SEO Wash-up Monday 25th April 22

Google Update

Google testing a curved with green border & more visible ad label – Google is testing a new ad label on the search ads that is way more noticeable than the normal ad label. This one in particular has a black ad label text but it is outlined in a curved green border making the ad label stand out much more than previous ad labels. Users have been talking about it throughout social media and screenshots have been shared, although I cannot replicate it.

It is a surprise to see the search giant to test an ad label that is more visible. The trend Google has been going was towards ad labels that are less visible. We went from a black ad text label, to a green outlined label, yellow ad label and so on.

Bing Update

‘Bing News PubHub’ moved to Bing webmaster tools – The Bing News PubHub to within Bing Webmaster Tools by Microsoft Bing. What is Bing News PubHub? Well it is a way for publishers to submit their site for approval in Bing News and also check on the status of their approval. So it is no longer available at ‘pubhub.bing.com’ and now has been moved to Bing Webmaster Tools.

It was first launched back in 2016 and it actually has not changed, outside of just moving to Bing Webmaster Tools. You can access Bing News PubHub on the bottom of the navigation bar within Webmaster Tools. So it will either show you the status of your Bing News submission or let you apply or re-apply. The form even looks the same as the original form from 2016.

Microsoft wrote that these are still the criteria:

• Newsworthiness – Reporting on timely events and topics that are interesting to the people using our services. Content that does not focus on reporting, such as how-to articles, job postings, advice columns, product promotions, is not considered newsworthy. Similarly, content that consists strictly of information without including original reporting or analysis, such as stock data and weather forecasts, is not considered newsworthy.
• Originality – This includes unique facts or points of view. Faced with numerous sources frequently reporting similar or identical content, originality or uniqueness becomes a critical way to determine the value to a user of an individual story.
• Authority – News sites with authority maintain the highest level of trust and respect from our users. Submissions must identify sources, authors, and attribution of all content.
• Readability – Content containing correct grammar and spelling and that keeps site design easy for people to navigate. Advertising should never interfere with the site experience.

New Microsoft advertising cruise ads for Bing search – Microsoft has announced a new advertising format for Bing search named ‘Cruise Ads’. This is Microsoft creating all these vertical ad formats that in a couple years from now will result in a big consolidation story where Microsoft announced they consolidated the vertical ad formats for simplicity purposes.

Though Microsoft advertising launched automobile ads, health insurance ads, credit card ads, and tour and activity ads. Well now they have ‘Cruise Ads’ and we will most likely see many more verticals in 2022.

Microsoft go on to mention that this new vertical ad solution leverages search intent data and a deep understanding of users’ needs to offer advertisers a richer ad experience to attract cruise enthusiasts. Balancing what is good for their users with what is important for their clients led them to create an ad format which reflects the uniqueness of the cruise industry.

The ‘Cruise Ads’ use search intent and dynamically-generated elements to deliver relevant ad experiences based on data feeds. So advertiser feed offers are automatically matched to queries without a need for keywords. Advertisers can also use negative keywords for optimisation.