SEO Tools and Resources

Google has introduced a “Creative Content” section in Merchant Center, giving brands the ability to manage video assets directly alongside product listings. The feature enhances both paid and organic visibility across Google surfaces. Why we care. Videos uploaded here automatically sync with the Google Ads asset library for linked accounts — streamlining creative management and strengthening brand storytelling across campaigns. Where to find it. If available in your account, look under Creative content → Video assets, just below Product Studio. Video sources: Social channels (including TikTok) Your website Google’s Product Studio The cool par…

When you think of video advertising on YouTube, you probably think of ecommerce: Videos showing products. Influencers doing an unboxing. Other visuals of consumer products that lend themselves to the video format. Even Google’s own case studies for video emphasize consumer-focused themes. Just look at the analysis of the top 2025 video ads. See any B2B brands there? Me neither. It’s true that YouTube Ads perform very well for ecommerce advertising aimed at consumers. But YouTube can also help drive B2B leads. You might be scratching your head and saying, “But I’ve tried YouTube for B2B. It doesn’t convert.” And you would be right. YouTube…

The Alpha Beta account structure was the gold standard of paid search. Over the past several years, PPC marketers have adapted to Google’s push into automation and AI by first tweaking Alpha Beta – built on single keyword ad groups (SKAGs) – and eventually moving away from it altogether. SKAG maintenance and buildout are no longer ideal for paid search in 2026 and beyond – but that transition isn’t as simple as flipping a switch. Existing SKAGs still hold valuable data and insights you can carry into a more consolidated setup. This article covers the benefits of SKAG consolidation and best practices for building a structure that sets your campaigns up fo…

Every Black Friday reveals how consumers search, compare, and decide. This year added something new: a real-world test of how AI models interpret commerce under true demand. So we ran a structured test across major LLMs and analyzed 10,000 responses. The goal was simple: to see how these systems form their internal view of the retail landscape and which signals shape the answers they generate. As we reviewed the dataset, a clear pattern emerged: Black Friday acts as a natural stress test for AI-driven discovery. The sheer volume of queries, the range of categories, and the speed of shifting consumer attention expose the sources, structures, and behavioral tend…

Microsoft is now testing a Google-like redesign of search ads in Bing, grouping multiple sponsored links under a single “Sponsored results” label and adding a “Hide” button that collapses the entire ad block. Driving the news. Sachin Patel spotted the Bing test in the wild and shared screenshots and video showing the new layout. In the test, only the first sponsored result carries an ad label, while subsequent ads appear unlabelled underneath it. Users can tap “Hide” to collapse the entire set of ads, then “Show” to reveal them again. How it works. The structure groups ad units in a way that can blur the distinction between organic and paid content. By collaps…

Headings structure your content for both readers and search engines. They help users scan a page, understand its content, and quickly locate the information they need. Search engines and AI systems use headings to interpret the topic and structure of your content. By using one clear H1, supported by well-written H2 and H3 headings, you can improve readability, accessibility, and SEO simultaneously. Table of contents What are headings? Why are headings important for SEO? Why are headings important for readers? How to use headings correctly How many H1 headings should you use? How to use H2 and H3 headings Common mistakes when using headings Headings and accessibility…

Do you want to immediately raise the blood pressure of the Google Ads practitioner sitting next to you? Say one word: Recommendations. If you’ve spent any time in the Google Ads platform, you’ve seen Recommendations jumping out at you on every screen: when you’re adding keywords, when you’re adjusting your campaign settings, when you’re changing your bid strategy, when you’re minding your own business! And we’ve all received that email from a client asking why their “Optimization Score” is falling. In this article, I’ll explain what Recommendations actually are (and aren’t), where they come from, and how you should handle them. Why does everyone hate Google A…

Pinterest attracts users who want inspiration and solutions, not passive browsing. The platform now reaches 600 million monthly active users, many of whom arrive with clear intent to research, plan, or purchase. That makes its ad formats especially valuable for marketers who want to appear in moments when people are actively looking for ideas and products. Here’s how each format works and when to consider it. Ad formats explained Pinterest Ads offers a variety of ad formats, many of which aren’t available on other social media platforms. Let’s take a look at what formats they offer and when you might want to consider using them. Carousel ads …

Google added a new section to the core updates search developer documentation that confirms it releases smaller core updates without announcing those updates. Google has told us this before, but has now added it explicitly to the search documentation. What is new. Google added this new paragraph: However, you don’t necessarily have to wait for a major core update to see the effect of your improvements. We’re continually making updates to our search algorithms, including smaller core updates. These updates are not announced because they aren’t widely noticeable, but they are another way that your content can see a rise in position (if you’ve made improvements). …

Google may finally be starting to address a popular SEO and AI visibility “tactic”: self-promotional “best of” listicles. That’s according to new research by Lily Ray, vice president, SEO strategy and research at Amsive. Across several SaaS brands hit hard in January, a pattern emerged. Many relied heavily on review-style content that ranked their own product as the No. 1 “best” in its category, often updated with the current year to trigger recency signals. What’s happening. After the December 2025 core update, Google search results showed increased volatility throughout January, according to Barry Schwartz. Google hasn’t announced or confirmed any updates this y…

U.S. consumers are expected to spend a record $253.4 billion online this holiday season, according to Adobe’s annual shopping forecast. That’s a 5.3% year-over-year increase covering the period from Nov. 1 to Dec. 31. Adobe’s analysis, based on over 1 trillion visits to U.S. retail sites and 100 million SKUs across 18 categories, suggests that this year’s season will be shaped by the dominance of mobile shopping, flexible payment options and the growing influence of generative AI and social platforms on consumer behavior. Cyber Week to drive nearly a fifth of spend. Adobe expects 10 separate days where online spending will top $5 billion. Cyber Week – the five-day…

Google is investigating a disruption affecting Google Ad Manager, according to an update posted on the Google Ads Status Dashboard. The incident began at 13:49 UTC on March 4. By 13:54 UTC, Google said it was reviewing reports that some users could access Ad Manager but weren’t seeing the most up-to-date data. What’s happening. The issue appears to impact reporting consistency. Specifically, Ad Exchange match rate and Ad Exchange request values are not aligning between Ad Manager’s interactive reports and the legacy reporting query tool (now deprecated). Why we care. Reporting discrepancies in Google Ad Manager can directly impact how you evaluate performance …

Generative AI is no longer a single thing. Ask, “What is the best generative AI tool for writing PR content?” or “Is keyword targeting as impossible as spinning straw into gold?,” and each engine will take a different route from prompt to answer. For writers, editors, PR pros, and content strategists, those routes matter – every AI system has its own strengths, transparency, and expectations for how to check, edit, and cite what it produces. This article covers the top AI platforms – ChatGPT (OpenAI), Perplexity, Google’s Gemini, DeepSeek, and Claude (Anthropic) – and explains how they: Find and synthesize information. Source and train on data. Use…

Remember when link building was all the rage in SEO? While it never disappeared, its role evolved as Google introduced clearer guidelines and placed greater emphasis on quality, relevance, and intent. Today, as AI search reshapes the organic landscape, link building has shifted into a closely related – and increasingly prioritized – initiative: brand mentions. You might think of brand mentions as “citations,” but in the context of AI search, citations describe how brands are referenced by LLMs. Brand mentions are the input that leads to those citations. To avoid confusion, this article uses brand mentions to describe the tactic itself. Beyond their r…

Google Ads added image quality checks to its Recommendations tab, nudging advertisers to upgrade low-performing visuals. How it works. The system now scans uploaded assets and suggests edits such as “copy and edit background color to white.” Advertisers can preview suggested changes and make quick fixes directly within the dashboard. Why we care. Image quality plays a growing role in how ads perform across surfaces like Display and Gmail – and these AI-driven tips aim to help advertisers improve engagement and delivery with cleaner, more consistent creatives. Bottom line. Advertisers who act on these image recommendations could see higher engagement and be…

As SERPs continue to change, we see more search features taking up space on Page 1. That’s why it’s increasingly important to gain visibility in People Also Ask results. Let’s go over some ways to research People Also Ask (PAA) rankings, and methods you can use in order to get a website ranking in them. What is the People Also Ask box? This accordioned box shows a list of questions related to the query that you searched. You can expand the accordions to find out more information and click through to different links. In some cases, AI Overviews results can appear within an expanded PAA box. See below: So, if you have a shoe company but are…

Table of contents The scanning habits of our brain Factors that determine reading depth The impact of mobile evolution on content consumption The psychology behind bullet points The science of information processing The hierarchy of scannable elements Implementing psychology-driven content Respecting your reader’s brain Your content has 15 seconds. That’s it. In those precious moments, your reader’s brain makes a critical decision: scan or abandon. The statistics are sobering. Users read only 20-28% of webpage content, spending an average of 15 seconds on a page before deciding whether to stay or leave. Yet many content creators still write as if their audie…

Google rolled out brand inclusion controls for Standard Shopping campaigns, a long-requested feature that gives advertisers direct control over which brands appear in their Shopping ads — without the need for complex workarounds. How it works: The new feature lets advertisers add or remove brand lists directly within the ad group targeting section of both Performance Max and Standard Shopping campaigns. Marketers can now define exactly which brands to include or exclude, preview the setup, and apply changes — all within the Google Ads interface. Why we care. Until now, brand targeting tools were only available in Performance Max and AI Max, leaving Standard Sh…

Google parent Alphabet is expected to face a new EU investigation over claims that it demotes news publishers in search results if they run sponsored or promotional content, a significant revenue source for many media outlets. What’s happening. The European Commission, the EU’s top antitrust enforcer, is expected to announce the probe as soon as Thursday. The case falls under the Digital Markets Act (DMA), a law that bars tech “gatekeepers” from unfairly favoring their own services or penalizing others. Companies that break the rules can be fined up to 10% of their global revenue. Site reputation abuse. Google’s enforcement against publishers is based on a…

Google introduced a low-visibility setting that could impact brand control for location-based ads. Driving the news. In the Shared Library under Location Manager, Google Ads now includes an option called “Google Owned Location Data.” When enabled, Google can automatically pull imagery from its own library and use it in ads tied to your business locations. Why we care. While Google frames the setting as a way to support performance goals, it allows creative assets to appear in your ads that you didn’t upload, select, or explicitly approve — a potential issue for brand-sensitive advertisers. The big picture. Automation in Google Ads continues to expand beyon…

Table of Contents What is an SEO reporting tool? Summary: best SEO reporting tools at a glance 10 SEO Reporting tools to choose From Google Search Console (free) Yoast SEO Dashboard (free) Google Analytics (free) AgencyAnalytics (paid) Semrush (free & paid) Ahrefs (Paid) Moz Pro (free trial & paid) Screaming Frog SEO Spider (free & paid) Mangools (paid) BrightLocal (paid) Choose wisely: what to consider Turn insights into action TL;DR If you’re investing time and budget into SEO, you’ll want to know if it’s actually delivering results. That’s where SEO reporting tools come in. They take the guesswork out of your strategy by showing you what’s worki…

Google Lens now supports the Nano Banana, the image generation feature from the Gemini app, within Google Search. Google said, “we’re bringing Nano Banana to Google Search.” Open the Google Lens feature in the Google app for Android or iOS. Then you can tap on Create mode to make an image. You can then transform an image into your ideas directly from Google Lens. What it looks like. Here is a video of it in action: Here are some screenshots: Why we care. AI search features are moving fast and these fun and creative features might help win over consumer loyalty. OpenAI, Microsoft, Perplexity and other are all trying to compete with AI and Sea…

Table of contents What are backlinks? What are AI citations? Why AI citations matter for visibility? How are AI citations and backlinks different? How to earn both? Create deep, original, and useful content Write for real questions, not just keywords Leverage structured data Build relationships for natural backlinks Focus on clarity and quotability Monitor, analyze, and adapt Exploring Yoast’s AI features Backlinks or citations: What truly matters for visibility? For years, backlinks have been the gold standard for building authority, driving link juice, and climbing up the SERPs. But with the rise of Generative AI, the search landscape is shifting. Instead of…

Table of contents What are you actually paying for when building a website? Website building options Watch out for these hidden costs How Yoast saves you money (over time) Budgeting tips for small business owners Ecommerce vs. general website: does it change the cost? Final thoughts TL;DR Thinking about building a website? Whether you are a small business owner, a freelancer, or launching a side project, one of the first questions you will want answered is: how much does it cost to build a website? This is not just about curiosity, understanding your website costs early on can help you budget effectively and avoid any unpleasant surprises. The truth is that t…

Google is clarifying its Misrepresentation policy for Shopping ads and free listings. The update doesn’t change enforcement but adds more examples and guidance to help advertisers comply. Enforcement clarification: Google added examples related to non-delivery and inoperable return or refund processes. These are clarifications, not new rules. Support clarification: New guidance explains best practices for maintaining compliance and provides more detail on the appeals process. Why we care. Advertisers now have clearer expectations about what counts as misrepresentation. This can help prevent policy violations, reduce account suspensions, and improve customer tr…