SEO Tools and Resources

Google released the May 2026 core update today, the company announced. This is Google’s second core update of 2026. It follows the March 2026 core update, and then the March 2026 spam update and the February 2026 Discover update. What Google is saying. Google updated its Search Status Dashboard to state: Released the May 2026 core update. The rollout may take up to 2 weeks to complete. Google posted on LinkedIn saying: This is a regular update designed to better surface relevant, satisfying content for searchers from all types of sites. The rollout may take up to 2 weeks to complete. About core updates. Core updates roll out several times each ye…

Conversion signals are disappearing from your marketing data, and it’s probably costing your business money. Ad blockers, aggressive privacy laws, cookie deprecation, and a host of other converging factors have combined to mask significant conversion data, costing businesses up to $203 million in revenue annually, according to one Deloitte study. For most brands, the path from discovery to purchase is no longer clear. This signal decay is more than an annoying data quirk. Left unchecked, it can make it harder for new customers to discover your brand. Most marketers don’t realize they’re making decisions based on incomplete data. Instead, they see top-of…

AI adoption appears to be diverging between professional and consumer audiences, according to Rand Fishkin’s new analysis of Datos desktop-panel data and SparkToro audience comparisons. The data highlights a sharp divide in how people talk about AI use: broader consumer adoption may be slowing, while professional and B2B audiences appear far more likely to use tools like Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini. Why we care. There’s no one-size-fits-all AI strategy. Your audience may behave very differently from broader AI trends, so you need to understand whether your audience is actually using these tools — and which ones. ChatGPT desktop growth slowed. Fishkin, SparkTor…

AI search doesn’t just translate or localize results. It decides which sources, institutions, and versions of reality get surfaced in the first place. Catalonia offers a useful stress test for that system. Two languages share the same geography, which makes retrieval patterns easier to spot. When the same queries are run in Catalan and Spanish across Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT, the differences go far beyond wording — and reveal broader problems that extend well beyond multilingual regions. Catalonia as a stress test for AI search Did you know that if you search for Tradicions de Sant Jordi — Saint George’s Traditions, written in Catalan — Google Trans…

As the race to optimize content for AI consumption and citation continues, clients keep reaching out, confused about the web’s favorite genderless alien doodle, Reddit, and what it means for their near-term SEO and AI Overview strategy. Questions usually sound something like this: Should I be actively responding or posting about my brand on Reddit? If AI is trained on Reddit, should we be running paid ads on Reddit? Our CEO wants us to create a subreddit for each of our product lines. What do we do? Why is Google’s AI Overview citing a Reddit thread that calls my product slow and difficult? The problem is that people often lump together three distinc…

The customer journey used to start on the SERP. But that’s no longer the case. By the time a buyer types a search query into Google, they usually already have a few potential brands in mind. They’ve: Seen the same product recommended across multiple Instagram Reels over the course of days or weeks. Read a Reddit thread where five strangers agreed the same tool was the best option. Watched peers recommend a specific service inside a Facebook group. Google has become the confirmation step, not the starting point. Nobody searches with a blank mind. Buyers arrive focused on confirming assumptions and gathering more specific information, not browsing for optio…

Ask any paid media manager how their Monday morning starts, and you’ll hear some version of the same story. Google Ads. Meta. LinkedIn. TikTok. Reddit. Pull the numbers, drop them into a spreadsheet, make them tell a coherent story, and send the report to your client or boss by 10 a.m. Somewhere in there, figure out what worked last week and why. It’s a terrible use of a Monday morning. I’ve been in performance marketing long enough to remember when “multi-channel” meant running Google Ads and maybe a Facebook campaign on the side. That was already hard enough to reconcile. Now you’re dealing with 10 or 11 networks, each with its own attribution logic, campaig…

On May 20th, 2026, the next major release of WordPress came out: WordPress 7.0. While previous releases focused on improving the block editor, this release takes it to a new level. It pushes the platform into the next phase of its roadmap with smarter workflows and a more app-like experience. So, let’s dive into what’s new and what features are interesting for you. Table of contents A modern admin experience Revisions are now more visual New blocks in the block editor Better responsive design controls Smarter pattern editing Connect to AI tools of your choice A new list filter for plugins Final thoughts A modern admin experience WordPress 7.0 introduces a…

Google’s new Lighthouse “Agentic Browsing” audits now check for the presence of an llms.txt file. The new experimental Lighthouse documentation frames llms.txt as a discoverability and efficiency signal for AI agents, not a traditional crawling directive. The audits are part of Chrome’s emerging “Agentic Browsing” category, which evaluates whether sites are structured for machine interaction. This document comes less than a week after Google published new guidance on optimizing for AI search features like AI Overviews and AI Mode, in which it said you don’t need llms.txt files in a mythbusting section of its new guide on optimizing for generative AI features. …

Google is expanding its Direct Offers pilot with new AI-powered promotion formats, native checkout integrations and travel-focused deal experiences as announced today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. The company announced several updates designed to make promotional offers more discoverable inside AI-powered Search experiences. Brands will soon be able to upload: Discounts Giveaways Local coupons Product bundles Google says Gemini will help dynamically construct personalized offers based on search intent. How it works. Advertisers upload eligible promotions, products and campaign guardrails into Google Ads. Gemini then assembl…

Google is expanding its measurement capabilities with new integrations between Google Analytics 360, Meridian and predictive AI reporting tools as announced today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. Meridian, Google’s open-source marketing mix modeling platform, will be integrated directly into Google Analytics 360. The integration is designed to help advertisers: Unify first-party and cross-channel data Measure incremental performance Forecast campaign outcomes Optimize media mix investments Google is also introducing Qualified Future Conversions (QFCs), a predictive reporting metric powered by Gemini. QFCs connect current a…

Google is introducing new Merchant Center tools designed to help retailers improve visibility across AI-powered shopping experiences as announced today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. The company announced AI Performance Insights, a new reporting feature that helps merchants understand how their brand performs across AI surfaces. The tool compares a brand’s share of voice against similar competitors and provides visibility into AI-driven discovery performance. Google is also rolling out Conversational Attributes, a new product data capability that helps retailers optimize listings for more natural, conversational search behavior. How it wo…

Google is adding new creator, video and measurement capabilities to Demand Gen campaigns as it pushes YouTube further into performance advertising as announced today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. The company announced several new Demand Gen updates focused on creator partnerships, product discovery and cross-platform campaign optimization. Advertisers will soon be able to: Use multimodal video creation inside Asset Studio Promote creator partnership videos directly within campaign setup Upload Merchant Center product videos for dynamic distribution Extend Demand Gen campaigns into Google Maps inventory Google is also expand…

Google is introducing a new generation of Gemini-powered ad formats across AI Mode and Search designed to make ads feel more conversational, contextual and helpful as unveiled today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. The company announced several new ad experiences for AI-powered Search, including Conversational Discovery ads, Highlighted Answers, AI-powered Shopping ads and Business Agent for Leads. The updates are part of Google’s broader push to integrate Gemini deeper into Search and advertising experiences. Conversational Discovery ads are designed to answer a person’s specific question directly inside AI Mode. For example, someone searching for…

Google is rolling out major updates to Asset Studio aimed at helping advertisers generate creative assets faster using Gemini as announced today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. Asset Studio will now support AI-powered generation across text, images and video using natural language prompts. According to Google, the platform can understand: Marketing briefs Brand guidelines Website content Campaign goals The system then generates creative assets across multiple themes and formats. Google is also integrating Gemini Omni, its multimodal model, into Asset Studio to support video creation workflows. Advertisers will additio…

Google is expanding its Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) initiative with new checkout features, AI shopping integrations and support for additional industries as announced today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. The company announced several new UCP-powered commerce capabilities designed to support what it calls the “agentic commerce era.” A key update is the expansion of Universal Cart, which allows shoppers to save products across retailers and complete purchases using Google Pay or retailer checkout experiences. Google says the experience will soon support brands including Nike, Sephora, Target, Walmart, Wayfair and Shopify merchants such as…

Google Marketing Live 2026 made one thing clear: Gemini is no longer just powering features — it’s becoming the operating system behind Google’s advertising, commerce and measurement ecosystem. This year’s event focused heavily on agentic AI, conversational Search, automated creative production and AI-assisted shopping experiences. Across Search, YouTube, Merchant Center and Analytics, Google introduced new tools designed to make campaigns more autonomous, predictive and interconnected. Here’s a recap of the biggest announcements from Google Marketing Live 2026. Google introduces a new generation of AI-powered Search ads Google announced several new Gemini-…

Most businesses sound interchangeable online, and AI search is making that impossible to ignore. When ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, or other AI systems summarize your business, they build that understanding from your website, profiles, reviews, and content. If all of it sounds like everyone else in your category, the machine’s summary will too. This is why AI visibility is becoming a positioning problem as much as a technical one. Businesses that stand out in AI search are not necessarily the ones with the biggest budgets or the most aggressive tactics. They’re the businesses that clearly communicate who they serve, what they do differently, and why customers sho…

Microsoft is rolling out a slate of new advertising updates aimed at simplifying campaign management and improving AI-powered optimization across its ad platform. What’s new. Microsoft introduced a new Import Center designed to simplify importing campaigns from Google Ads and Meta Ads into Microsoft Advertising. The new hub allows advertisers to: Search and filter imports Edit or pause imports Access imported campaigns View troubleshooting guidance Get performance recommendations after imports complete Microsoft says the goal is to reduce manual troubleshooting and simplify cross-platform campaign management. Bidding capabilities. AI-power…

Understanding how to optimize for visibility in Google Ask Maps starts with recognizing what’s changing. Instead of returning a long list of businesses, Ask Maps narrows the field, interprets the user’s intent, and explains why certain businesses are a good fit. That shift has an important implication. Visibility in Ask Maps now depends on how a business is understood and positioned within the response. If Ask Maps is more recommendation-driven, what should businesses and SEOs do differently? At a high level, the answer is not to treat Ask Maps as a separate tactic. It’s to make your business easier for Google to understand, easier to match to real-world situation…

Google introduced publisher follows and profile pages to Discover last year but the feature remains lightly documented and poorly understood. Since then, publisher profiles have started appearing more broadly across Discover for publishers, creators, and social-first accounts. Here’s how Discover publisher profiles appear to function today, how they connect to social accounts and the Knowledge Graph, and why some publishers are already getting access to more customizable profile experiences. Why publisher profiles matter more now As a technical SEO, I’m used to Google leaving plenty unsaid in its documentation. Discover publisher profiles take that even fur…

New data from the recent Storyblok Global Speed-to-Market Benchmark Report reveals the biggest causes and costs of slow go-to-market (GTM) delivery today — with tech limitations at the center of the problem. The world has shifted gears in recent years, and the pace of change has accelerated beyond anything we’ve experienced before. Rapid advances in AI and technology, combined with the constant emergence of new digital channels and trends, have transformed GTM delivery. Customer and organizational expectations are clear: deliver great work fast or lose out. The problem is that while speed-to-market expectations are skyrocketing, only 22.5% of teams say they c…

Google is introducing Ask Advisor, a new Gemini-powered AI collaborator designed to work across Google Ads, Google Analytics, Merchant Center and Google Marketing Platform as announced today at Google Marketing Live 2026. Driving the news. Ask Advisor acts as a unified agent that connects insights, workflows and recommendations across Google’s marketing ecosystem. According to Google, the tool can help marketers launch campaigns, analyze performance and surface optimization recommendations without needing to switch between products. For example, a marketer could ask Ask Advisor to “find new customers for my hair care products,” and the system would automatical…

Google is now letting searchers build their own apps directly into Google Search. This enables searchers to set up a search feature that delivers the information they need, in the format they want, from the sources they want. Liz Reid, the head of Google Search, announced at Google I/O, “Search can build the ideal response, in the right format for your question – completely on the fly. So you can get custom generative Ul, including visual tools and simulations, tailored precisely to your needs.” Examples. Here are a few examples of what you can code yourself into Google Search: (1) Whether you want to wrap your mind around astrophysics or visualize how your …

Google announced its latest and greatest AI model, Gemini 3.5 Flash today at Google I/O. Google’s head of Search, Liz Reid, said Gemini 3.5 Flash is Google’s “newest Flash model delivering sustained frontier performance for agents and coding.” She added that is now being used to power AI Mode globally. Gemini 3.5 Flash. Not only is Gemini 3.5 Flash powering AI Mode in Google Search, but it is also powering the Gemini app, for all users, not just paid users. For developers, 3.5 Flash is now live in Google Antigravity, Gemini API for Google AI Studio and Android Studio and for enterprise users for Enterprise Agent Platform and Gemini Enterprise. Koray Kavukcuogl…