Every month in the world of search brings new challenges, news, and additional changes to Google’s search algorithm. Throughout the month of June 2022, there were a number of updates, including:
- Google SERP feature updates
- more algorithm updates
- more John Mueller goodies
In our monthly recap post, SEO professional Brian Harnish takes you through the most significant algorithm changes of June 2022.
May 2022 Broad Google Core Update
As I reported in May 2022 in SEO, Google ended up releasing the May broad core update. They also announced it officially over on their blog.
This was one of the more active updates, and it ended up accelerating quite fast. Volatility was reported by many webmasters within 24 hours after it was launched.
The following includes comments about what Webmasters were experiencing surrounding the events of the Broad Core Update:
Remember this rule of thumb with these core updates… Don’t panic day 1 unless you are completely obliterated. Google claims these take 2 weeks to fully rollout but you should feel this update within 48 hours or it’s not affecting you at all. Then wait for the dust to settle before analyzing your SERPS. Keep an eye out for a correction too. Sometimes these core updates have adverse affects and Google sees these signals and reverts. On a separate note, the PDF spam needs to be addressed in this core update because the Spam update of November sure as hell didn’t. Good luck everyone
UK informational site with lots of UGC. Real-time currently about 2/3 of what I’d usually expect this time of day. Trying not to give into the fear just yet.
I am seeing a BIG decline in USA traffic today…similar to the one day blip last week. USA is down 56% and search is down 30% at 11:30am. Once again my most important landing pages are down 70%+…it’s always the same landing pages that get hit too. I see this at least once a week now, and it usually bounces back at the end of the day, or next day.
This is the result of on-page changes I assume…i.e. loading the pages with too much crap so that organic results get pushed down. I would be panicked, but my SERPS actually improved overnight so I am thinking it will last 12-24 hours again. Otherwise if this sticks it will be very ugly.
Glenn Gabe reported the following over on Twitter:
OK, we are starting to see a lot of movement based on the May 2022 broad core update. Here’s a sampling of domains seeing surges or drops. And a number of them saw previous drops/surges during the November or June/July core updates. I’ll be digging in. Stay tuned. pic.twitter.com/hAWF1ijNLb
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) May 27, 2022
And there is a noticeable trend with a number of sites seeing a lot of movement with the 5/18 volatility and then more with the broad core update. Or was that the start of the broad core update? 🙂 pic.twitter.com/QBKYaa0Cs7
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) May 27, 2022
Browse By Search Features Expanded on Google Search
The “browse by search” feature has been expanded on Google. This feature lets you browse search results for things like the product line, product material it’s made of, and more.
These are all dynamic implementations and they are not exactly new. There have been implementations of this before.
This is an interesting change to the Google search interface and allows you to really drill down to specific products. Saad AK reported this over on Twitter:
Google > Mobile
I saw “Browse by” Search Feature in SERPs.
Sending to: @rustybrick SIR.
Example: 1 pic.twitter.com/CPZsAhhgmp
— Saad AK (@SaadAlikhan1994) May 31, 2022
Example 2:
Sending to: @rustybrick SIR. pic.twitter.com/DJ4PnT2BnO
— Saad AK (@SaadAlikhan1994) May 31, 2022
Example 3:
Sending to: @rustybrick SIR. pic.twitter.com/HAJimr8SE7
— Saad AK (@SaadAlikhan1994) May 31, 2022
It will be interesting to see how these new features in the SERPs impact click throughs and SERP features in general.
Yoast Premium Implements IndexNow
Yoast has officially announced that they are adding support for Microsoft’s IndexNow in the premium version of their popular WordPress plugin.
Joost deValk, the owner of Yoast, announced on his blog the following:
A recent addition to the website toolkit of ways to inform search engines is IndexNow. It’s a fairly simple protocol that allows you to ping search engines a URL that has changed on your site, or a list of URLs that has changed, and they say they’ll spider them quickly.
This new standard is supported by Bing, Yandex and Seznam, so far, and I’ve heard rumors of other search engines joining their ranks. This might not be useful for everybody with this current set of search engines, but the idea in general isn’t a bad one, especially as they “echo” pings to each other. This means you only have to ping one endpoint and they’ll send them along to all. We’ll be adding support for it to Yoast SEO Premium soon and we look forward to seeing the impact it makes, if any.
This is a great addition to another WordPress plugin, but others have also added support for IndexNow, as Barry Schwartz noted in his post on the topic.
Google Makes Algorithmic Improvement For Titles
Early June also saw Google making a relatively minor algorithmic improvement on titles that aren’t aligned with the actual page.
They explained in further detail that this change affects titles that may not match the document exactly, and could impact titles that aren’t aligned exactly with the language of the page.
In their post on the official Google Search Central blog, they explained the following:
This week, we introduced an algorithmic improvement that identifies documents where the title element is written in a different language or script from its content, and chooses a title that is similar to the language and script of the document. This is based on the general principle that a document’s title should be written by the language or script of its primary contents. It’s one of the reasons where we might go beyond title elements for web result titles.
In general, our systems tend to use the title element of the page. In cases with multi-language or transliterated titles, our systems may seek alternatives that match the predominant language of the page. This is why it’s a good practice to provide a title that matches the language and/or the script of the page’s main content.
EU Publishers vs. US Users
Over on Twitter, SEO professional Esben Rasmussen asked John Mueller about how US media is able to geoblock EU users (due to GDPR being in effect there).
But, they are still able to get content crawled from the US without issue.
His main question to John Mueller was about whether EU media is able to do this for a US user and still get their content crawled by Google from the US, and without this being seen as cloaking.
John Mueller responded that there is currently no feasible and reliable way to do this at all.
So US media can geoblock EU users (GDPR excuse) and still get content crawled by Google (from the US).
How would an EU media do this for US user and get their content crawled by Google (from the US) – without seen as cloaking?@JohnMu any advice?
— Esben Rasmussen (@EsbenRasmussen) June 8, 2022
Yes, that’s not possible at the moment. Do you have a specific situation in mind?
— 🐝 johnmu.csv (personal) weighs more than 16MB 🐝 (@JohnMu) June 8, 2022
Microsoft Bing Tests a New Design On Local Pack Results
Over on Twitter, SEO professional Khushal Berwani reported that Microsoft’s Bing is testing a new design on their local pack.
He also provided a screen grab of this feature showing up in the search results.
He explained that this happens when you click on local business, it’s open with a popup in the same tab. They believe this is an amazing feature.
Microsoft Bing’s new test for local pack. When you click on local business its open with popup in same tab.
Its amazing feature .#localbusiness#mocrosoftbing
cc – @rustybrickpic.twitter.com/1UHfzN6yPC
— Khushal Bherwani (@b4k_khushal) June 13, 2022
John Mueller Office Hours Pared Down
For anyone who may not have noticed this change, there have been significant changes to both the format and the scheduling of John Mueller’s office hours.
A program that used to air and happened every week for years, it seems, has changed to once a month.
About a month ago, John stopped doing the live version of his hangouts, and changed to a format where he is able to better prepare the questions ahead of the recording time.
John announced that he is switching the format and scheduling of these hangouts to once per month.
One SEO professional asked John about this on Twitter. He explained that he needed the change so he could find a workable balance for these hangouts.
Indeed, there has been an improvement in how John answers questions. This improvement has resulted in more significant, better nuggets to be gleaned from these discussions than before.
I’m currently aiming for about 1/month, so unfortunately that’s even less frequent than you’re recommending … They’re always quite time-intensive for me, so I need to find a workable balance.
— 🐝 johnmu.csv (personal) – faxchecker 🐝 (@JohnMu) June 16, 2022
Google and Third-Party SEO Metrics
Over on Twitter, in early June John Mueller was asked about specific third-party metrics such as DA (domain authority) and toxic links.
John explained that for certain third-party metrics in this regard, Google simply ignores these metrics. He also recommended that SEO professionals move on to serious tools that don’t report on metrics that Google doesn’t use.
He also doesn’t like when these tools report on metrics that Google doesn’t use. While he understands that some of these folks are well-meaning, creating metrics like these is something that creates false expectations and false expectancy on results.
In other words, if Google doesn’t use this metric, don’t trust that your SEO efforts going after these metrics are going to do anything for your overall results.
I have nothing against 3rd party metrics like these – and I’m sure they’re made by smart, honest, & well-meaning folks. The part I struggle with (with our tools too) is the desire to treat them as a goal of their own, or as a checklist. They’re tools which ideally – …
— 🐝 johnmu.csv (personal) weighs more than 16MB 🐝 (@JohnMu) June 7, 2022
Everytime I see a “how to improve $METRIC” thread, I cringe a bit: so much wasted energy. Do I post to tell them that the metric is irrelevant to Google? (I don’t)
Creating metrics is hard, money matters, and it’s not your fault they’re used like this, but it’s lost time…— 🐝 johnmu.csv (personal) weighs more than 16MB 🐝 (@JohnMu) June 7, 2022
Google Search Algorithm Update Around Juneteenth
Around the weekend of Juneteenth, we saw yet another Google search algorithm update. This week saw many webmasters and SEO professionals who were concerned about drops in traffic and other major negative issues as a result of certain algorithmic changes.
The following includes the ongoing commentary over on Webmaster World:
Is anyone else seeing a big drop in international traffic today? I’m seeing USA traffic up for the first time in a week, UK is also normal…but Australia is -70% for two days now…Canada -40%, UAE is also -40%. Germany is -20%, France and most of the rest of W. Europe is at 0 visits today…not one visit. Perhaps we are seeing the rollout of new serp layouts to a wide market?
That’s just 1/2 of a Googleday completed for me and traffic at 20% of expected levels. Proportionately the visitor demographics has not changed which is a surprise therefore where has the “volume” gone IF that still exists or is it mostly Google ads now meaning unless you are #1 then you will have to pay for traffic?
IMHO I had better add that being #1 now seems to mean absolutely nothing whatsoever.
Most of my global industry gave-up updating their websites around 2016, some earlier, will I be able to justify my 30th anniversary year in 2023?
Google News Launches a Brand-New Design
In a rather stunning turn of events, Google News has launched a brand-new design. It wasn’t exactly a secret, as has been reported in the past by Barry Schwartz.
Google explained the following in the update on their blog:
The new Google News
Google News is available in over 125 countries and 40 languages. Each month, people click through from Google Search and Google News results to publishers’ websites more than 24 billion times. Google’s algorithms use machine learning to analyze hundreds of different factors to identify and organize the stories being covered around the world.
To help people dive deeper into important stories and more easily find local news from around the world, today we’re launching a redesigned, more customizable Google News experience for desktop.
Our new look for Google News on desktop was inspired by feedback we received from readers. We’ve made it easier for you to catch up on the most important news by bringing Top stories, Local news and personalized picks for you to the top of the page.
They also showed the following example of the redesigned Google News interface:
They also said:
20 years of Google News
This year marks the 20th anniversary of Google News. When it launched, Google News broke new ground in news aggregation by gathering links in real time, grouping articles by story and ranking stories from publishers worldwide.
Brand-New LGBTQ+ Owned Attribute for Businesses
Google announced over on their blog that they are now adding brand-new LGBTQ+ owned attributes for Search, along with Maps for US-based business owners.
Mackenzie Thomas (she/her), who is a Product & Marketing Inclusion Lead at Google, explained the following behind this launch:
A couple of years ago, my partner and I moved to Kentucky, not knowing anyone in the state. Before moving, I extensively researched local websites and online magazines, trying to understand the neighborhoods and get a sense of the community. Somewhere along the way I found Lussi Brown Coffee Bar, a local business run by by a queer woman. Not knowing whether I’d get a response, I eagerly reached out through email, asking questions to get a sense of the community. To my delight, the owner, Sarah Brown (she/they), quickly responded and provided an overview of the rich history of the LGBTQ+ community in Lexington. And of course, she shared recommendations of some of their favorite LGBTQ+ owned businesses in the state too!
As we moved into town, Sarah and their girlfriend welcomed us with open arms, very much making the community immediately feel like home. And our physical home brought that same love, too. Unintentionally, we rented an apartment on a short street filled with LGBTQ+ folks from their 20s through their 70s — in fact, our neighbors called it Kentucky’s “Barbary Lane,” a nod to the tight knit, beloved street of LGBTQ+ folks in Armistead Maupin’s novel “Tales of the City.”
With that same spirit, we want to make it easier for others to find LGBTQ+ owned businesses in their own community. Starting today, merchants in the U.S. with a verified Business Profile on Google can add an LGBTQ+ owned attribute to their profile, making it easier for customers to find and support them through Search and Maps. This new offering joins the Black-owned, Latino-owned, veteran-owned and women-owned business attributes we already offer, and is yet another way people can support diverse businesses.
As we celebrate Pride, it’s important to remember visibility and representation are critical, all year round. A flag in the window of a small business has the power to bring queer folks together, to celebrate our joy, honor our history, and fight for our diverse community. It’s our hope that this attribute will allow business owners to celebrate their identity and community with the world.
A fantastic move by Google.
New Google Algorithm Update Expected Late June
Beginning on June 27th, after a relative lull in activity for the past week, there was yet another algorithm update that hit (again).
The increased chatter among the Webmaster World community all but confirms it. The following includes more insights into this potential update, along with activity hitting these sites:
Traffic is still there, one weekend, two sites:
Global site Saturday was average, Sunday 38.7% and it strggled to get there and had zero interaction with potential clients. For those who work Monday to Friday do remember not all countries have your working hours and days.
UK dedicated hotel / pub site with a festival weekend Saturday + 175%, Sunday +219% driving the highest traffic figures of the year and also the highest income of the year.
Whilst we expected increased traffic to the UK site it was still surprising considering that, realistically, it is a local event and just who was looking at the site as several thousand who passed through the venue and were enjoying themselves? After years of organsing this event every time it exceeds all expectations, more money than ever was raised for the charity and in 15 years we were again blessed with the best weather.
So, one site down, no realworld business, one site up, loads of realworld business. Talking to Joe Public over the weekend was very interesting. Saturday night was a pre-pandemic night seeing people we hadn’t seen since early 2020. Sunday saw loads of families supporting the charity and enjoying the weather however many did make the point that they were being much more careful with their spending “just in case”.
My realworld international trade enquiries are down substantially this year and I know, in India which is my widget world’s 2nd/3rd largest supplier after China, in some major supply areas that in excess of 1,000 small / family factories are closed at the moment, this is the reality at the primary end of current global consumption therefore it is not surprising so many sites in many industries are experiencing reductions apart from all the Google ads and update.
Sat and Sun were both average, but Monday is down massively so far. Search is down 31% by 11am, and USA is down 52% from an average Monday. My visibility increased according to the trackers I use…
Also seeing big drops of 50% or more for many of my top referring countries on a rolling basis from June 13th-17th…Australia, UK, Canada, UAE, Germany…in some cases (UK and Germany) the traffic bounced back after about 4-5 days, in other cases it has has remained at the new lower level. Has anyone seen this big drop in mid-June?
I checked this morning on desktop and many pages are starting with a block of product ads or 4 text ads, then local, one organic link, a huge twitter carousel, people also ask block, one organic link, image search, videos…. It changes upon each search.
This happens EVERY update. Some sector is just convinced Google has targeted them personally,
There are 3 of these stories out there that are clearly (to me) by some agency who’s client was smacked and the agency has no idea what happened. So they put out a blog post saying it was the entire sector.
https://www.estateagenttoday.co.uk/breaking-news/2022/6/google-seo-changes-may-have-pushed-agency-websites-down-search-rankings–warning
My global overall traffic is still down and this is entirely due to former top-ranking pages most of which have disappeared completely from the top 100 meanwhile many other pages, in the thousands, using precisely the same tamplate and format, are happily ranking extremely well, many at #1.
It’s the bizarre removal / demotion of the popular pages that concerns me, many of the newly promoted pages are very poor and thin, none of them are new, however they are ALL USA companies, realistically the foreign pages have all been removed for these specific widgets from at least the top 50.SERPs.
These newly promoted sites do not rank for any other widget pages except these top keyword searches which is what makes it so bizarre, there seems to be no logical pattern to the demotions / penalties. It would be easier to understand and cope with were an entire site penalised but to have so many pages ranking well and yet others simply go MIA surely indicates some sort of error / glitch in the algo?
Has anyone seen any improvement?
Google Stops Showing Some Rich Results
Back in January, 2021 – Google had accidentally stopped showing job training rich results. However, finally on June 1, 2022, they made it official: they are no longer going to be displaying rich results for job training snippets in the search results.
Google explained that “this change doesn’t affect any other features that may use Job Training markup.”
Redesigned Knowledge Panels Tested on Google
Barry Schwartz reported that knowledge panels without a box border were being tested on Google Search.
He explained that there is a new user interface where Google doesn’t surround a knowledge panel entirely with a border.
A vertical line has replaced this entirely instead.
Barry posted the image of what this new interface looks like:
Google Algorithm Update Communications
On June 27th, Google held a meetup in NYC, where SEO professionals from all around the world could show up and meet distinguished Googlers.
In fact, our own Jason Hennessey was able to attend this meetup, and met with John Mueller, Barry Schwartz, and Danny Sullivan.
One major point from this meetup is that Danny Sullivan reported that Google is working to become more active about communicating on algorithm updates now than ever before.
Danny explained that they are sharing more information about the updates in a more public fashion.
Google isn’t doing more updates, they’re just sharing more information about the updates publicly
They share this information so you can know if any traffic volatility was due to a Google update
via @dannysullivan@Marie_Haynes got a little shout out ☺️ pic.twitter.com/ZtwubFiO3n
— Lily Ray 😏 (@lilyraynyc) June 27, 2022
Another Month End Recap With More Google Changes
If there is anything that’s consistent in the search industry, when everything else is not, is change.
This industry is always in a constant state of flux, and could be challenging to keep up with for some folks.
As changes occur, it’s important to keep updated. Even reading regular search news on an ongoing basis can help inform your strategy and keep you updated.
This can help you adapt and make changes to your overall strategy as a result of some of these changes, should these updates become warranted for any reason.
Happy SEO-ing!!