Google says it values all local reviews, both positive and negative
Google has updated its reviews help document page in the Google Business Profile support area to say that Google values all reviews, not just positive. Now Google says it is “more trustworthy” to see a mix of both positive and negative reviews on the business profile.
What is new. Google has added a bullet point to the document that reads “Value all reviews: Reviews are useful for potential customers when they’re honest and objective. Customers find a mix of positive and negative reviews more trustworthy. You can always respond to a review to show the customers that you care and provide additional context. If the review doesn’t follow our posting guidelines, you can request to remove it.”
Here is a screenshot:
Ranking impact? This will probably not impact rankings in any way but it might be a sign that if a business has 99% of all positive reviews, maybe – just maybe – Google will flag that business and manually audit the reviews of that business. It is simply not natural for all customers to only leave positive reviews on a business online.
Read more: Google says it values all local reviews, both positive and negative
Google Merchant Center now automatically displays badge eligibility for products
Google Merchant Center is now automatically showing retailers when their products are eligible for badges, a Google spokesperson has confirmed to Search Engine Land. Available badges include, but are not limited to, the “sale price,” “price drop,” “amount off,” “percent off,” and “buy the quantity, get percent off” badges.
Tip of the hat to Kirk Williams, who first posted about this new feature.
Badging isn’t new. However, the column showing which badge your products are appearing with is new and it can help merchants understand how potential customers are seeing their ads, without needing to manually figure it out for themselves. This can help retailers identify the types of promotions that are (or aren’t) working out for their business.
Read more: Google Merchant Center now automatically displays badge eligibility for products
7 best link-building services for SEO performance
The 7 best link-building services to help improve search rankings
Link building is the process of actively seeking out backlinks from another website back to yours.
Having high-quality links to your site is one of Google’s most important ranking factors. It’s a key trust signal for search engines and an indication that people like your content and your brand.
A number of ethical, white-hat link-building strategies can be used to accomplish this, including broken link building, guest posting, and outreach campaigns to show people your incredible content.
1) Reputable link-building company
Recommended provider: LinkBuilder.io
Using a specialist link-building agency is the best overall option since they’ll use a number of different link-building strategies at their disposal to build high-quality backlinks to your website.
2) Outreach platform
Recommended provider: Pitchbox or GroupHigh
Link-building outreach platforms will help you to find relevant bloggers & websites that you can email and connect with to try and earn a backlink. They are an essential game-changer for anyone serious about link building.
3) HARO
Website: Helpareporter.com
“Help a Reporter” is a platform that connects journalists seeking expertise to sources who have expert knowledge in a given subject matter.
Active journalists use the platform to crowdsource insights from experts in any given field, and there are hundreds of requests every day from writers at huge sites like Shopify, Yahoo, and American Express.
4) Citation building service
Recommended provider: SEOBuilder.com or BrightLocal
The fact is the vast majority of local businesses only have links from directories. Pull up the backlink profile of any local dentist or optician in your area, and you’ll notice that even websites ranking at the top of Google have a ton of directory links.
5) Facebook & Slack groups
Recommended Group: B2B Bloggers Boost Group
Social media & Slack provides an incredible opportunity for link building for those willing to spend the time.
6) Podcast booking service
Recommended provider: Podcast Bookers
There’s an ever-increasing number of podcasts in every industry imaginable, and the podcast hosts are always looking for great guests to interview.
This is an incredibly great way of combining brand & company awareness in addition to backlinks since the host will always link back to your site.
7) Digital PR
Recommended provider: Fractl
Digital PR involves taking high-quality content and sharing it with relevant journalists who might want to cover the story.
Read more: 7 best link-building services for SEO performance
Google drops its mobile-first indexing deadline, leaves it open-ended
Google’s mobile-first indexing deadline is no longer a deadline and it decided to leave the “timeline open for the last steps of mobile-first indexing,” John Mueller of Google said on the company blog. Previously, Google postponed the deadline from September 2020 to March 2021, and that deadline came and passed.
No timeline. Now, Google said there is no specific timeline, instead, Google said the search company “decided to leave the timeline open for the last steps of mobile-first indexing.” Google added currently Google does not “have a specific final date for the move to mobile-first indexing.”
Why no deadline. Google said the deadline has been removed because after “analyzing the sites that are not yet indexed mobile-first” the company “determined that some of these sites are still not ready to be shifted over due to various, unexpected challenges that they’re facing.”
Read more: Google drops its mobile-first indexing deadline, leaves it open-ended
Google: Sites Can Be Stuck In Algorithm Penalty Limbo For Several Years (Rare)
Google’s John Mueller said in this past Friday’s hangout that in rare situations some sites can get stuck in some sort of algorithmic penalty limbo or black hole state and not be able to recover because Google stopped updating that algorithm. He said this can lead to some sites not being able to recover for several years.
This came up at the 24:49 mark into the video where John said “The other thing that I’ve very rarely seen is that a site gets stuck in some kind of a weird in-between state in our systems in that, I don’t know, at some point or algorithms reviewed the website and found it to be absolutely terrible and for whatever reason, those part of the algorithms just took a very long time to be updated again. And sometimes that can be several years.”
Read more: Google: Sites Can Be Stuck In Algorithm Penalty Limbo For Several Years (Rare)
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