Google: SSL Errors Do Not Currently Impact HTTPS Ranking Boost

As you know, Google is giving a tiny ranking boost to HTTPS URLs.

But I was under the impression the HTTPS URLs must be really secure and that broken/invalid SSL certificates and content mismatch errors would invalidate the ranking boost. I was wrong!

Google's John Mueller told me in a Google+ Hangout yesterday that Google will currently give the tiny ranking boost even if there are errors, if the URL is HTTPS. He said that may change but right now, since it takes time for webmasters to switch over and deal with the HTTPS/SSL migration quirks, they are being very easy on the requirement.

So right now, even if the URL is really not 100% secure, even if you use a low-bit encryption key, Google will give you the HTTPS ranking boost (whatever that may be).

Google's John Mueller implied Google will get stricter in the future by possibly enforcing that ranking boost only on higher level and newer SSL certificates (i.e. 2048-bit key certificates) and by checking that it doesn't have security errors on the page.

Google does use mismatch errors when there is no redirect from HTTPS to HTTP, and Google has to choose a URL. But not for the HTTPS ranking boost.

John Mueller said this 17 minutes and 47 seconds into the hangout. Here is the video:

Here are our past stories on the HTTPS ranking signal in Google, yes a bit obsessive covering this:

• Going HTTPS/SSL Will Now Give You A Ranking Benefit In Google
• Google HTTPS: Run On A Per URL Basis In Real Time & Not Part Of Panda
• Google News Publishers Can Switch To HTTPS
• I Just Migrated This Google News Site To HTTPS
• My HTTP To HTTPS Status Report For RustyBrick
• Google Change Of Address Tool Does Not Support HTTPS Migration
• Google AdSense Earnings Drop With HTTPS Migrations
• Google's Feedburner Doesn't Like HTTPS Source URLs
• SEO Says: I Switched To HTTPS & My Google Rankings Dropped
• A New SEO Business: Selling SSL/HTTPS Links

Forum discussion at Google+.

How I Deal With SEO Outsourcing Calls

If you are anything like me, you get several sales pitches a day, including one or two requests from companies to outsource your SEO or web development to them. My company on average gets three phone calls a day with SEO and web development outsourcing requests.

My old solution was to say, "we don't outsource." But it doesn't help, more and more companies call every day.

So we got creative and implemented Lenny. Lenny is an Asterisk PBX based IVR that basically deals with these calls in an automated fashion. You can learn more about it at itslenny.com but we basically integrated it into our PBX and now when we get these unwanted calls, we transfer them to Lenny.

It goes like this.... Someone calls and you detect they are selling you something. You say, oh, you need to talk to Lenny, I'll transfer you to Lenny. Then Lenny takes over.

Remember, Lenny is a robot. Here is a recording I took on Friday of a company trying to outsource SEO services that spoke to Lenny. It went on almost twenty minutes!

Amazing, don't you think?

Forum discussion at Google+ and Reddit.

Beware Of Google Matt Cutts Impersonators

Truth is, this is nothing new, people have been impersonating Matt Cutts since the GoogleGuy days. I've seen many comments here from "Matt Cutts" that were indeed not from Matt Cutts, I've seen people claim Matt emailed them when he did not.

With Matt Cutts on leave, it makes it even harder to believe that he is responding to SEO questions on blogs or email.

So when Paul Botham posted in Google Webmaster Help forums that Matt's blog was hacked and he was emailing back and forth about penalties with Cutts, it had to be a lie.

One, the blog that he is referencing is mattcuttsblog.com which is not owned by Matt Cutts himself.

Two, Matt is on vacation and is staying out of search quality topics while he is gone.

Three, Matt would only email you from an @google.com address, not a gmail address or something else.

Google's Eric Kuan came in to clarify in the thread:

Just wanted to confirm that mattcuttsblog.com is not Matt's official blog as nidya and others have pointed out. And unfortunately, that wasn't Matt responding to you on that email thread.

In the future, if someone from Google does contact you, it will most likely be through an @google.com email address. Feel free to post in the forums again if you do encounter any suspicious emails.

I'd also be wary of anyone who promises you of a guaranteed ranking boost of any kind. In fact, any type of guarantee about ranking or a boost in ranking whether it be from Google or another company should send up a red flag. This article has some more advice that you might find helpful: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35291.

Just a final note about links. Low quality links can negatively affect your site, and if you do find any, I would try to get them removed as soon as possible. If you're unable to contact the webmaster to remove the links, you can use the disavow tool in Webmaster Tools.

So don't fall for fake Matt Cutts impersonators. 

Is Google Launching Penguin 3 Today?

We know it has been over 10 months since Google launched a Penguin update and Google explained it is complicated to just refresh it.

But this morning, in a Google+ Hangout, John Mueller kind of hinted that it is coming really soon. He talked about it at 21 minutes and 40 seconds into the video. He said "engineers are working on" and admits it has "been quiet a while" but said it is "not that far away" but it is "not launching this morning." But are you sure? Maybe this afternoon? Google likes launching these larger algorithms late Friday afternoons.

Here is the video:

All the tracking tools are going a bit nuts the whole week, including Mozcast, SERPs.com, SERP Metrics and Algoroo. Plus, the forums are continuing with their chatter.

WebmasterWorld has one SEO asking, "Perhaps a Penguin or Panda update is brewing?" With many claiming major changes:

I saw a big increase in traffic beginning at 6:00 am eastern time on Saturday, August 9. Previously I had suffered a 40-45% hit on March 14 and had a slight recovery to a 33% hit two months later. However, since August 9, the site had another recovery and yesterday it was 17% below pre-March 14. I don't know if that is a trend, but it looks like I was favored by whatever happened this past Saturday.

A BlackHatWorld thread has SEOs asking if Penguin is about to go live today based on all the fluctuations? Maybe Google is testing it widely now and about to push it out to everyone?

If anything, I wouldn't be surprised if Penguin was released in the next couple weeks, if not this afternoon.

Forum discussion at BlackHatWorld & WebmasterWorld.

Why Do Google Manual Actions Return: A Bug, Error Or Penalty?

Jennifer Slegg posted an interesting case of a manual action being revoked and then the same day reappearing and then being revoked again. Interestingly enough, another complaint about this popped up this morning on Google Webmaster Help forums.

@marie_haynes explained to Jennifer:

“I have had 3 cases like this so far,” says Haynes. “All three were partial actions for unnatural links. The frustrating thing is that I can’t say for certain whether the manual action was ever removed from the viewer. I have reviewed all of my emails to clients and can’t see one where I say that the manual spam actions viewer was clean. But, I usually don’t send my final bill until I see that the actions viewer shows no manual spam actions. I really think that all three of these had the viewer showing the penalty was clear and then somehow it just reappeared.”

Why would this happen? Could it be the delay in manual actions? We know manual actions are processed twice daily but messages are sent once daily.

Jennifer got a response, well, two, from Google's John Mueller on Google+.

John wrote:

This should be pretty rare -- but sometimes it can happen for a good reason. For example, if the webspam team can recognize that a linking issue has been mostly cleaned up, but still sees something that needs to be taken care of, they might switch it to a partial action, so that only those remaining, problematic links are taken care of, without affecting the rest of the site. Usually that's a sign that you're on the right track, that you've convinced the webspam team that a full manual action is no longer necessary.

Without any examples, there's not really much I can do. These processes are constantly being analyzed and improved. Due to these requests being reviewed manually, there is a possibility of edge-cases sometimes going the wrong way (how much is "cleaned up enough"? It's sometimes hard to determine objectively), and even mistakes could happen. That's why it's useful to allow the webmaster (or you -- the experts who have worked with lots of sites on similar issues) to submit another request. It's in our own best interest to help webmasters efficiently solve problems that come up (if they're willing to do that), and there's definitely no "let's confuse webmasters" policy in place :).

So if you have examples, you're welcome to send them my way. The webspam team takes these very seriously. That said, sometimes there's not much more that we can say to escalations, sometimes the webmaster just needs to do more to clean things up. 

John received the examples but has not responded since. I am not sure if he will.

Forum discussion at Google+ & Google Webmaster Help.

Security Certificate Companies Promoting Google's HTTPS Algorithm

It has been about a week since Google announced their new HTTPS ranking signal and the security SSL certificate companies have begun promoting this fact to prospective customers.

Jaimie Sirovich shared an email on Google+ he received from GlobalSign, a security certificate reseller, about the ranking signal.

Here is a picture of the email he received:

Yes, it says "if your site is secure with SSL it will rank higher in Google's search engine."

They aren't saying anything inaccurate and truth is, they could have made the email sound even more urgent, and they have not, but of course, they are promoting this fact. Here is their blog post on the topic.

Forum discussion at Google+.

Google AdWords Exact Match Now Matches On All Plurals, Misspellings, Etc.

Google AdWords announced last night that they are now dropping the option to opt out of close variants for exact match keywords. That means, Google will match your exact match keywords for plurals, misspellings and other close variants - even if you didn't want it.

Google said, "starting in late September, we’re applying close variant keyword matching, an intuitive way to connect people with the businesses they’re searching for, to all exact and phrase match keywords."

Greg Finn explained:

If you are a paid advertiser that enjoys having full control of their campaigns - someone who bids differently based on plurality and likes knowing exactly where their ads are displayed - my sincere condolences. In late September that option for precision targeting will be removed.

Greg explains that if you bid using exact match for "baby clothes," Google will now also match these variations: babby clothes, baby clothing, baby cl othes and baby cloths.

Google did say you can bid different for each one, but that means you need to specifically add each one of these variations to your keyword list, and that can be had to predict.

Google added:

Starting in late September, we’re applying close variant keyword matching to all exact and phrase match keywords. Because close variant matching was already the default setting for campaigns, most of you won’t see a change in your keyword matching behavior. For advertisers that opted out, the option to disable close variants will be removed in September. Your exact and phrase match keywords will then begin matching to close keyword variations, allowing you to reach more of your potential customers with the right ad while aiming to lower cost per click and improve clickthrough rate.

Here is that option that will go away:

I suspect the savvy AdWords folks here will not be a fan of this change but for the bulk of advertisers, they won't notice.

Of course, many will say this is a nice way for Google to make more money. 

Google Guidelines Update: Low Quality Guest Blogging Considered Content Spam

Google has quietly updated their Webmaster Guidelines, the little or no original content section. They added a example reference there for "low-quality guest blog posts." Brian was the first to spot this change.

Here is a screen shot of the page before:

Here is a screen shot of the page now:

Google has gone after guest blogging for link purposes most recently but now they seem to be making a statement with this change for content spam purposes, not just link building. Google has taken action numerous times for guest blog link networks and other guest blogging for links.

Now, will we see many penalties and manual actions for guest blogging specifically around content spam and not specific to links?

Forum discussion at Google+.

Google HTTPS: Run On A Per URL Basis In Real Time & Not Part Of Panda

As we learn more about the Google HTTPS algorithm I want to keep you posted.

Three new tidbits came out on the topic through yesterday's Google webmaster hangout with Google's John Mueller on Google+.

(1) The HTTPS algorithm is completely separate from Google's Panda algorithm or any other algorithm. I am not sure why there was confusion on that but it is separate.

(2) The algorithm is a live algorithm and run in real-time. It is not run monthly or pushed manually. So you don't need to wait long for it to kick in. It basically kicks in when the new URL is indexed.

(3) It is not a site wide algorithm but rather an algorithm run on a URL by URL basis. So if some of your URLs are HTTPS and some are not, only the HTTPS URLs will benefit and not the HTTP URLs.

John is asked about the Panda relationship at 29 minutes and 6 seconds in and makes these three new points. Here is the video:

Here are our other stories on Google HTTPS:

• SEOs Already Blaming HTTPS Migrations On Poor Rankings
• Google News Publishers Can Switch To HTTPS
• Google Change Of Address Tool Does Not Support HTTPS Migration
• My HTTP To HTTPS Status Report For RustyBrick

Forum discussion at Google+.

SEO Says: I Switched To HTTPS & My Google Rankings Dropped

24 hours ago, Google announced that HTTPS was a ranking signal and SEOS and webmasters, including best-practices.

Not even 24-hours into it, SEOs and Webmasters are already blaming their poor rankings directly on their HTTPS migration.

A Google Webmaster Help thread has one SEO who said "Moved from HTTP to HTTPS, now SEO is in the ditch."

He wrote:

We followed the instructions to the tee. Straight 301 redirects from http to https, appropriate canonicals on all pages referencing https, and SEO has seemingly started from scratch - used to be in position 1 for a variety of important keywords ("skateboards") and searches, now they're beyond page 10.

But if you look closely, the HTTPS switch over had nothing at all to do with the traffic decline. It looks like they were hit back in July 13th to 20th time frame, at least according to SearchMetrics. So this webmaster is quick to blame the site move to HTTPS, which he just did yesterday.

I've been tracking the traffic to rustybrick.com, which I migrated to HTTPS yesterday morning around 10am EDT and there has been no signs of any traffic changes from Google organic, as of yet. Of course it is way too early to tell at this point, both in terms of a negative impact or long term positive impact.

Some people are so quick to blame. :)

Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help.

Google News Publishers Can Switch To HTTPS

After learning about the Google SSL Algorithm that was launched yesterday morning, I was eager to test my own sites and see if migrating had an impact both in the short-term and long-term in a positive or negative way in Google's rankings.

I jumped at it with my corporate site and have seen no positive or negative signs yet. But I waited to do this site because it is syndicated by Google News and I thought changing the URL will have an impact on inclusion within Google News, thus removing me from the Google News index.

So I asked two different sources at Google about this, one through PR channels and our friend John Mueller, and both said there should be no difference in migrating a Google News syndicated site versus a normal site.

John Mueller wrote on Google+:

I checked with the News folks -- HTTPS is fine for Google News, no need to even tell them about it. If you do end up noticing anything, that would (most likely) be a bug and something worth letting the Google News team know about. A bunch of sites are on HTTPS in Google News, it would be great to have more.

So in the next several days, I will migrate this site over and be the guinea pig for all the rest of you and let you know how it goes. The process thus far for us has been:

(1) Set up the SSL certificate

(2) Restrict HTTPS to my office IP so we can test

(3) Fix any mismatch content errors, mostly due to (a) images (b) embeds (c) social share icons and the like

(4) Test again

(5) Test again

(6) Test again

(7) Set up the proper 301 redirects

(8) Test again

(9) Update the sitemap files and XML feeds

(10) Test again

(11) Flip off the IP restriction and open it up to the world and GoogleBot

(12) Test again

(13) Try and fail to do site move in Google Webmaster Tools

(14) Track Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools data

That has been my process thus far and I will let you know how it goes for both a normal web site and a Google News syndicated web site.

Forum discussion at Google+.

Google Change Of Address Tool Does Not Support HTTPS Migration

During the mad rush for all SEOs to migrate from HTTP to HTTPS to get that tiny little boost in their rankings with the new Google HTTPS Algorithm, many noticed a failure within the Google Webmaster Tools Change of Address Tool.

In short, when you do a URL change in Google, from one URL to another, i.e. HTTP to HTTPS, you want to use the Change Of Address Tool, as the Google documents clearly say. But it simply does not work from HTTP to HTTPS within Google Webmaster Tools.

Here is a screen shot (click to enlarge) of me trying to change it for HTTP rustybrick.com to HTTPS rustybrick.com:

The option is not there. Google is indeed aware of it, John Mueller of Google said so on Google+. In response to a question on why it is not working, John wrote, "unfortunately that's still in work :-/. In the meantime, I'd just use normal 301s."

So I guess go 301 and forget about the change of address tool, hopefully it won't be an issue?

Google AdWords Says You Can Be Charged For Invalid Clicks When...

An advertiser posted in the Google AdWords Help forum a discussion he had with a Google AdWords representative about invalid clicks he was being charged for.

He said, he excluded IPs from generating traffic to his site but they were still coming in. Google said it is possible only if the IP changes from the query to the click.

The advertiser sent Google an email to credit him for clicks he received that came from his campaign IP exclusion list. He wanted to know why these IPs are able to see and click his ads and why he was being charged upon these clicks?

Google responded to him saying:

1. There are cases where a search is made with with IP 'A' (which was not excluded) and then the click is made with IP 'B', which is excluded but Google has no control over it.

2. You are charged upon these clicks unless we detect these clicks as fraudulent. The fact that you have blocked an IP and that a click is made with this IP is irrelevant because the search that led to this click is done with a different IP.

Google's Coco chimed in the thread adding:

So it is technically possible for this scenario to happen. IP exclusion is query-based, and IPs can actually change as a user browses, so it could happen that a user searches with an IP that isn't excluded, they see the ad, their IP changes to an excluded IP, then they click on the ad.

I don't expect this scenario to happen a lot. More often than not, there are issues with how your weblogs are reporting clicks if they're showing clicks from a lot of excluded IP addresses. All that said, are you see a lot of clicks from these excluded IPs?

So I guess it is possible but rare?

Forum discussion at Google AdWords Help.

Google Webmaster/SEO Rank: Like Author Rank Or Site Authority

Greg, aka goodROI, asked in a WebmasterWorld thread if Google assigns an "SEO credit scores" to a webmaster or SEO.

Think of it as the author rank concept, where Google knows who writes content and no matter where it is, that author ranking factor is used on site A or site B, but is associated with the author, not the site.

Of course, sites have factors as well. Is the site an authority, trusted, respected, etc.

But what about the webmaster or SEO who builds or markets the site. Do they get assigned ranking factors? Can Google even decipher who made the site or who is promoting the site for it to actually work?

I have never heard of Google using a webmaster or SEO rank formula.

Greg asked, "Do you think Google is assigning website owners a SEO credit score that impacts how current and future websites perform?"

I don't think so, but what do you think?

Google Toolbar PageRank Hasn't Been Updated In 8 Months

It has been eight months and one day since the last toolbar PageRank update and the one before that was on February 4th, a 10 month wait time. Prior to that, Google updated the toolbar PageRank every 3-4 months.

Do you think Google will do another toolbar PageRank update in the future? I bet they are trying to avoid it at all costs.

And the update they did in December 2013 was not really on purpose. Matt Cutts said then, "Team was fixing a different backend service and did a PR update along the way."

So will they update it in the future? Maybe, I mean, if all these sites switch to HTTPS, all the PR will be down to 0, so they might have to refresh it once in the future, to assign PageRank to those new URLs.

Personally, I wouldn't mind if they never updated it again.   

Google Learn More About Links With Publisher Images

Just when we think authorship and publisher is dead, because Google dropped author images back in June - we see signs of maybe rel=publisher making some headway?

A tweet by @northeasternext shows Google testing showing "learn more about..." with an image next to it. It seems if you click it, you may be taken to the Google+ company profile.

Here is the screen shot:

In this case, the search was done for the query [exterminator brooklyn ny] on an iPhone using the Google search app. I was unable to replicate it on my Google search app on my iPhone, nor normal search in mobile safari on Google, nor on my desktop.

Google has not confirmed anything with this test, but it would not surprise me if Google continues to test authorship, publisher or some other forms of Google+ local integration.

Forum discussion at Twitter.

Update: As Enrico Altavilla commented, I should note, that this does look like a mobile view of the knowledge graph drop down overlay links we see on desktop. But I still cannot replicate this in mobile.

Here is the desktop version:

@northeasternext sent me more images of the behavior that shows this as collapsed on mobile:

And this as expanded on mobile:

Google Webmaster Tools Messages Shows Your Reconsideration Request Submissions

When you submit a reconsideration request, Google notifies you they received it with a blanket message in Google Webmaster Tools. Now, supposedly, Google will also show you a copy of your submission via the reconsideration request form.

Meaning, Google will show you the details of your reconsideration requests, instead of just telling you they got it.

I guess this is good because it can provide you an audit trail, in case you didn't keep your own copy, for what you put into your reconsideration request.

Jody McCombe posted this on Twitter yesterday reporting this:

@Tripp_Hamilton shared a screen shot of this in action:

Forum discussion at Twitter.

Google News Publisher Center: Webmaster Tools For News Sites

Google Webmaster Tools already has special features for Google News publishers, like a separate view of the news indexing and processing details, as well as news specific errors. Either way, Google decided to launch the Google News Publisher Center which provides even more details and management features for Google News Publishers.

The current features include:

• Update your news site details, including changing your site name and labeling your publication with any relevant source labels (e.g., “Blog”, “Satire” or “Opinion”)
• Update your section URLs when you change your site structure (e.g., when you add a new section such as http://example.com/2014commonwealthgames or http://example.com/elections2014)
• Label your sections with a specific topic (e.g., “Technology” or “Politics”)

If your in Google News and already have verified your site within Google Webmaster Tools, then you automatically will see these features at the Google News Publisher Center. If not, you need to verify your site to see the features.

This is only available to publishers in the U.S. but Google promises to launch it wider soon, as well as release more features.

Here are screen shots from the tool:

Forum discussion at Google+, Google News Help, Google+ and WebmasterWorld.

Google Gives No Comment On Pigeon Updates

On Friday we reported on a refresh of the local search results, after the major Google Pigeon update a week or so before. We named it the Pigeon 1.1 update and asked Google for a comment.

Google basically told us they have nothing to say on this and likely will not provide future details on local search algorithm changes.

Here are the search results for the query [ice cream] I have been tracking:

Pigeon 1.0:

Pigeon 1.1:

Today, about the same but different order:

Again, Google would not confirm 1.1 and likely won't be confirming future Pigeon refreshes.

Forum discussion continued at WebmasterWorld.

Google Webmaster Tools Drops Author Stats

In December 2011, Google launched author stats, a way to see how your content, across sites, based on your Google Authorship profile, fared. That is now gone, there is no way to access those reports anymore.

Glenn Gabe was the first to spot this and posted it on Google+ saying:

Google Author Stats Is Missing! Removed From Google Webmaster Tools. And that's after sitting since 7/9 without being updated. I was going to write a post about that, but now it's completely gone. Yes, author stats leads to a 404 page in GWT. Is it simply a glitch or is there something else going on?

Yes, trying to access it directly does 404, here are screen shots from Glenn:

The link is now missing from Google Webmaster Tools:

If you try to access it directly, the page will 404:

I emailed Google about this yesterday and pinged some folks on the Webmaster Tools team and have not heard back.

I should note that author stats was removed before but it did come back eventually.

This seems a bit more permanent, since we know Google dropped author images back in June of this year and Google claimed it had no impact on CTR, but the stats showed otherwise.

Forum discussion at Google+ and Google Webmaster Help.

Google Package Tracking Now Has An Opt Out

Google and most search engines let you search for a package with ease but should Google show those packages in your Google now based on past search history or based on your Google Wallet orders or Gmail confirmation emails? Google now let's you opt out if you do not want to show packages in Google Now.

Florian Kiersch noticed this and posted a screen shot in Google+:

I assume they added this opt out because of those folks who are CCed on all the orders placed for companies or for e-commerce site owners who get lots of these tracking numbers? Imagine having hundreds of tracking numbers show up in your Google Now notifications.

You can now opt out via the Google Dashboard.

Automatic Google My Business Listing Verification Via Google Webmaster Tools

Google's Jade Wang announced in a Google Business Help thread that your Google My Business listings, formerly known as Google Place Listing or Google Local Business listing, can now be automatically verified if your website URL is already part of your verified sites in Google Webmaster Tools.

Jade wrote:

Good news -- starting today, if you’re verifying a page for your business, you may be instantly verified on Google My Business if you’ve already verified your business’s website with Google Webmaster Tools. The verification will happen automatically, if applicable, when you attempt to verify a page for your business.

If you’d like to try instant verification, please make sure you’re signed in to Google My Business with the same account you used to verify your site with Webmaster Tools

Not all businesses with websites verified using Google Webmaster Tools will have instant verification, since not all business categories are eligible. If that’s the case, please use one of our other methods of verification (https://support.google.com/business/answer/2911778).

You may be instantly verified to manage your business if you’ve already verified your business’s website with Google Webmaster Tools.

Make sure you’re signed in to Google My Business with the same account you used to verify your site with Webmaster Tools. Note that some business categories may not be eligible for instant verification.

This is a nice step to help businesses become verified within Google My Business.

Was There A Google Update Yesterday?

Over the past few days, I've seen some but not a ton of chatter about a possible update at WebmasterWorld.

The chatter began around June 30th at a high enough level for me to keep an eye on it and it continued through July 31st. Since it is the summer months, often this type of chatter is always a bit diluted. But here are some complaints in the thread:

What's happened?

My traffic has been decimated today across all sites, checking logs something happened last evening UK time. 

From the looks on my multiple domains/subdomains, this week is a new Panda sherif in town. A bad one, also...

Also, the tracking tools showed signs up a smallish update:

Then James Rowland noticed that the UK [travel insurance] search results completely changed, here is a side by side:

Have you seen any changes in your verticals? It might be a Panda refresh or something else or nothing at all. The last unconfirmed update we covered was on June 28th and July 5th.