This Week’s Industry News
Compiled by the Rocket Clicks Team
Top Stories
Manually Index any URL via Google Search Results
This week SEOs discovered an alternate way to request URL indexing. Instead of submitting it through Search Console or the submit URL form, do a Google search for “Submit URL to Google” and the SERP will provide a box to submit your URL. This new method requires little effort and could be a great way to request indexing for one-off URLs. Source: Search Engine Roundtable
Google to Hold Performance Summit on May 23
Google has announced their annual performance summit where they share Analytics, AdWords, and other updates will be held on May 23 in San Francisco. But, this year, the event will be operating under a new name: Google Marketing Next. In addition, Google stated that they will be “giving you a sneak peek at how brands are starting to use the Google Assistant to delight customers.” Source: Search Engine Land
Google Image Search Launches “Similar Items” for Mobile
Google added a new feature to Image Search with the launch of “Similar Items” this week. The similar items feature identifies products in lifestyle images and displays matching products to users. Retailers can make sure that their products are eligible for similar search by using product markup schema including the image reference details. Currently similar items is only supporting handbags, sunglasses and shoes, but more categories should be coming soon. Source: Google Webmaster Central Blog
Phishing Scam Disrupting Bank PPC Ads
Industry experts have recently uncovered a phishing scam on the Google Search results. In this case, paid search ads are posing as official bank and credit card ads. When a user clicks the ad they end up getting drop onto a phishing website for a landing page. These ads typically follow a set of tactics like posing as a popular bank brand through “brand + login” related keywords. The page itself will claim malware has been downloaded to your computer and can often come with an annoying, hard to close pop-up. Source: Search Engine Land
Search Console Displaying Empty Link Reports
Webmasters wanting to do a bank link audit were surprised to see that Google dropped both external and internal links from displaying within Search Console. While the lost link reports are not affecting all users, those who lost link data have been without the information since Friday. Google has confirmed the bug and are currently on a fix, but have not provided any more insights regarding the glitch. Source: The SEM Post
Additional Commentary
Shopping Campaign Mistakes to Avoid
PPC Hero Kelsey Hadaller wants to help you avoid some common Shopping campaign mistakes. The first mistake to avoid is only running one Shopping campaign. If you have specific promotional products or top sellers, you should place them into their own campaigns to easily track performance in these areas. Another mistake to avoid is not using priority settings. This comes into play when you have multiple Shopping campaigns like Top Sellers. Last, and the most obvious mistake to avoid, is failing to exclude “Everything else”. Because if you don’t, all ad groups will become an All Products ad group. Source: Kelsey Hadaller, PPC Hero
Are SEOs Neglecting the XML Sitemap Tool?
SEOs already know that the XML Sitemap tool and some of the features, but knowing the best practices and common mistakes could reveal why it’s not working as well as it could be. Moz blogger Michael Cottam went through and described common issues and how to begin resolving them. Some tips include: while submitting a XML sitemap can help to guide Google to important pages, but it doesn’t mean Google will follow it just because you uploaded the file. And don’t forget pages you’ve blocked in robots.txt should not be in the index which gives Google conflicting instructions. Source: Michael Cottam, Moz Blog
