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Google Updates and SERP Changes - September 2021

         

goodroi

10:30 pm on Sep 1, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Administrator 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



August is typically a holiday/vacation month in the northern hemisphere as people take time out to recuperate, and to prepare for a busy quarter, and 2021 is likely to follow similar patterns. Black Friday and cyber Monday, along with many other regional holiday dates usually have an impact on business in the quarter, as well as Christmas and New Year.

Looking back at the past quarter of Google's SERPs changes has brought the usual shenanigans, and winners and losers. Traffic, and most importantly, conversions, is a goal of publishers selling services and goods to business and to end users. Here are a few of the changes worth noting in the past month or so that you may have missed.

The Google and Link Spam: Qualify Links for Affiliate Links or Sponsored Guest Posts Update [webmasterworld.com] took quite a while to roll through, and it was probably a good four weeks or so of changes.

There were quite a few observations of note in our Google Updates and SERP Changes - August 2021 [webmasterworld.com]

Also, there was a Google Image Rendering Bug Causes Some Failures in Top Stories [webmasterworld.com]

Do you want to know how to control parts of snippets displayed in the SERPs "Data-no snippet" How to Stop Parts of a Google SERPs Snippet From Showing [webmasterworld.com]

There was also a piece about How to Remove Web Results From Google Search [webmasterworld.com]

Is it a penalty, or the result of an algo change. [webmasterworld.com]

Google changing descriptions in the SERPs have been going on for years, and here's the latest on the changes in our thread titled Update: Google Generating Page Titles on SERPs [webmasterworld.com]

Supporters forum (paid subscriptions) Google's NLP demo taken down and it's still available if you know how [webmasterworld.com]


Plus lots of other Google search and SEO topics [webmasterworld.com], and recent discussion in other sectors on WebmasterWorld [webmasterworld.com]

What are your observations on the algorithm updates/changes to the SERPs?

Tolomen

8:07 am on Sep 2, 2021 (gmt 0)

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Hope that September will be as successful as the last days of August were - a lot of my site traffic and Google positions are back.
Good luck to all of you ...

Danik

9:28 am on Sep 2, 2021 (gmt 0)

5+ Year Member



Today the semrush sensor is at 8.0, a very high value.
I think we are at the beginning of a big update.

yollo03

10:34 am on Sep 2, 2021 (gmt 0)

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The performance in gsc hasn't been updated for more than 24 hours. Is anyone seeing this as well?

renatovieira

1:35 pm on Sep 2, 2021 (gmt 0)

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Massive drop today...

JesterMagic

8:38 pm on Sep 2, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Saw over 13% drop yesterday when compared to the same day in previous weeks.

Google Bot also has been visiting my site a lot more over the last few days as well.

yollo03

9:37 am on Sep 3, 2021 (gmt 0)

5+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Google found a creative way of increasing its ads revenue. When visitors enter your website your competitors will be displayed to them. 'Continues Search.' Once this is launched (in beta the moment) it will be a real game changer.

[seroundtable.com...]

Featured image: webmasterworld
www.seroundtable.com
Chrome Beta Can Display Competitors When Customers Are On Your Site
Part of the latest version of the Chrome beta, not out to the masses yet, is a feature named continuous search. Continuous search basically will show you search results along the top of the page whe

rayankhaled

11:16 am on Sep 3, 2021 (gmt 0)

Top Contributors Of The Month



SEMrush spikes again this morning 5.7
hugh fluctuations

RedBar

1:55 pm on Sep 3, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



The first couple of days have been fine across all sites for me however today is looking much lower across all sites ... at least that is consistency!

christianz

2:25 pm on Sep 3, 2021 (gmt 0)

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'Continues Search.' Once this is launched (in beta the moment) it will be a real game changer.


Excellent. Maybe when Chrome will come equipped with this adware toolbar, more users will start to question whether they really want to use Googles products.

frankleeceo

2:53 am on Sep 4, 2021 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



auto ads refreshes, auto refreshes, ads popup (do you want this product), coupon pop up, instant buy button, retargeting, auto ad injection, auto opt in to email list, google SMS ads, matrix style auto ads insertion directly into the brain, plenty of more ways for ads and more search volume!

Dooku

8:27 am on Sep 5, 2021 (gmt 0)

5+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Here is how to easily check if google has rewritten your page titles:
[seowl.co...]

Featured image: webmasterworld
www.seowl.co
Google Title Rewrite Checker SEOwl
Check if Google has rewritten your page title for a list of URL, for free !

RedBar

12:11 pm on Sep 5, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



The third day of traffic being significantly lower across all sites for me, something's changed, not too sure what as yet.

Dooku

2:27 pm on Sep 5, 2021 (gmt 0)

5+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Maybe when Chrome will come equipped with this adware toolbar

That chrome browser itself is malware. Don't believe me? Just hook up Wireshark and you will have one of those moments where you suddenly realize that reality is far more weird than fiction!

@Redbar, you have UK based websites but even so, it's Labor Day weekend in the US and that has it's influences especially in this day and age where people want to go out and visit locations/family.

But there was an update from september 2-4 so after the weekend we will know more.

ichthyous

3:37 pm on Sep 5, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



I checked with the SEOWL site and it reported drastic changes to my titles and completely incorrect pages titles in some cases, however when I checked the same pages at Google it wasn't actually the case, the titles were mostly unchanged or small changes (shorter title). Could it be that Google serves variations by location, or even changes titles on the fly to see which get the best click through?

In other news, I am seeing a huge divergence between impressions and clicks in Google Search Console these days. My clicks were heading upward until 8/26, then dropped again...impressions keep heading upward though.

RedBar

4:28 pm on Sep 5, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



@Redbar, you have UK based websites

I'm UK based however not focussed with only half a dozen UK sites, the remainer are all global and my day starts at midnight my time in New Zealand, Australia, Japan through Asia etc, come mid-day my time I've usually had about half my day's traffi, sometimes more.

Whilst the US is my single biggest traffic country it is not like 60/70% of my traffic, it's usually about 30%. Whilst Labour Day may affect me it is not as significant as a US only site would.

And just how many holidays does the US need in a year? Our next one is Xmas!

Martin Ice Web

8:00 am on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Biggest drop ever, much bigger than panda. Yet i don´t know if it is our site or if it is due to total mismatch of serps and query. Searching for apples shows a lot of fruits but no apples.

But it seems that we are outranked by sites with 1x picture, 1x H1 , no description, 1x buy button. I forgot this must be a compelling website.

RedBar

9:32 am on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Traffic less than half of where I would normally expect it to be. Two notable points:

1. Almost all single page views ... this always tells me something is wrong.

However the last 3-4 days:

2. My global traffic sources have changed with 50% now coming from the USA, up from 30%, and my second biggest source, India, has gone from multiple page views to a few single pages and even many of thise do not look genuine.

Something has been up-borked majorly! That's my polite terminology:-)

ichthyous

2:02 pm on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



I am not seeing huge drops this weekend or today (yet), in fact today has started off fairly strong. USA traffic was slightly lower Fri-Sun, but normal for a holiday weekend. I am seeing impressions increasing and clicks declining in GSC now. Is this a result of lower CTR due to poorly rewritten (by Google) page titles? Is this a ploy by Google to drive down clicks to organic sites once again by making their titles irrelevant or confusing? I wouldn't doubt that for a second, but perhaps it's just another inept attempt at ensuring that the title truly reflects the page content via the use of their equally inept AI.

[ibb.co ]

Featured image: webmasterworld
ibb.co
Screen-Shot-2021-09-06-at-9-57-35-AM
Image Screen-Shot-2021-09-06-at-9-57-35-AM hosted in ImgBB

superclown2

2:46 pm on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



This will be my last posting on webmasterworld.

After more than 15 years of contributing to this forum, I am no longer content to have my postings which are critical of Google deleted (as indeed I expect this to be) by those with, presumably, their own reasons. Whilst I am more than happy to discuss these views, others clearly are not so I shall join the long list of ex-contributors.

I was in this business before Google and I fully expect to be still it it when the public and legislators finally, and inevitably, realise what a once great search engine has turned into. I wish you all good luck. You will need it - or very deep pockets indeed, to feed the Gorg with.
Best regards from Superclown2

RedBar

2:53 pm on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Sorry to see you go superclown2 ... seemingly like much of tech and govt, many are being delibertaely silenced for speaking out.

NickMNS

3:44 pm on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 5+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



I'm seeing a drop as well, as of about 8am I'm down ~40% as compared to same day last week. This basically rolls back the update from August 22nd, when I compare today to a Monday earlier in the month I am right back were I left off.

NickMNS

4:57 pm on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 5+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



I should add to the above, that it is Labor day in US and Canada, that is likely contributing to the drop in traffic. Also it is not uncommon for Google to use holidays to role-out updates in order to obfuscate and mask the actual impact.

RedBar

6:31 pm on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Did someone at The Plex read my post? Suddenly getting multiplr page views again!

EditorialGuy

8:31 pm on Sep 6, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Also it is not uncommon for Google to use holidays to role-out updates in order to obfuscate and mask the actual impact.

Or, more likely, to test changes in the wild at a time when the impact will be minimal.That seems like a sensible approach to me. It's better to test changes to the show in an out-of-town preview than on opening night.

RedBar

11:39 am on Sep 7, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month




After 6 days of September what am I seeing?

My UK-focussed sites are just managing their averages, no spikes nor troughs.

However my global sites are all seeing the same, traffic at my new lower levels experienced in May to July.

Why was my traditionally quieter August back to Jan to March levels?

If this isn't manipulation I do not know what is!


[edited by: not2easy at 12:54 pm (utc) on Sep 7, 2021]
[edit reason] spacing/cleanup [/edit]

mzb44

11:59 am on Sep 7, 2021 (gmt 0)

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I am not seeing any changes myself in September but I see a lot of chatter both here and on Twitter.

ichthyous

7:15 pm on Sep 7, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Big drop in USA traffic today from 11am EST onward. Only USA traffic affected, so far only "Direct" traffic, and mostly my top landing pages. I am continuing to lose ranking for high volume searches, but it's two steps back, one step forward with that...a very slow leak of placement.

RedBar

7:42 pm on Sep 7, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Realistically until about 15.00 my time it was mostly single page views, since then it has improved but still heading towards my new lower daily average.

Realworld business fine, www becoming more and more superfluous for my global sites each month.

I'm considering the idea of solely having a monthly / quarterly pdf magazine type of site ... thoughts?

Edge

11:12 pm on Sep 7, 2021 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



@ Superclown2

x2 - enough is enough...

Get a grip WebmasterWorld, the truth is good content..
This 163 message thread spans 6 pages: 163

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