SEO Tools and Resources

Sometimes, content on your website becomes irrelevant or outdated and you need to decide whether to update it or delete it. It can be tricky to decide what needs to be done, but don’t let this hold you back. Regularly updating outdated content should be a key part of your content maintenance activities. Let’s help you make that decision and discuss when you should update existing content or remove it altogether. Update old content that is still valid On our blog, we have an article on meta descriptions that needs regular updating to keep it relevant. We just have to ensure it stays up to date with all the changes Google makes to the way it handles meta description…

In recent years, the open web has felt like the Wild West. Creators have seen their work scraped, processed, and fed into large language models – mostly without their consent. It became a data free-for-all, with almost no way for site owners to opt out or protect their work. There have been efforts, like llms.txt initiative from Jeremy Howard. Like robots.txt, which lets site owners allow or block site crawlers, llms.txt offers rules that do the same for AI companies’ crawling bots. But there’s no clear evidence that AI companies follow llms.txt or honor its rules. Plus, Google explicitly said it doesn’t support llms.txt. However, a new protocol is now emergi…

Imagine telling someone that www.mysite.com/blog/myarticle and www.mysite.com/myarticle are actually the same page. To you, they’re the same, but to Google, even a small difference in the URL makes them separate pages. That is where the canonical tag steps in. In this guide, we will walk you through what a canonical URL is, how URL canonicalization works, when to use it, and which mistakes to avoid so that search engines always understand your preferred page version. Table of contents What is a canonical URL? How does URL canonicalization work? Why do canonical tags matter for SEO? When to use canonical tags? Implementing canonical URLs and canonical tags Implementi…

Performance Max (PMax) campaigns have become the cornerstone of AI-driven advertising. Both Google and Microsoft offer advertisers a way to consolidate creative assets, audience signals, and automation into a single campaign type. (Disclosure: I work as Microsoft’s product liaison.) While the concept is similar across platforms, the execution and feature sets differ significantly. This article aims to provide an objective comparison of Google PMax and Microsoft PMax as of late 2025. We’ll explore what’s universally true, what’s unique to each platform, and strategic considerations for advertisers looking to maximize performance. What’s universally tr…

Last month, I asked ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini the same question about three of my clients: “Who is [Brand Name] and what do they do?” Two out of three got it wrong. Wrong services. Outdated office locations. One even suggested a competitor as a better alternative. Here’s what makes that more than a curious mistake. What today’s AI errors reveal about brand visibility AI-sourced traffic jumped 527% year-over-year from early 2024 to early 2025. While that growth is real, it’s growing from a very small base. Most sites still see AI referrals representing less than 1% of total traffic. But when half the AI-generated descriptions of your brand ar…

Marketers have debated SEO versus PPC for years, usually shaped by whatever has worked – or failed – for them in the past. Organic search promises compounding visibility, while paid search delivers immediate control. Most teams ultimately favor one over the other based on experience, budget constraints, or a survival instinct. But in 2026, this old debate no longer fits the reality of search. Why this debate has changed The search landscape has shifted, and the old SEO-or-PPC debate no longer fits. Search behavior has evolved. Search results pages have evolved. The platforms – and the machine learning driving their bidding systems – have e…

Gary Illyes, an analyst with the Google Search team, posted his reaction to a Microsoft Bing article written by Fabrice Canel and Krishna Madhavan of Microsoft, about how AI Search is changing how conversions are measured. Coevolve. Gary Illyes wrote on LinkedIn, “I know for sure however is that SEM and SEO will need to coevolve with search, just like it has the past 30 years.” SEOs and SEMs will have to adapt as search evolves; which many SEOs have been doing since SEO became a service. And some of the best SEOs and SEMs have adapted and evolved over the years. SEO is not dead. Gary Illyes also said, “SEO is not dead.” Yes, these same best SEOs and SEMs…

OpenAI announced a visual upgrade to ChatGPT, adding more images from the web for answers about people, places, products, and other common topics. How it works. The update takes ChatGPT from simple answers to a more search-like experience: Images will appear when they add clarity. The web-sourced images will appear next to the most relevant text. Clicking an image will let you see it in its original dimensions and the source attribution. Where it’s live. This update is rolling out globally and gradually across all ChatGPT plans: It’s available on web, iOS, and Android. Works only with responses generated by GPT 5.1. Why we care. Search is be…

Google is quietly rolling out a new Performance Max feature that lets advertisers upload video files directly inside the “Edit assets” panel — no YouTube channel or Shared Library required. Driving the news. The feature, spotted in the Google Ads UI, adds a simple “Upload” tab during asset creation in PMax campaigns. A highlighted upload box now appears in the YouTube ad setup workflow, guiding users to drop in a video file and move on — significantly reducing friction for new video advertisers. How it works. Uploaded videos are stored in a Google-managed house channel, not the advertiser’s YouTube account. That means the assets can be used in ads, bu…

Google is rolling out automatic linking between YouTube channels and Google Ads accounts when its systems detect a strong data relationship between the two — giving advertisers access to richer audience signals without manual setup. Driving the news. Google will begin automatically linking accounts when its signals show a “high-confidence connection.” Admins and channel owners receive an email 30 days before the link is created, giving them the option to opt out or link early. How it works If no one opts out during the 30-day window, Google completes the link automatically. Dual admins — with access to both accounts — can link immediately. Even after li…

A three-year analysis of up to 6,000 advertisers shows that using Google’s seasonality bid adjustments during Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM) consistently harms efficiency — even though the platforms keep recommending them. The big picture. Smart Bidding’s models are designed to anticipate predictable retail spikes. Optmyzr’s analysis of tens of billions of impressions across 2022–2024 found that advertisers who skipped seasonality adjustments consistently performed better on efficiency metrics. Without adjustments, Smart Bidding: Identified the BFCM conversion lift on its own Raised bids rationally Kept ROAS stable — even improving it in 2024 …

Black Friday is peak retail season, yet many brands still lose money on Google Shopping ads for products they’ve already sold out of. The problem. Ads continue to run after items go out of stock, triggering cost-per-click charges with little to no chance of conversion. In a ShoppingIQ study of 500 global retailers, 97% continued to pay for clicks on unavailable products, often for 24 to 48 hours. Why we care. Out-of-stock ads waste budget, distort campaign performance, and confuse algorithmic learning. When clicks lead to dead ends, conversion rates drop, rankings slip, ROI falls, and future bidding becomes less efficient. Example. Argos reportedly continued t…

You’ve probably heard the saying: Fast, cheap, or good – pick two. The concept goes something like this: If you want something fast and cheap, don’t expect it to be good. If you want it good and fast, it’s going to cost more. And if you want it good and affordable, well, you’ll need to give it time. It’s a simple way to explain how tradeoffs work in projects. In SEO, these tradeoffs are especially important to understand because you’re often creating problems that will cost more to fix later. This article looks at variations of this project management concept and how it applies to SEO. Then I’ll explain why a quality-first approach l…

Canonicalization has long been a core SEO practice, yet it’s still one of the easiest to overlook. At its simplest, canonicalization helps search engines identify the original source of content and prevents duplicate versions from competing with each other. Large sites rely on solid canonical structures to stay organized, and small sites benefit by avoiding duplicates that can dilute rankings and visibility. As we move into 2026, canonicalization is becoming even more important as generative engine optimization (GEO) rises alongside traditional SEO. With AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, and other generative systems shaping how content is selected, summa…

Google Posts now supports scheduling and multi-location publishing within Google Business Profiles. This should make it easier for you to manage your Google Posts for your business(es) and client(s). Scheduling. When you add a new Google Post within Google Business Profiles, there is a new option to “schedule this post.” You can then select a date and time for when you want the post to be scheduled. Lisa Landsman from Google said on LinkedIn, “plan your entire week or month in advance! You can now schedule your Google Posts to go live automatically at the perfect time.” Multi-location publishing. Also, if you manage multiple locations for a business and you wa…

As shopping becomes more visually driven, imagery plays a central role in how people evaluate products. Images and videos can unfurl complex stories in an instant, making them powerful tools for communication. In ecommerce, they function as decision tools. Generative search systems extract objects, embedded text, composition, and style to infer use cases and brand fit, then LLMs surface the assets that best answer a shopper’s question. Each visual becomes structured data that removes a purchase objection, increasing discoverability in multimodal search contexts where customers take a photo or upload a screenshot to ask about it. Visual search i…

Microsoft Ads introduced two updates that could significantly improve campaign management and reporting for advertisers. The changes: Asset-level disapprovals: Ads will now be disapproved at the asset level—whether a single image, headline, or text line—allowing the rest of the ad to continue running. This reduces wasted spend and prevents entire campaigns from being paused due to a single issue. Conversion reporting transparency: Advertisers can now measure the average time it takes for 90% of conversions—online or offline—to be recorded after a click. This provides critical clarity for evaluating campaign performance and optimizing bidding strategies. Th…

Google Ads appears to be reviving — or reinventing — its old Website Optimizer, after new help docs quietly surfaced detailing a tool that would live directly inside the Google Ads interface. Driving the news. Several new Google support pages were spotted describing Website Optimizer, a tool expected to show up under the Reporting tab. While the name recalls the OG Website Optimizer from 2008 that later became Google Optimize (sunset in 2023), this version appears to be something new. How it works: The tool requires Google Ads access and admin permissions on the linked GA4 property. If an advertiser doesn’t have a GA4 property, Website Optimizer will autom…

Shopify is experiencing a major login outage on one of the peak shopping days of the holiday season, leaving merchants unable to access their dashboards, POS systems, mobile apps, or even contact Shopify Support. What’s happening. Shopify’s status page shows a series of escalating alerts beginning at 14:54 UTC, warning that merchants “may experience issues when trying to login.” Minutes later, the platform confirmed the outage affects POS, mobile logins, and support access. By 15:26 UTC, Shopify urged merchants to stay logged in on any devices that are currently active to avoid further complications. Why we care. A login outage during a top-tier sale…

Google withdrew its antitrust complaint against Microsoft after EU regulators opened a new probe into Azure under the bloc’s tough tech rules. Driving the news. Google pulled its 2024 complaint—centered on Microsoft’s allegedly anti-competitive cloud licensing practices—just as the European Commission launched fresh investigations into whether Azure and Amazon Web Services fall under the Digital Markets Act (DMA). Google says the withdrawal doesn’t mean it’s backing down. What they’re saying. “We filed our antitrust complaint…to give voice to our customers and partners,” said Giorgia Abeltino, Google Cloud Europe’s head of public policy. She added that Google stil…

OpenAI is reportedly nearing the launch of ads in the ChatGPT Android app, according to recent code findings. Meanwhile, one user says an ad has already appeared in the wild. What’s new. Early references to an ad system were found in the latest ChatGPT Android beta (v1.2025.329). Inside the APK, TestingCatalog spotted strings such as: “ads feature” “bazaar content” “search ad” “search ads carousel” These entries may suggest an ad framework under active development, likely focused on search, shopping, and product recommendation requests rather than disruptive display ads in every chat. Zoom out. ChatGPT ads will help OpenAI offset the cost of serv…

Google is now officially testing pushing searchers from AI Overviews in Google Search into the AI Mode interface. When you click on the “Show more” button within some AI Overviews, Google may jump you directly into the AI Mode interface. What Google said. Robby Stein from Google announced this on X, saying, “Today we’re starting to test a new way to seamlessly go deeper in AI Mode directly from the Search results page on mobile, globally.” Here is a video of this in action, with the full message from Robby Stein: (2/2) This means you’ll continue to get an AI Overview as a helpful starting point, and now you can also ask conversational follow-up questions in A…

Gemini 3 launched in AI Mode just a couple of weeks ago, but now Google is expanding it to about 120 countries and territories for English queries. Google’s Robby Stein said, “Gemini 3 is now available in AI Mode, across nearly 120 countries & territories in English.” What is AI Mode with Gemini 3. Google shared how AI Mode in Search is now using Gemini 3 to enable new generative UI experiences like immersive visual layouts and interactive tools and simulations, all generated completely on the fly based on your query. Gemini 3 is used in AI Mode in Search with more complex reasoning and new dynamic experiences. Just last week, Google automatically began u…

If you entered PPC 20 years ago, testing was scientific, comforting, and one of the biggest reasons to run paid search campaigns. We proudly talked about all the data we collected. You had Ad X and Ad Y. You waited. You declared a winner. You paused the loser. It was a binary world of “Yes” or “No.” We used to swear that the title case descriptions outperformed sentence case descriptions. Or that putting a period at the end of a description line was the secret to performance. Today, if you apply that same rigid framework to Google Ads or Meta, you’ll fail. The world isn’t black and white. You can’t draw hard conclusions from most m…

Major SEO platforms, such as Ahrefs and Semrush, along with agencies like Seer Interactive and other leading companies, have released substantial studies that appear to offer definitive answers. But a closer look reveals something else entirely: nearly every possible narrative about AI search impact has a “study” to support it. The more I examined the data, the clearer a more uncomfortable truth became – no one has the definitive answer, and the numbers can be sliced to validate almost any storyline. The core consensus that isn’t really consensus At first glance, the major studies agree on fundamentals. Ahrefs reports that top-ranking organic results …