Search Intelligence
Notes from the difficult websites.
Original analysis, experiments and technical breakdowns on SEO, search, AI search, development and strategy. Published when there is something worth saying.
Outbound links: what you vouch for, and when to qualify a link
Every outbound link on a page says something about its destination, and Google gives specific guidance on when to qualify one. This article sets out what…
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What Search Console’s Performance report can and cannot tell you
The Performance report is the main first-party record of how a site appears in Google Search, and it is easy to read more into it than…
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Where AI-driven visits show up in analytics, and where they do not
Google’s AI features and other AI assistants are recorded in different places under different rules. Here is what Search Console and Google Analytics document, and what…
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Site structure is a strategy decision: what Google documents about URLs and links
Google documents the mechanics of URLs, links and hostnames in some detail, and says openly that several structural choices are the business's to make. This article…
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Why links built by script can be invisible to crawlers
A menu that works perfectly in a browser can leave a crawler with nothing to follow. Google documents which link formats it can use, and how…
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Structured data: what Google supports, and what it does not promise
Structured data gives Google explicit clues about a page and can make it eligible for rich results. Google's documentation is equally clear about what it does…
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Using Search Console and Analytics together to find where the opportunity is
Search Console shows how a site appears in Google; Analytics shows what visitors do once they arrive. This article covers what Google says about combining them,…
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Sitemaps: what they do, what they do not, and how to keep them honest
A sitemap tells Google which URLs you think matter. It helps discovery, but it guarantees neither crawling nor indexing, and a file full of redirected, blocked…
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Security and spam problems as causes of a traffic drop
Google lists security threats and spam-policy violations as separate causes of falling search traffic, each with its own Search Console report. This article sets out what…
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Technical causes of a traffic drop: crawling, indexing and serving errors
Google defines a technical cause of a traffic drop as an error that stops it crawling, indexing or serving your pages. This article goes through the…
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Traffic drop after a site move or release: what to check
A fall in organic traffic after a launch is not automatically a failed launch, and not automatically normal. Google's documentation says what to expect after URL…
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Editorial standard
What gets published here, and what doesn’t.
Yes
Original analysis. Experiments with a stated method. Technical breakdowns. Things learned on real projects.No
Round-ups, recycled advice, and anything published only to have published something.