SEO Wash-up Monday 4th March

Google Updates

Google adds new features & improvements to ‘test my site’ tool – The search giant has said that they are rebuilding the ‘test my site’ tool. They also mention that that they have added a whole new set of features that can help developers build a faster website.

Below are some of the new features in the tool:

• The speed of your entire website & individual pages
• Whether your website/page speed is faster or slower compared to the previous month
• Whether your website speed/page speed ranks as fast, average or slow
• How your website speed compares to your competitors
• The potential impact of site speed on revenue
• A detailed list of recommended fixes to increase speed on up to 5 pages on their site
• A complete report to share with their team

Google upgrades search console with products report & merchant/manufacturer centre – Google has said that they are doing some upgrades to products in Google search. They have added a new enhancements report that shows how your product market is doing on Google search console. Furthermore, the search giant has also added the ability for product data feeds to be uploaded onto Google merchant centre, now being eligible for display in results on surfaces like search or images and up-to-date product information through Google manufacturer centre.

Google Ads Tests Large Image In Search Ads – Google seems to be testing large images in their search ads. You may notice it and there has been chatter on social media about this and Google had a few comments on it. The search giant has done this for automotive ads starting in 2016 but they started testing large images for search ads back in 2013.

Google image search on mobile adds swipe to next – It seems that on image search for mobile, Google has added a “swipe to next” notice when you look at specific images in their search results. So if you click on an image, it will overlay for a second or two a message that tells you that you can swipe to see the next image.

Google ads to stop average position metric – Google has mentioned that they are going to be putting an end to one of the oldest AdWords metrics, the average position metric. This is plan to end in September this year and will be replaced by four new metrics Google has launched last year November, which are;

1. Impression (Absolute Top) %
2. Impression (Top) %
3. Search (Abs Top) IS
4. Search (Top) IS

Google has also said that with the availability of these new metrics, you can understand the importance, and If you currently use average position, then they have recommend you start using those new metrics when measuring and optimizing for prominence.