October 2025 Google Search Observations

[saladtosser]

@gatormark Been seeing this for weeks bud! Its a shame the AI crap isn't restricted to that tab but its flooding every other tab as well

[gatormark]

Ads not showing doesn't mean they at not paying for ads.

When I realised that Adwords was a bad investment,

I am not sure what that has to do with my comment, but I promote using Google Ads as well. It is proving to be an OK investment for me.

That doesn’t have anything to do with positioning.

[Martin Ice Web]

What ever they did last week it is a step back to useless traffic.
we had 4 good days without bots and good google traffic. Now it is bots and useless traffic.
Especially in the night after noon till 1am bots are 100% traffic.

This is gonna be the worst ever year in history for free traffic.

[Treud]

Yes I see something better since 4 days, BUT, huge traffic from China …. I can’t block as my suppliers are there.

[Martin Ice Web]

Something just startet at 12am. No google traffic anymore but hundrets of bots.

[EditorialGuy]

BUT, huge traffic from China ….

I saw that, too, a few days ago. Now China has slipped down the list of countries, so things are back to normal (or what passes for normal in this era of daily ups and downs).

[Treud]

Probably scrappers. I see that with Singapore as well.
Maybe the Chinese IA that is feeding its database..

On Google side it’s also better, impression are same low but CTR improved so they changed something because I didn’t on my side

[mosxu]

Zombies …

[tangor]

At what point we webmasters are going to take back control of our online businesses by creating a viable alternative that address this greedy "tech" disgrace?

Given that nothing is impossible, anyone have a suggestion about what could be done?

How much money you got?

</because-it-WILL-take-MONEY>

...and hard work, organization, venture capital, a business plan, market opportunity, a public void to fill, national defense, and just plain capitalism (and some might not like that last part). Not saying it CAN'T be done, merely that wishing it away won't work and moral altruism only goes so far.

[saladtosser]

Core update kicking off? Seeing big movements!

[gatormark]

These Google search results are the worst. I have never seen them this bad.

[mosxu]

Like yesterday I was thinking I am dealing with superintelligence but Deepmind is laughing stock

[ausfmarketing]

After being rock solid rank 1 for months for multiple keywords, My top ecomm page disappeared and has been replaced by individual product pages and different product categories. Thank you Google

[Martin Ice Web]

50% drop since yesterday.

[chuviie]

20% drop and ton of china/singapore bots

[Micha]

Looks like another update is underway: yesterday the shop crashed, two hours ago the news site.

[gatormark]

I bumped up my Adsense advertising a little over a day ago and my traffic went down 10% the following day (yesterday). LOL

[saladtosser]

Chess engines have been superhuman for years, and you can set them to any strength. Yet almost all players still queue for real opponents in online lobby's. Beating code feels sterile, outsmarting a real person brings a sense of accomplishment. Same with all other online games, I only want human lobbies. The mind games, the wins, the losses. When your tea bagging their corps while they rage down the mic, this is most of the fun.

That human friction is why online multiplayers are huge, not because they can play a 100 bots in a single game but because they can play with/against a 100 humans. I reckon based on how online gaming has proven people want to play humans this will become the default across the web once again at some point. People want the human touch, and sooner or later the big platforms will realise we want fewer AI walls and more tools that connect us to each other, they will have to accept this truth at some point and realise this generative AI is just a fad like 3D tvs IMO

[gatormark]

It really is the death of websites as we have come to know them. I never thought this would happen, but I should have. It's my mistake, because it occurs in all industries. Now, I am trying to figure out how to adapt—trying to determine what to do next. In the interim, I will continue to accept these pittances. Are you going to futilely fight to the end or acquiesce to the inevitable?

[goodoldweb]

Webmasters should all work togther to end Google's reign. We do have the power.

[gatormark]

@goodoldweb, the more I think about this, the more I realize that it's not Google's fault. It's the natural evolution of the internet with AI at the center of the macroevolution. It's not just impacting web developers or website owners; AI is affecting scores of industries...more than some may realize. This is a paradigm shift, no different than the advent of the internet itself.

[Kendo]

Yet almost all players still queue for real opponents in online lobby's.

While machine chess can be beaten, humans can make bad judgement calls. It is more like "catch of the day".

Also, humans can have their attention averted while preparing a trap elsewhere.

[Kendo]

How much money you got?

because-it-WILL-take-MONEY... and hard work, organization, venture capital, a business plan, market opportunity, a public void to fill, national defense, and just plain capitalism

A free anti-virus software that detects and removes all offending apps and services will not cost that much.

A Microsoft Defender update would be quick.

[goodoldweb]

@goodoldweb, the more I think about this, the more I realize that it's not Google's fault. It's the natural evolution of the internet with AI at the center of the macroevolution. It's not just impacting web developers or website owners; AI is affecting scores of industries...more than some may realize. This is a paradigm shift, no different than the advent of the internet itself.

It’s Google.

A quick look at our store server logs leaves no doubt in my mind. They’ve positioned themselves strategically at all the main intersections of the web, Chrome, Search, Gmail, Android, and more — and now they control the faucet as they please.

Our webstore logs tell a very grim story. Organic clicks have completely vanished. What remains are paid clicks, expensive, low-quality, and non-converting. When we do make a few sales, the patterns are bizarre: spikes from specific states, sudden demand for products that haven’t sold in months, and overall strange click behavior while our pages show top positions when we search for our products (from other machines, other networks etc). Somehow the rest of the country don't see our listings?

The level of control this company has over online trade is staggering.
The world has essentially allowed a fat cat to guard the milk.

Yes, AI plays a role in all this, but most users, especially those over 47ish aren’t actively using or even interested in using AI yet. So where did all those real customers go? How come they don't see our listings?

Make no mistake — it’s Google adjusting everyones exposure as they see fit. We should not fool ourselves, this company is now clearly run by people with thierd world mentality.

Ever asked yourself, how many "core updates" do they really have to do every week now? :)

[Martin Ice Web]

@goodoldweb, the more I think about this, the more I realize that it's not Google's fault. It's the natural evolution of the internet with AI at the center of the macroevolution.

this doesn´t explain the sudden drops in traffic within seconds. Remember we all are seeing some days with good traffic followed by weeks of rubbish traffic. This is in googles hands.
They squeezing the very little rest out of free traffic. AI is not only a Zero traffic player but also dosn´t convert into money for the most AI companys (google included).

[saladtosser]

Using AI for answers is a bit like hiring a morbidly obese guy who's never worked out or dieted as your personal trainer.

Yes, he read all the books and curated the knowledge of others into some qualification on how to do it, ............ but has never done it himself! So has zero experience! Would you use that guy as your go to source for all things fitness? If not why not? And if the answer comes down to "lack of experience", ask yourself why the same logic is not applied when asking a LLM that curated the knowledge of others with no experience for everything else?!

This is what we need to get across to the masses, even if we have to use fat shaming analogies!

[gatormark]

this doesn´t explain the sudden drops in traffic within seconds. Remember we all are seeing some days with good traffic followed by weeks of rubbish traffic. This is in googles hands.

@Martin Ice Web @goodoleweb

I understand what you're saying, and yes, Google is manipulating traffic. However, that doesn't discredit my initial conclusions. Google sees the handwriting on the wall and is "reacting" to the new AI frontier and how "information" will be acquired moving forward. Google is REACTING. It's similar to what we will need to do to survive. We can keep the status quo and go the way of the dodo bird (or malls, laser disc players, and word processors), or try to catch the AI wave in the same way we long-timers caught the internet-website wave. I haven't had a real job in 12 years. Websites have paid my bills for 12 years. I have now resigned myself to the fact that the wave is over. Now, I am trying to determine what the best course of action is for a 60-year-old who retires in 2 years.

[BigKat]

Google sees the handwriting on the wall and is "reacting" to the new AI frontier and how "information" will be acquired moving forward. Google is REACTING.

I have to agree with this. Google's reactionary moves started with ChatGPT blindsiding them and now they are trying to catch up. Google's gravy train is coming to an end, and Google will have to do something they're not very good at - innovation. Google is losing their grip on search, and I see it in where our sales are coming from. Though these are challenging times for us, I hope when we emerge from the other side Google's monopoly will have been neutralized by market forces. Surely serving bad search results, and the ongoing geo-targeting problems Google now has, aren't helping Google at all. Google got to the top by serving quality results, stayed at the top by buying out their competitors and IMO it's the poor results/problems Google now has that will bring them down.

[gatormark]

@BigKat, EXACTLY! The Titanic saw the iceberg before it ran into it, but the ship was too unwieldy to respond in time.

[goodoldweb]

Devastating "core updates" and flooding the top part of the SERPS with thier own products have started way before AI. They've started a couple of years after the introduction of adwords and became more and more aggressive with every round.

Don't give them any credit. They're the problem. The way they control so many online businesses is mind blowing.

[gatormark]

Fortunately, my main website is community-based, so I still have a large core group of active users. Unfortunately, that crowd is getting older and they can pay for memberships that allow them to turn off ads. So, advertising income —my primary source of revenue —will eventually decline to zero.