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The Signal by Good Signals

ICYMI 👉 Your Guide to SEO and Web Search

Published over 1 year ago • 3 min read

Every Wednesday / 29th May 2024 / goodsignals.com​
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We. Are. Back. After taking a short break and using face-to-face opportunities like BrightonSEO to gather feedback about The Signal, we've reached some conclusions and we thought we'd share them with you.
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People love the content, but each email was simply too long. So, we've decided to streamline our communications. Here’s the plan:

  • Our Top Picks: Every Wednesday, we'll send you the most important articles we've discovered.
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  • The Playlist: Every 2-3 weeks, receive the best podcasts, YouTube videos, and webinars we've enjoyed.
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  • The To-Do List: A monthly email featuring upcoming events and webinars to attend.
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  • 'Funledge': Sent only when we stumble upon something truly exciting—a blend of knowledge and fun that’s sure to bring a smile.

If you only want to receive Our Top Picks or The Playlists, update your preferences here.

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​Secrets from the Algorithm…on iPullRank by Mike King
​An Anonymous Source Shared…on SparkToro by Rand Fishkin
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On Monday, Mike King (from iPullRank) and Rand Fishkin (from SparkToro) shared that they discovered over 2,500 public API documents, which are allegedly internal Google documents accidentally published on GitHub and subsequently pulled through to HexDocs. Both Mike and Rand shared their initial analysis, mentioning that they confirmed the legitimacy of the documentation with ex-Googlers, but it has not been confirmed by Google or any current Googlers.
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The posts are quite long and technical. Essentially, the documents contain various modules representing functions and features, which gives an insight into the workings of Google Search. We don't know the context of these documents, how their contents have been used, or the timeframe they represent, but we know they cover more than Google Search.
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Dixon Jones has created a log of the features and attributes, and Kristi Hines has uploaded it to ChatGPT to create a tool called "Is it a Ranking Factor?".

Initial Takeaways:

  • Focus on the overall quality of your website, not just individual pages.
  • Create engaging content and web experiences that meet user expectations and encourage interaction.
  • Keep content fresh and up-to-date.
  • Prioritise earning quality links through creative campaigns.
  • No mention was found of disavow files.

​Google starts testing ads in AI overviews - Anu Adegbola from Search Engine Land reports that Google is testing the inclusion of shopping ads in its newly launched AI Overviews.

​OpenAI begins training next AI model as it battles safety concerns - The Financial Times reports on OpenAI's plan to train the next-generation AI software, yet the company's chief executive Sam Altman has an even bigger ambition - to build a "superintelligence" smarter than humans!

​Google just updated its algorithm. The Internet will never be the same - Here's an article from the BBC about Google's rollout of AI Overviews and recent algorithm updates.

​John Mueller on recovering from Core Updates - Maybe you had a good run… - A site owner at their wits end writes on Reddit that their site is hitting a dead end - what shall they do? Google's John Mueller offers his insights.

​Google Ads now being mixed in with organic results - After a year of secret experimentation, Google is now placing ads below the top organic results on certain queries. Read this piece by Brodie Clark to learn how to adapt to the changes.

​The traffic impact of AI Overviews - So everyone is talking about Google's AI Overviews right now - and you should, too. Read Kevin Indig's analysis in Growth Memo to learn whether your content could lose clicks due to the recent AI rollout.

​What we learned from a year of building with LLMs (Part I) - Want to build AI products by yourself using large language models (LLMs)? Don't miss this super practical guide curated by O'Reilly's AI experts.

​Google's CEO Sundar Pichai on AI-powered search and the future of the web - Following on from Google I/O Developer Conference, Nilay Patel from The Verge sits down with Google CEO Sunder Pichai to talk about AI Overviews and the fate of the web.

​Google March 2024 Core Update Case Study: A tale of four tremors, reversals, and a great example of the counterbalancing of systems - Should you delete the well-ranked but unrelated content from your site? Read this case study by GSQi's Glenn Gabe to find out.

Joyce Yang,

editor at The Signal

Good Signals, Studio 1, The Bottle Factory, 12 Ossory Road, London, Greater London SE1 5AN
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​P.S. We totally get that you get tonnes of emails like this.
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