Google Search Console 2018 Update – New Features And What It Means For You

Google Search Console 2018 Update
Several months ago, Google started rolling out a new beta version of Google Search Console to select users. On January 8th, 2018, it announced on its Webmaster Central Blog this beta version will be released to verified Google Search Console users. This is the biggest update to the Google Search Console tool in over 12 years. Google wants to provide more transparency into its indexing and facilitate better communication between Google and website owners. With these changes, Google aims to help users resolve issues faster, optimizing a website’s presence on Google Search.

New features include

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Search Performance report
Index Coverage report
AMP Status report
Job Postings Status report.
Google says it will continue to roll out updates to Search Console throughout the year. Both versions will be live simultaneously until the rollout of the new version is complete.

Search Performance Report
The new Search Performance report aims to improve on the Search Analytics report. Previously, only three months of Search Console data was available. The new report includes 16 months of data. The increase enables users to analyze longer term trends and make year-over-year comparisons. This report shows you clicks, impressions, CTR, and average position. The Search Performance report aggregates all data by site, except when grouping by page or site appearance.

You are now able to filter data by multiple dimensions, including web, image, or video search results. Furthermore, you can segment by query, page, country, device, and search type. This new report enables you to compare data between two exact values in any one group dimension. For example, if you have a mobile and non-mobile version of your site, you are able to compare total searches on your mobile site to mobile searches on your desktop site. Currently, you are only able to compare data in one dimension at a time. Adding a new comparison will remove the existing comparison. Google has stated it will soon make this data available via the Search Console API.

 

Google Search Console Search Performance Report

Index Coverage Report
Google has made updates to the Index Status report with the new Index Coverage report. This report shows webmasters how well Google is indexing URLs from their site. In addition to listing properly indexed URLs, it gives webmasters warnings about indexing issues and explains why Google is not indexing some URLs. Google provides issue tracking functionality that alerts webmasters when it detects new errors and helps monitor the progress of fixes.

Google includes several new features to help facilitate fixing indexing issues.

You are able to click any error URL to bring up page details with links to diagnostic tools to better understand the source of the issue.
Because fixing issues often involves multiple teams, Google has also created a share button to create a sharable link to this report.
After resolving the errors, you are able to validate the fix and resubmit the URL for indexing.
You can use the new sitemap filter over Index Coverage data in order to focus on an exact list of URLs.
Google Search Console Index Coverage Report Screenshot
AMP Status Report
This report aims to help webmasters identify and fix errors preventing AMP pages from appearing in Google Search results. It groups the URLs that have issues by issue. In addition to identifying issues, the AMP Status report helps diagnose the issue and test the AMP URL after fixing. After Identifying the issues, you can notify Google to validate the fix. It will crawl and reprocess the identified sites with a higher priority without having to wait for the regular crawl. This makes the process of resolving issues much quicker.

In addition to identifying errors

this report provides warnings for pages that have potential issues that are still indexed. Google is trying to assist webmasters in addressing issues before being identified as errors. The AMP Status report also helps you watch for error spikes and identify missing AMP pages. Google is providing a share button for this report, as well.

Google Search Console AMP Status Report Screenshot

Job Posting Status Report
Finally, Google has a new Job Posting report for websites that post job listings. It will only be visible if Google finds Job Posting rich results on your site. Currently, it is only available in certain areas. This report shows stats for your site’s job listing results. You can notify Google of any fixes or updates made to these pages and have them revalidated. Spikes in errors or a drop in total items are made easily visible in this report. Like the AMP status report, the Job Status Report provides warnings for pages with potential issues that are still indexed. This is another tool Google is providing webmasters to identify and address issues before they become errors.

Google Search Console Job Postings Status Report Screenshot

Industry Reactions To The Google Sear

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Google has repeatedly stated it makes regular updates to its search algorithms–as many as 2-3 per day. Most of these changes go largely unnoticed and the impacts on SERP rankings are considered normal fluctuation. However, there were over a dozen dates in 2017 where many sites noticed major shifts in SERP rankings, suggesting more significant updates and changes to Google’s algorithms. Below is a list of 2017’s most significant Google algorithm changes we’ve noted in the Demand Sphere platform – and a summary of their impact.

January 10, 2017 – Intrusive Interstitials Update
In a rare move, Google preemptively announced in late August 2016 that it would be penalizing sites utilizing “intrusive interstitials” on January 10, 2017. True to its word, Google started penalizing the ranking of sites where content was not easily accessible to a user when transitioning from mobile search.

Examples of the types of interstitials being penalized by Google:

A popup overlaid on the main content as soon as the user navigates from the search results, or while browsing through the page.
A standalone interstitial the user must dismiss before viewing the main site content.
A layout where the above-the-fold portion of the page appears to be a standalone interstitial, but the main content appears inline below-the-fold. examples of interstitials
Examples of techniques being used responsibly that will not be penalized include, interstitials appearing due to a legal obligation (i.e. cookie usage or age verification), login dialogs for content not publicly indexable, and banners that use a reasonable amount of screen space and are easily . For more information, see Google’s blog post on the update.

February 1, 2017 – February 1 Update
While not given an interesting name, starting on February 1, 2017 – many in the SEO industry agreed that there was likely an update to the effective facebook advertising Google algorithm. Though unconfirmed by Google, sites utilizing links” (determined by Google), appear to have experienced ranking penalties. The rank penalization seems to have peaked on February 6th.

February 3, 2017 – Google Japan Algorithm Update
Google confirmed updates to the Japanese search algorithm. This update lowered the ranking of sites it assessed as being low quality. Google penalized sites not providing useful and reliable information to viewers and rewarded sites with original and useful content.

Check out the Google announcement here.

February 7, 2017 – February 7 Update
Another unconfirmed algorithm update appears to have  on February 7th. Many in the SEO community saw large changes in SERP results. This change seems to have negatively impacted sites with low-quality user engagement, thin and low-quality content, mobile usability problems, and deceptive advertising techniques. Sites that made improvements after previous penalization were rewarded with this update. Examples of changes resulting in improved rankings include only indexing high quality pages, cutting down on aggressive advertising techniques, improving user experience for both desktop and mobile users, and fixing technical SEO problems potentially causing quality issues.

For deeper analysis of these changes, please see Glenn Gabe’s post on his G-Squared Interactive Blog.

  • March 8, 2017 – Fred

    On March 8, many sites started reporting large drops in rankings and traffic. “Fred” was never confirmed by Google, but the SEO community agreed these rankings shifts were a result of a major algorithm update.

In an interview with Google Spokesman Gary Illyes after the fact, he stated “Fred” was not a singular update, but a series of updates centered around cn numbers website quality. Most (but not all) of the sites impacted by “Fred” appear to be ad-heavy, low value content sites created to generate advertising revenue without clear benefit to the user.

Here’s a link to Gary Illyes’ interview at Brighton SEO 2017.

You can also check out an-depth analysis of the Google “Fred” update at Search Engine Journal.

  • May 17, 2017 – Quality Update

    Starting on May 17th, many sites reported large shifts in SERP rankings. These changes appear to be the result of further unconfirmed core Google algorithm updates focused on site quality.

These quality updates again seem to have impacted sites with aggressive/deceptive advertising tactics, user experience issues, thin content, poor UI experience, and low quality content. Sites that made improvements after prior quality updates appear to have been rewarded and those that didn’t, experienced further ranking penalties.

Glenn Gabe provides in-depth analysis of this round of changes on his G-Squared Interactive blog.

June 25, 2017 – June 25 Update
Another unconfirmed algorithm update was likely pushed on June 25. This update appeared to primarily target sites ranked 6-10. Initial reports suggested the food and beverage vertical was the most heavily impacted, but health and fitness, gambling, retail, and travel niches also reported significant

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