Google Business Profiles Adds New Delay Before Managers Can Access Accounts

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Google Business Profiles (formerly called Google My Business) has added a new waiting period for new profile managers or owners when they have been added to an account.

If you try to edit your business listing during this period, users will get an error message alerting them that their access is temporarily suspended.

This new information was discovered in the recently updated help guide for adding or removing profile managers or owners,

A single person – typically the business owner or an executive responsible for a brand’s online presence – can “claim” their Google Business Profiles listing to become the primary user without experiencing the delay. 

However, if you then add an employee or marketing agency to manage your listing, they will be required to wait 7 days before they will be granted full access to the account. 

As the new help document explains:

When a new owner or manager is added to an existing Business Profile, they must wait for 7 days before they can manage all the features of the profile. During this 7 day period, the new owner or manager gets an error if they try any of the following:

  • Delete or undelete a profile.
  • Remove other owners or managers from a profile.
  • Transfer primary ownership of a profile to themselves or a third user.
  • An existing owner or manager tries to transfer primary ownership of the profile to a new owner or manager still in their first 7 days.

If the new owner or manager deletes their account within the first 7 days, they’re removed from the profile. If they undelete their account, they must be added to the profile again.

Most likely, this temporary delay has been added as a means to prevent hackers or other bad actors from attempting to illicitly access Google Business Profiles accounts.

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Google Reveals It Has Two Ways To Crawl Web Pages

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Most people these days understand the general idea of how search engines work. Search engines like Google send out automated bots to scan or “crawl” all the pages on a website, before using their algorithms to sort through which sites are best for specific search queries. 

What few outside Google knew until recently, was that the search engine has begun using two different methods to crawl websites – one which specifically searches out new content and another to review content already within its search index.

Google Search Advocate John Mueller revealed this recently during one of his regular Search Central SEO office-hours chats on January 7th.

During this session, an SEO professional asked Mueller about the behavior he has observed from Googlebot crawling his website. 

Specifically, the user says Googlebot previously crawled his site daily when it was frequently sharing content. Since content publishing has slowed on this site, he has seen that Googlebot has been crawling his website less often.

As it turns out, Mueller says this is quite normal and is the result of how Google approaches crawling web pages.

How Google Crawls New vs. Old Content

While Mueller acknowledges there are several factors that can contribute to how often it crawls different pages on a website – including what type of pages they are, how new they are, and how Google understands your site.

“It’s not so much that we crawl a website, but we crawl individual pages of a website. And when it comes to crawling, we have two types of crawling roughly.

One is a discovery crawl where we try to discover new pages on your website. And the other is a refresh crawl where we update existing pages that we know about.”

These different types of crawling target different types of pages, so it is reasonable that they also occur more or less frequently depending on the type of content.

“So for the most part, for example, we would refresh crawl the homepage, I don’t know, once a day, or every couple of hours, or something like that.

And if we find new links on their home page then we’ll go off and crawl those with the discovery crawl as well. And because of that you will always see a mix of discover and refresh happening with regard to crawling. And you’ll see some baseline of crawling happening every day.

But if we recognize that individual pages change very rarely, then we realize we don’t have to crawl them all the time.”

The takeaway here is that Google adapts to your site according to your own publishing habits. Which type of crawling it is using or how frequently it is happening are not inherently good or bad indicators of your website’s health, and your focus should be (as always) on providing the smoothest online sales experience for your customers. 

Nonetheless, it is interesting to know that Google has made this adjustment to how it crawls content across the web and to speculate about how this might affect its ranking process.

To hear Mueller’s full response (including more details about why Google crawls some sites more often than others), check out the video below:

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Google May Start Deindexing Your Website If It Goes Offline For More Than a Day

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If your site is offline for more than a couple of days you could be at risk of having your pages deindexed, according to Google Search Advocate John Mueller.

It should go without saying that the less downtime your website experiences, the better. Still, some downtime is unavoidable thanks to maintenance, updates, redesigns, and other issues which can be entirely out of your hands.

This inevitably raises the question of exactly how long is too long for your site to be offline. At what point does this begin to hurt your rankings?

After years of debate, we finally have an official answer from Google courtesy of John Mueller during the most recent Google Search Central SEO office hours session.

How Long is Too Long to Be Offline?

The topic arose when an SEO specialist named Aakash Singh asked Mueller what can be done to minimize the loss of rankings or search performance while his client’s website undergoes an expected week of downtime.

The bad news is that a week is simply too long for a site to be offline without experiencing any negative side effects. In fact, Mueller says that sites can start having pages be de-indexed after being down for just a few days.

John Mueller On How Site Downtime Impacts Rankings

Beginning his response, Mueller explains how Google “sees” sites that are experiencing downtime.

“For an outage of maybe a day or so, using a 503 result code is a great way to tell us that we should check back. But after a couple of days we think this is a permanent result code, and we think your pages are just gone, and we will drop them from the index.”

“And when the pages come back we will crawl them again and we will try to index them again. But it’s essentially during that time we will probably drop a lot of the pages from the website from our index, and there’s a pretty good chance that it’ll come back in a similar way but it’s not always guaranteed.”

The general message is that sites should minimize downtime, even when using the proper redirects or site codes.

Mueller does leave us with a suggestion for avoiding the worst fallout from downtime, but he still emphasizes the importance of getting a site back up as quickly as possible:

“… that could be something like setting up a static version of the website somewhere and just showing that to users for the time being. But especially if you’re doing this in a planned way I would try to find ways to reduce the outage to less than a day if at all possible.”

To hear Mueller’s full explanation, check out the recording from the December 10th SEO office hours session below:

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Google Shares The Top Trending Searches For 2021

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Google has revealed their yearly recap of all the top trending searches for a smorgasbord of topics and themes for 2021. The lists show a focus on the news, money, and (of course) Squid Game, but they also reveal a bit about how Google thinks about its purpose as a search engine. 

In addition to the expected stories or trends like Gabby Petito or various types of cryptocurrency, the list of top trending searches brings attention to the ways people use Google to find information, connect with others, and how to improve their own lives with tutorials, resources, and ways to help others in need. 

Below, we will include some of the most interesting top trending search lists for the US from 2021, or you can explore Google’s full Year In Search site here.

Google’s Top 10 Trending Searches in 2021

  1. NBA
  2. DMX
  3. Gabby Petito
  4. Kyle Rittenhouse
  5. Brian Laundrie
  6. Mega Millions
  7. AMC Stock
  8. Stimulus Check
  9. Georgia Senate Race
  10. Squid Game

Top Trending News Searches

  1. Mega Millions
  2. AMC Stock
  3. Stimulus Check
  4. Georgia Senate Race
  5. GME
  6. Dogecoin
  7. Hurricane Ida
  8. Kyle Rittenhouse verdict
  9. Afghanistan
  10. Ethereum price

Top Trending Searches for How To Help Others

  1. How to help Afghan refugees
  2. How to help Texas
  3. How to help India COVID
  4. How to help toddler with cough
  5. How to help foster kids

Top Trending Searches For “How To Be”

  1. How to be eligible for stimulus check
  2. How to be more attractive
  3. How to be happy alone
  4. How to be a baddie
  5. How to be a good boyfriend

Top Trending “This or That” Searches 

  1. Effect or affect
  2. Barbie, Bratz or Fairy
  3. Allergies or COVID
  4. Bones or no bones
  5. Bougie or boujee
  6. Pfizer or Moderna
  7. Sinus infection or COVID
  8. Choose Bidoof or Bidoof
  9. Cold or COVID
  10. Capitol or capital

Top Trending “Where to Buy” Searches

  1. Dogecoin
  2. Shiba coin
  3. PS5
  4. safemoon
  5. N95 mask
  6. XRP
  7. NFT
  8. Baby Doge
  9. Xbox Series X
  10. Squishmallows

As usual, Google also collected many of these lists and trends into a Year in Search video for 2021. Check it out below:

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Google Maps Adds 4 New Local Shopping Features

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Ahead of the holiday shopping season, Google Maps is launching four new features aimed at improving the in-person shopping experience for consumers and driving more sales for local businesses.

The updates not only make it easier to plan your shopping trips ahead of time but also bring many shoppers new ways to order from local businesses online.

Let’s explore these four new features:

New Local Shopping Features for Google Maps

1. Area Busyness

Everyone dreads the idea of getting stuck in a massive holiday shopping crowd when you are just trying to pick up a few things. Now, you can see an estimate of how busy a specific area is before you leave.

For this new feature, called Area Busyness, Google analyzes recent traffic data from local businesses nearby to gauge how many people are shopping in the area.

To see the Area Busyness information, simply open Google Maps and tap on a general area to see how busy it is.

Notably, Google says shopping malls tend to be least busy on Tuesday evenings, while Saturday is unsurprisingly the busiest time to shop.

2. Expanded Directory Tabs

Google Maps is expanding the existing Directory tab globally for all airports, malls, and transit stations on Android and iOS devices.

The Directory tab details the stores in a shopping center, as well as showing airport lounges, car rental agencies, and other services in a building.

The tab also includes other helpful information pulled from local listings, such as whether specific stores are open and their Google reviews.

3. Grocery Shopping on Google

After testing the feature with some stores earlier this year, Google is expanded its grocery shopping feature to over 2,000 stores in 30+ states across the US.

Now, shoppers can order groceries from several large companies in the country, such as Kroger, Fry’s, Ralphs, and Marianos.

Once ordered, Google Maps tracks your order status and allows you to share your location info with the store so they will know when you arrive.

According to data from the tool before the expansion, Google says that customers who shared their ETA typically waited less than five minutes to pick up their order.

4. Additional Restaurant Info From Customers

Google Business Profiles for restaurants will now include more information provided by reviewers.

When leaving a review, Google now prompts customers to estimate the restaurant’s price ranges and note any amenities the restaurant offers – such as curbside pickup, delivery, or outdoor seating.

For more information about these updates, read the blog post from Google Maps Director of Product, Amanda Leicht Moore.

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Improved PageSpeed Insights Arrive At Google

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A few weeks ago, Google teased that it planned to refine its PageSpeed Insights tools to make data “more intuitive” and easy to understand. Now, that update has arrived.

What Is The PageSpeed Insights Tool?

If you’re unfamiliar, the PageSpeed Insights tool from Google evaluates your web pages to provide suggestions to improve how quickly content loads. 

The tool has been around in various forms since 2013 when it was a simple API webmaster could use to test their page speeds. Version 5, the most recent major update, arrived in 2018. However, smaller updates like this week’s happen somewhat regularly. 

Along with this new update, Google has moved the PageSpeed Insights tool to a new home at https://pagespeed.web.dev/.

What Is New In The PageSpeed Insights Tool?

The biggest focus of the new update is a change to the user interface to be more intuitive by “clearly differentiating between data derived from a synthetic environment and data collected from users in the field.”

To do this, Google has added dedicated sections for each type of data.

Where the tool used to include a label specifying which type of data you were viewing, Google has instead added information about what the data means for you and how it may be used to improve your performance.

Additionally, Google has shifted its emphasis to data collected from real users by moving field data to the top.

The Core Web Vitals assessment has also been expanded, with a label showing if your site has passed a Core Web Vitals assessment in the field and in-depth metrics from simulated environments.

Importantly, the PageSpeed Insights tool also includes details at the bottom of the page specifying how the data was collected in the field. This information includes:

  • Data collection period
  • Visit durations
  • Devices
  • Network connections
  • Sample size
  • Chrome versions

Lastly, Google has removed the previously included screenshot of the page as it indexed your content, replacing it with a series of images displaying the full loading sequence. 

For more, read the announcement for the update from Google’s Web.Dev blog.

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Google Is Going To Apply the Page Experience Algorithm to Desktop Search Results

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Google’s Page Experience Algorithm update is officially coming to some desktop search results, beginning in February of next year.’

Google Search product manager Jeffrey Jose teased this news earlier this year at the annual I/O event. At the time, however, details about when it would be rolled out and how it would be implemented were scarce. Now, we have the full rundown.

What Is Google’s Page Experience Algorithm?

The Page Experience Algorithm was originally rolled out exclusively for searches coming from mobile devices earlier this year, but the search engine confirmed it will be bringing much of the algorithm to desktop searches. This includes the much-talked-about “Core Web Vitals” metrics which are intended to ensure a good user experience on sites.

As the announcement says:

“This means the same three Core Web Vitals metrics: LCP, FID, and CLS, and their associated thresholds will apply for desktop ranking. Other aspects of page experience signals, such as HTTPS security and absence of intrusive interstitials, will remain the same as well.”

However, one notable signal from the mobile Page Experience Algorithm will not be coming to desktop search results for obvious reasons: mobile-friendliness.

To accompany the new search signal, Google says it is working on a new Search Console report dedicated to showing how your desktop pages stack up when this algorithm is applied to them.; For now, the release date of that is unknown, but most believe the report will arrive before or at the same time as the algorithm update.

For more information, read the full announcement here.

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Google My Business is Getting Relaunched as “Google Business Profiles”

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Say goodbye to “Google My Business” and say hello to “Google Business Profiles” as the search engine streamlines its tools for businesses.

Though much will stay the same for businesses listing their services on Google, the rename marks some significant changes – such as where and how your businesses can claim their profile. Starting now, your brand can claim its profile directly from either Google Search or Google Maps.

Below, we will talk a bit more in-depth about how you can claim your listing and what this means for existing listings.

How to Claim a Google Business Profile

When signed into the Google account associated with your business, the fastest way to claim your listing is to simply search for your business name. 

This will bring you to a prompt that will allow you to verify your listing or challenge someone who has already made a claim for your listing. 

Once claimed and verified, you will be able to edit any information shown and add additional details like photos, videos, unique services, and Google Posts.

Is Anything Else Changing?

For the most part, everything else is staying the same regarding local business listings on Google. Their appearance will stay the same, as will the optimization methods to ensure your business appears for relevant searches. 

What will change is where you are editing this information. 

For example, the search engine says it is no longer necessary to use the specific Google My Business website or app to update your listing.

The app will be phased out in early 2022, though you can still use the website if you are managing multiple listings. It will simply be renamed to “Google Business Profile Manager.”

For now, this is all the news we have about the relaunch of Google My Business and Google Business Profiles. More info will be coming in the coming months as the relaunch rolls out.

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What Is “High-Quality Content” According to Google

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When it comes to ranking a website in Google, most people agree that high-quality content is essential. But, what exactly is quality content? 

For a number of reasons, most online marketers agreed that Google defined high-quality content as something very specific: text-based content which clearly and engagingly communicated valuable information to readers.

Recently, though, Google’s John Mueller shot down that assumption during a video chat. 

While he still emphasizes that great content should inform or entertain viewers, Mueller explained that the search engine actually has a much broader view of “content quality” than most thought.

What Google Means When They Say “Quality Content”

In response to a question about whether SEO content creators should prioritize technical improvements to content or expand the scope of content, Mueller took a moment to talk about what content quality means to Google.

“When it comes to the quality of the content, we don’t mean like just the text of your articles. It’s really the quality of your overall website, and that includes everything from the layout to the design.

This is especially notable, as Mueller specifically highlights two factors that many continue to ignore – images and page speed. 

“How you have things presented on your pages? How you integrate images? How you work with speed? All of those factors, they kind of come into play there.”

Ultimately, Mueller’s response emphasizes taking a much more holistic view of your content and focusing on providing an all-around great experience for users on your website. 

There is an unspoken aspect to what Mueller says which should be mentioned. Mueller subtly shows that Google still prefers text-based content rather than videos or audio-only formats. While the company wants to integrate even more types of content, the simple fact is that the search engine still struggles to parse these formats without additional information.

Still, Mueller’s statement broadens the concept of “quality content” from what is often understood. 

“So it’s not the case that we would look at just purely the text of the article and ignore everything else around it and say, oh this is high-quality text. We really want to look at the website overall.”

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Google Releases Unofficial Tool For Removing Bad Ads

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Google has released an unofficial new tool to help save advertisers from being suspended for violating its new Three Strikes policy for policy violations. 

The tool, which comes in the form of a short python script, helps identify and remove ads that violate the terms and conditions for advertising.

How The Three Strikes Policy Works

As announced in July 2021, Google is now using a “Three Strikes” policy to suspend or ban repeat violators.

After the first violation of any type, the advertiser is given a warning. After that, they are allowed three strikes for each kind of violation.

If an advertiser account receives all three strikes, they are then suspended unless they win an appeal through the company.

As the announcement described the system:

“To help ensure a safe and positive experience for users, Google requires advertisers to comply with Google Ads policies.

“As a part of the Google Ads enforcement system, Google will begin issuing strikes to advertisers, which will be accompanied by email notifications and in-account notifications to encourage compliance and deter repeat violations of our policies.”

Google’s Bowling Tool To Remove Disapproved Ads

This week, the company’s developer blog announced a new tool called “bowling” that is designed to assist advertisers in spotting and removing any problematic ads. 

The announcement described the tool’s purpose by saying:

“…Bowling is a mitigation tool allowing clients to act and remove disapproved ads before risking account suspension.

“The tool audits (and offers the option to delete) disapproved ads that may lead eventually to account suspension in perpetuity.”

Despite being announced on the developer blog, however, the python script includes a disclaimer explicitly stating it is not an official product.

As the disclaimer says:

“This is not an officially supported Google product. Copyright 2021 Google LLC. This solution, including any related sample code or data, is made available on an “as is,” “as available,” and “with all faults” basis, solely for illustrative purposes, and without warranty or representation of any kind. This solution is experimental, unsupported and provided solely for your convenience.”

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