Daily Search Forum Recap: March 4, 2020

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

Vlog #51: Ginny Marvin On Periodic Table of PPC & Natural Language in PPC

Ginny Marvin (@ginnymarvin) is the Editor-in-Chief of Search Engine Land and the other Third Door Media properties and is someone I have worked incredibly closely with for the past several years. As you can tell from watching the interview…

Google: It’s Fine To Link To HTTP URLS For SEO
Google’s John Mueller confirmed that from an SEO point of view, linking to an HTTP URL, instead of an HTTPS URL is fine. Google won’t penalize or downgrade your site if you link externally to a non-secure page. Of course, from a user point of view link to the HTTPS version if possible and make sure your site and embeds are secure.

Google I/O Cancelled Over Coronavirus Caution
Google announced they are cancelling the physical/in-person version of their massive developer conference, Google I/O, over concerns with the Coronavirus. This was no surprise, as Facebook, Amazon, and other big tech companies have done the same.

Google Ads Mobile App Gets Dark Mode & Optimization Score Details
Google announced that the Google Ads app has added two new features. The first being dark mode, so you can sit up all night working on your ad campaign without disturbing your partner. The second is new optimization score features to help you make Google more money.

Google: Nofollow Change Was A Policy Change; No Action Was Necessarily Taken By Googlers Yet
We are all still trying to figure out if Google took any action with the nofollow link attribute change on March 1, 2020 or not. It seems the answer is not. John Mueller said in a Google webmaster hangout at the 17:22 mark that this is a policy change and as far as he knows, no engineer or anyone at Google has actually done anything differently since the change.

Google Blanket Making Workshop
Here are a bunch of Googlers in the Google Boston office in a workshop learning how to make blankets. This was sometime last week and Google brought in someone to teach a group of Googlers how to mak

Other Great Search Forum Threads:

Anyone else in #ppcchat world getting directly/indirectly impacted by coronavirus? My UK based Google reps just had to cancel our QBR because they are not being allowed to travel for work internationally until further notice, Jon Kagan on Twitter
BTW, here’s a great example of a reversal after the 2/7 update. Below you’ll see GSC data for the site that dropped heavily, only to recover 5 days later. And I’ve included search visibility trending for the site, which shows, Glenn Gabe on Twitter
If they’re really good at SEO, you should be able to find them in search 🙂, John Mueller on Twitter
Judging from the documentation, I’d say that’s a glitch in GSC showing it as an error instead of a warning. I’ll check with the relevant teams. Thanks for reporting. Just for the future: These thin, Martin Splitt on Twitter
Let’s Encrypt revoking Certificates due to Bug, WebmasterWorld
Yeah, finding the right balance can be tricky, regardless of mobile-first indexing, especially on a site that’s so image heavy & with little text. I don’t have a one-size-fits-all answer that will solve this for a s, John Mueller on Twitter

Search Engine Land Stories:

Optimization score comes to Google Ads app
Fake and inaccurate reviews driving billions in ‘wasted’ consumer spending [Report]
5 critical elements for local marketing success
The Mandalorian’s guide to the search galaxy: Evolving from SEM lone wolf to company leader
What are analytics experts looking to in 2020 with data and privacy?

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