Essential Search and Social News - WO Strategies Monthly Update
Katherine Watier Ong
Enterprise SEO | Accomplished multi-industry digital marketer | CEO@ WO Strategies. Host of the Digital Marketing Victories podcast. Talks about #journals #.gov #associations, #SEO and #AI
Hi there,
Happy New Year! I hope your 2025 is off to a great and refreshing start. A lot happened during the holiday season.
Now let’s kick things off with the latest SEO updates.
New Podcast Interview
The Digital Marketing Victories podcast will release its third season of interviews in late January, featuring Dana DiTomaso, Founder & Lead Instructor of KP Playbook. While you’re waiting, you can check out my interviews on the Voices of Search podcast:
Part 2: SEO for Academic Journals
My 2025 Take For Your SEO Strategy
The 2024 Conductor benchmark study shows SEO as a traffic driver at 30% across most industries. While SEO is still the most effective channel, it has to stop existing in a vacuum now that social media posts show in search results. Additionally, younger audience are searching their native social media platform vs. Google.
Building a brand is essential for a high-ranking brand in search engines (we now know it’s a bar to hit before you can get search featured snippets, and we know that 44% of searches in Google already know what they want and are looking for a brand).
To build brand impressions and value, it is essential to understand your customers and be present where they hang out online. You need to be there as an influencer or in partnership with an influencer who can share their first-person experience. Video consumption will only increase, so everyone needs a video strategy. (If you need help with the social side of things, drop me a note as VP of Social media at Ketchum; I have launched plenty of these strategies.)
Google Announcements and Updates
Google Is Testing Gemini 2.0 Powered AI Overviews In Search
It can handle complex topics, multi-step multimodal questions, advanced math equations, and coding. They released a capability video. This is a peek into what Project Astra will be like.
Things to Know Dropdown:
It’s similar to a People Also Ask feature, highlighting summaries generated by Gemini that look like an AI overview and citing multiple sources.
Get an AI Explanation:
If you highlight text within the SERP, you may see a prompt displaying a Gemini summary.
These features are not segmentable in Google Search Console and have not yet been tracked by SEO tools.
Google will add AI mode to its search in 2025.
As reported by the Verge, the AI Mode tab would live on the left side of all the tabs. When you receive a response in AI Mode, Google will display links to related URLs, and the old search bar prompting you to ask a follow-up question (like the one that was live during the AI Overview beta) will be visible.
Google’s 2025 strategy session highlighted their focus on everything AI: new features coming to Gemini and possibly from Project Astra, its multimodal universal AI agent. These initiatives Google de-prioritize the traditional search box and create new points of contact between users, Google, and the websites in Google’s index. Keep an eye on its Project Mariner.
November Core Update ended December 5, 2024
More here. Here's a summary if you’re curious about how many core and spam updates we had last year.
December Core Update
It ran from December 12th through 18th.
December Spam Update
It started on December 19th, 2024, and ended on December 26th, 2024.
Google lets you turn off personalization.
Here’s what it looks like when results are personalized for you. You can now toggle off personalization.
NotebookLM gets new audio interactivity.
One of the features is the ability to speak with its fake podcast hosts.
The Google Search App injects links and takes users away from your content.
Check out the tweet here. If you want to opt-out, you need to fill out the form here. There is also a petition directed at Google.
More intel from the Google Warehouse leak
They have a consensus score. Google counts the number of passages in content that agree with, contradict, or remain neutral to the “general consensus.” Google will generate a consensus score, likely impacting your rank on a specific query. They have 8 refined query semantic classes that affect the ranking weights. Your site needs to meet a certain threshold of brand authority to be eligible for search features. This score is created from:
New: What People Are Saying Carousel
It looks like this, and interactions with this carousel are not segmentable in Google Search Console. It’s also not tracked in the major SEO software platforms (yet):
Bing Announcements
Microsoft Copilot Vision
Last month, it started testing the feature that lets Microsoft’s AI companion see what you see on an Edge webpage you’re browsing and allows you to ask questions about the webpage. You have to explicitly grant permission for Copilot Vision Pro to be able to read webpages in Microsoft’s Edge browser.
Bing's Transition to LLM/SLM Models: Optimizing Search with TensorRT-LLM
It will speed up the search results and enhance the accuracy of the response.
Copilot Beta Now in Bing Webmaster Tools For 10,000 Users
It allows you to use Copilot to ask questions about your data.
AI Updates
SEO for ChatGPT search: 4 key observations
The takeaways:
Gemini can now tell when a PDF is on your phone screen
You can ask about the PDF if you’re running Android 15 and are subscribed to Gemini Advanced.
LLM Search SEO Study
Which industry audience is moving to LLM search the fastest? “If current growth rates hold, 0.25% of total traffic from LLMs could become 10% of the overall traffic mix by the end of 2025.”
ChatGPT Search Can Mislead Searchers.
Shocker, I know. The finding was published in the Guardian, and the hack relied on hidden text on the websites in ChatGPT’s training data.
The BEST Overview on how to rank in AI Overviews
From Daniel Cheung, of course. A must-read.
How to influence ChatGPT’s search results for your brand
These are the steps that Chris from Go Fish Digital used:
AI Chatbots are better at evaluating social situations than humans.
Especially Claude. You can read the research here.
Technical SEO
411 about AI crawlers
Here’s what stood out to me from the Vercel article.
The takeaway:
Prioritize server-side rendering for essential content (vs displaying it with JS)
If you’re using Vercel’s firewall, you can block all AI bots from using your content in training. You can now do that, too, with Cloudflare’s Robotcop. Note: I don’t recommend blocking AI bots because you will lose brand visibility in AI-generated content and summaries. Additionally, many other LLMs do not publicly share their bot naming data, so to block them, you would need to do a log file analysis as this Akamai forum user has done with Claudebot, and then you would need to proceed with caution and update it regularly.
Google Recommends ETags
This was spotted in an update to their crawler documentation. If you use caching with headers like ETag and IF-None-Match and Last-Modified and If-Modified-Since, you can reduce unnecessary crawling and save server resources. They recommend the ETag over the other options and contacting your hosting or CMS provider for assistance in implementing it.
Google’s CDNs and Crawling
This blog post answered a question I’ve been looking into - that automatic bot detection systems from CDNs should throw a 503 status error so they don’t waste your crawl budget. This post has other great tips, and it’s worth reading for every tech SEO.
I love this quote and might have to use it in my tech SEO audits:
“If you’re in the business of making your users happy and perhaps also want to potentially save a few bucks on your hosting bill, talk to your hosting or CMS provider or your developers about how to enable HTTP caching for your site. If nothing else, your users will like you a bit more,” Gary Illyes added.
Google’s 40 Signals for Canonicalization
Yes, 40. I thought it was only about 10. No wonder that this often goes haywire. Unfortunately, they did not list all of those signals. The ones we know about are:
You can listen to the podcast where John mentions the 40 here.
Related, How to Fix the “Alternative Page with proper canonical tag error” in GSC
This is often a “don’t panic” report, flagging URLs appropriately. Oftentimes, this report flags URLs that you want to be non-canonical (like parameter URLs). That said, I’ve also seen Google not picking the URL you wish as canonical, and to fix you need to align the signals above.
Google’s updated documentation on how to manage crawling of faceted navigation
E-commerce and large publishers are challenged with setting up faceted navigation in a way that doesn’t create a crawl trap. The documentation starts by mentioning the following:
Find your subdomains. Know your subdomains
I agree with Gabe. I have also found subdomains the client was not aware of that were created for malware purposes or that were lost and unmaintained. I’ve also shared on podcasts (like my interview with Voices of Search) that I learned my lesson and now check subdomains before estimating the level of effort for a site technical audit. One of my .gov clients had 150 different subdomains I found.
Setting up Chrome or Canary browser to emulate Googlebot
Step-by-step instructions on how to set up the browser and extensions (including location) to see if Googlebot is having any issues viewing the site you’re auditing.
Is Schema still relevant in 2024?
Last month, there was a discussion about how relevant schema is with the dawn of LLM Search. AI tools don’t use schema to understand your content. It is still used for rich search features, disambiguation, and placing your brand in the Knowledge Graph.
Here’s the response from Wordlift, which provides schema implementation solutions.
Google Says It Makes No Sense To Block Disclaimer and Privacy Policy Pages
John Mueller also mentioned that it makes no sense to block them as they are good for EEAT.
Google Chrome site engagement metrics
Type chrome://site-engagement/ into your Chrome browser and take a look. We know Google uses Chrome data based on the warehouse leak.
Syndication Challenges
Lily Ray points out in this post that Google will often not honor the canonical from the syndicated partner back to you, the publisher. Barry Adams added in the comments:
“Syndication really is a tough business decision. A publisher will have to evaluate the benefits of syndicating their content vs the cost of losing most - if not all - of their search traffic for articles they syndicate.” I am keeping this quote the next time a client asks me if they should syndicate.
Content
Quality Rater 411 Fast or Slow
Here are Google's Quality Rater Guidelines Summarised in Under 15 Minutespodcast style or an extensive overview (with infographic) of Google’s EEAT quality signals.
Social Media
Fake AI-generated bot “users” on Facebook and Instagram
Facebook is rolling out AI bots (on purpose) to boost engagement. They will have bios and profile pictures and will generate and share content.
Even though they will be labeled, I am concerned about the vast majority of the American population who can’t spot fake accounts or, like my 77-year-old mother, share AI images because she thinks it’s cool and doesn’t care if it’s fake. Truth and accuracy need support online. Or there’s the teen who committed suicidebecause of an AI persona’s suggestion. I don’t think the benefits outweigh the risks here.
TikTok will be dropped
The deadline is January 19, and it will be removed from Google and Apple storesif it is not sold by then to a company outside of China. TikTok will be unable to push updates, and there will not be new downloads. I have always been concerned about the implications of national security and have never installed it on my phone.
Mathematical Model Can Predict Social Media News Sharing.
It surfaced in this study. The bi-threshold model captures the linear threshold model, which assumes that individuals adopt a behavior when enough of their social contacts do. It also adds an upper threshold, which, when exceeded, triggers behavioral disadoption. I can’t wait until this is baked into a social media listening tool.
Gen Z’s are changing brand discovery.
Brands that are targeting this generation need to have a robust social media and influencer strategy.
Reddit Integrates AI-Powered Search With New “Reddit Answers”
Their AI summaries an answer to a query with links to specific Reddit discussions.
Video Optimization
An excellent guide worth bookmarking if you’re new to YouTube
SEO Measurement
Google Search Console now has a 24-hour view for performance reports
Google Analytics 4 - New Consent Settings
It’s available in the GA4 Admin, where you can manage the consent settings for your data streams using consent mode and quickly check whether your property is receiving consent signals.
Microsoft Clarity Consent API
Microsoft Clarity now requires explicit user consent for cookies in the EEA, UK, and Switzerland. To comply, you must integrate Clarity Consent API to manage tracking permissions. Clarity cookies won’t function without explicit consent, affecting session recordings and funnel tracking features. Compliance is mandatory by early 2025.
Reporting on LLM Referrals
Soft Skills
Tips worth reviewing:
New Tools & Resources
We’ve updated our Integrating AI into your SEO workflow resource with newly tested prompts and custom GPTs. You can get your copy here.
Here are the other resources I found last month that were worth sharing:
Feedback and Suggestions
Would you like to share a great resource? If you want to be featured, have a great resource, want to sponsor, or provide feedback for this newsletter, just reply to this email and let me know.
That’s it for this month. Hopefully, you had a restful holiday break and a chance to think about your goals and focus for 2025. Wishing you health and success in 2025!
Katherine