Today In SEO & Search News: April 11, 2017

Today In SEO & Search News: April 11, 2017

Hello all and welcome to today’s edition of “Today In SEO & Search News”. The top SEO and search stories since our last post are:

How Google Influences And Controls Users
How Google learns to influence and control users

I just had my latest article published as part one of a two part series.  The series covers two patents that combine into one purpose.  This first piece covers a patent that focused on systems of error correction.  That is, correcting users when they are about to act in a way that is contrary to doing something they need to do in the future (like catch and airplane). The second patent which will be discussed in the coming days covers techniques for smartphones (and voice-first devices) to gather information to drive users to a conversion with an obvious bias to paid listings.  Both are very interesting, very telling and will highlight what’s coming.

Content Marketing KPIs & Metrics
Rob Gardner from a good piece for Search Engine Journal. the article basically covers 15 points you’ll want to remember in deploying and measuring content marketing campaigns.  I love anyone who writes about how to measure the actions we’re told to take regularly and the article gives some solid tips and advice on not just how to measure what’s working but how to determine what to measure in the first place.

Google Fixing Bug On Link Reports
Don't Panic

Barry Schwartz reported for Search Engine Land on a bug in Google Search Console that is displaying “no data available” in the backlink reports.  Google’s John Mueller has announced that it’s a known issue and is being worked on.  It started last Friday and as of this writing on Tuesday is still present.

Submit Pages To Google By Searching Google
Barry Schwartz also reported for Search Engine Land (busy guy) of a new feature in Google that let’s you submit a URL directly through their search results page for “submit url to google“. Personally I’ve always just found it a better use of time to build links and let Google’s crawlers do their job or use the Fetch as Google in the Search Console if I need a URL crawled very fast but it will be interesting as this post publishes to use the submission and see how quickly it works vs through the Search Console which generally takes between a few seconds and a few minutes.

Update – it takes seconds just like the Fetch feature. A handy feature to save a minute or two by logging into the Search Console.

Google Marketing Next Livestream
Google is holding a livestream on May 23 from 9am to 10am Pacific. They’ll be covering the latest updates and what’s coming up in AdWords, Analytics and DoubleClick. It should be interesting so get registered.

Google Announces Similar Items 
Mens shoes Google search result
Image Search on mobile has for a bit now been showing “Similar items”. That is, you can see images that are similar to the image you are looking at easily. Google yesterday released information on how to help make sure your own products and images can be used as possible matches.  If you sell product onlien this is a must read.

Facebook Instant Articles News CTAs
Danny Goodwin over at Search Engine Journal covered the announcement from Facebook that moving forward people who read your Facebook Instant Articles will be able to Like your page or subscribe to your newsletter from within the article.  If you’re a publisher or use Facebook Instant Articles and have Likes or newsletter signups as a KPI I highly recommend reading Danny’s write-up.

Google Ruins Assistant’s Shopping List
Google Assistant Shopping List

Ron Amadeo over at ARS Technica  called a spade a spade regarding recent changes to Google’s shopping list. The aspect of the assistant has been transformed from a useful tool to a featureless ad platform.  It’s an interesting read and certainly gives a feel for what the future will look like.

And that’s it for the day. If you think we missed anything I invite you to mention them in the comments below.