There’s so much happening in the world of digital marketing all the time. It’s a constantly changing landscape, ever-evolving, never stagnant. That’s why we’ve decided as an SEO agency to bring you a weekly update of some of the best, or worst, things that have happened in the digital sphere during the week. So without further ado, here’s the first one:
Google’s Diversity Update, update
In June, Google released the June 2019 Core Update which introduced a lot of new changes. Google also released another update in June, which they confirmed to be a separate update, and it’s a pretty important one.
This update is all about diversity in the search results. Have you ever searched for something and 4 or 5 of the first 10 results have been from the same website? Well with this update Google aims to change that and show no more than 2 results from the same domain. Well, except for when it decides that it’s appropriate to do so: “However, we may still show more than two in cases where our systems determine it’s especially relevant to do so for a particular search”. This is probably for searches that include branded terms. If you’re searching for “Primark dresses”, then you probably want to see results from Primark. The same can be said for sub-domains. Google has said that sub-domains will be treated as the same domain, so the same rules will apply, unless they deem otherwise. This is probably sensible because doubtless some people out there would be busy setting up a multitude of subdomains to try to dominate the search results.
It’s important to note that this update only affects the core results and not the featured snippets, map listings etc.
Searchmetrics has published a study on the impact of this update so far and it seems to show that the update is working. Three URLs showing up from the same domain are now showing for just 3.5% of keywords, down almost half from 6.7% prior to the update.
The downside to this update is that you need to be more creative in how you dominate the search results, a tactic which can yield great results. This is offset massively by the ability to compete in spaces that were previously dominated by other sites, giving you more chances to succeed on a variety of keywords.
Mobile-first index indicator
Google has announced new reports in the Search Console to help give you a better understanding of how Google is indexing your site. Google has made a lot of noise, and understandably so, about the importance of mobile devices and how your website should work on every device. The new update will tell you if and when they switched to using the Googlebot Smartphone.
Author: Conor Swarbrick