newer update has gotten slightly better when searching for various reviews, but it's still unbalanced. I saw good websites rank for nonsense, even if they had hands-on reviews and it's clear that the users will punish the website and then Google will punish it as well. And then rank the listicles high again because the websites are big and they can't do wrong. It's just a bad algorithm.

[javelin]

Had a big spike across all search platforms today. People woke up from the holiday. Volatility is high at the start of the week it seems. How are others doing?

[RedBar]

Global site within usual range for a four day holiday weekend, smaller UK sites quiet as expected since they were closed, the main UK sites all had a good traffic and trading weekend since they were open for hospitality / entertainment business. Overall result was solid.

[BushyTop]

Seems that there are loads of changes going through Google at the moment. Is anyone seeing better results? I'm actually noticing less spam.

[javelin]

As long as the weekly volatility remains so high it doesn't matter if one day sees improvements. Continual changes breaks whatever advances we could get and resets the game. Bing and others are more consistent now than Google.

[Jori]

Oh, I think Google is very consistent. Consistently bullying us ^^ ...

[ChokenBako]

On my end everything seems stable. Slightly better than last week because of returning visitors from holidays.

[ichthyous]

I'm seeing big swings from day to day...days where USA traffic is down the entire day and it's very targeted to my home page and my most important landing pages. The other day my home page and my three most important landing pages were all down exactly 55%. The next day a big surge, but the surge is mostly bots which are not being weeded out, and today it is a surge in Chinese, Indian and Bangla traffic.

Google is clearly rolling out the new overstuffed page layouts for more and more searches in USA (and I suspect UK as well) so Good quality traffic is in very short supply. I have had the worst start to the year by far since 2009 (after the financial crash)...even Q1 2020 was better than Q1 2022. So either rising inflation and the war have scared my customers away in every single country I sell to, OR Google has simply destroyed my business...or both are working in tandem.

[stef4]

should i update my site articles every 4 months now?

[Broaster]

Wow super low traffic still,also I checked my google search console and my google news visits are only 10 clicks with 300 views and I post regular articles daily and news updates.

I talked to the google help forums and the contributors are no help but several news publishers also experienced in the last year Zero to few trafffic from google news.

Its all the same big name news sites even for niches like tennis, cars, etc, they mostly show CNN, huff po, buzzefeed, and msnbc and big sites in google news :( its hopeless for independent niche news sites who cover specific things like food, sport, etc. mainstream news is taking all the spots now,

[javelin]

@stef4 what do you mean by update? Updating older content that is already pre-existing should be done about once a year but depends on topics. New content when added should open a window for you to add on or edit for internal linking pages. Keep building content bubbles this way.

@Broadster wow! I publish at most twice a week and yeah I would say that you definitely are getting nerfed. You should be pulling a whole lot more than that.

[Broaster]

javelin

So you are in Google news and get a lot of traffic only publishing twice a week? Ive been in google news for over 10 years the first 4 years I was getting massive traffic, so much so I was making money on adsense t consider it a job and even quit my job, then around 2013 or 14 all my traffic vanished, I used to publish articles and get instant traffic and then 2016 onward its been dead, I had to find a job again because I wasn't making any money off my website anymore maybe 1 dollar to 2 dollars a day tops.

I still put in work as much as possible but its hard to stay motivated when no traffic is coming in and you spend hours typing and reporting, and no money coming in.

Then I find out most of these news sites like Reuters and Associated Press are using AI writers.

[BushyTop]

UK Sensors through the roof, looks like more change is coming. Shame because as i reported earlier i thought search was looking better. Guess we'll wait and see...

[saladtosser]

When can we expect the next core update? July?

[javelin]

@Broaster Im not in news but as you described it was just too little for the amount of activity you put in, at least it seems.

It looks like Google uses a quota "fair and balanced" system where the traffic is sprinkled across the many. That is unless your authority allows for you to rise above that "level".

Among the worst in that category I think is health and news. Well we cannot have anyone speaking non approved content can we lol? More happens in those two categories than they will admit I think.

[BigKat]

Then I find out most of these news sites like Reuters and Associated Press are using AI writers.

This is to be expected. As Google drives profit increases by taking more from publishers and businesses, these entities are left with less money to afford the resources they once relied upon. Smaller publishers/businesses continually fold and are replaced by a new generation of automation as it is increasingly becoming the only way to remain profitable in an environment where Google's appetite for profits is never ending. Larger publishers and businesses have the financial resources to quickly adapt to lower revenues, and I believe we will see more automation as Google continues to tighten the noose even more.

From my perspective, handling the marketing and budget for a USA manufacturer, the skies have been dark for some time. Reaching new consumers is a difficult task considering the marketshare split between Amazon and Google. Amazon's policies enable high levels of buyer fraud, along with excessive returns, which leaves little profit left after they take their 15% commission. Google, on the other hand, produces very few sales from organic search. And Google's poorly performing ads aren't profitable even with products that have modest profit margins. If Big Tech can't leave a profit for domestic publishers/businesses to continue using their services, then they should expect us to stop flushing our time and money down the drain. As we greatly reduce our spending on Google, as my company has, Google will be compelled to change SERP layouts to drive more paid ad clicks/capture more money which will drive more domestic advertisers off their platform. It's a vicious cycle entirely under Google's control, though consumers of information, goods and services will eventually seek out alternatives providing such alternatives are not bought out and closed by Google or other Big Tech companies.

[ichthyous]

Big boost in ranking today...continuing the solid upward trend since early February. I have recovered much of what I lost from the late March / early April and June 2021 updates, but my traffic is still quite a bit lower than last year and business is far lower than Q1 2021. What is interesting is the ON / OFF pattern of traffic...you'll suddenly have 2/3+ of your traffic vanish to specific landing pages for days. My home page is still down every day...some days by 30+%. We are all just being experimented on.

[christianz]

At this point they are bankrupting small information/news publishers too. Not just small sellers of goods and services.

As Google reduces itself into answers engine / smart assistant / Alexa thing and silly competitors like Duck and Bing do the same, there is a window of opportunity opening for some new company to do web search again.

If I want answers to some trivial questions and don't mind getting bombarded with ads, I can use Google. If I want to actually search for something or do something I would use that new search engine that actually does search.

High level planners at Google have a vision about search that is centered about providing direct answers to questions. There is no place for web of websites and apps in their vision. Other than few apps of large companies - one or two per each use case.

If a new search engine would arise that would do real search again, it would have to be website-centric. Put websites/webapps on the pedestal again. And measure success by how little time user spends on the search page between entering keywords and landing on a website/webapp.