Notes from the Google Webmaster Hangout on the 11th of August, 2017.
Google Takes Rel Canonical To Be Mistake If Present With Noindex
If a canonical and noindex are both present on a page, Google’s algorithms judge the rel canonical to be a mistake and the noindex as being used as a way to force a canonical.
Search Analytics Shows All Impressions Using Page Level View
Search Analytics in GSC filters out queries with very few impressions but can see the full numbers when you use the report on a page level basis.
Using Google Services Doesn’t Improve Site Relevancy or SERPs
Using Google Services such as Analytics, Search Console, AdWords or Adsense does not make your site more relevant in Google’s eyes and does not improve organic rankings.
Google Recommends Keeping Redirects For At Least One Year
Google recommends keeping redirects for one year minimum. This is because URLs will, in the worst case scenario, be crawled by Googlebot every six months, so a having the redirect in place for a year would give Google the chance to see that redirect at least twice.
GSC’s Unlisted Setting Used For Domains Switching From Country-Specific to International Focus
Unlisted setting used in Search Console explicitly says to use geo-targeting on the site. John recommends using this setting if a domain was previously highly focused on a particular country and you want to change it to have an international or global focus.
JS Content Indexed Depending If Visible to Googlebot On Page Load
Javascript content that is known by Google when the page is loaded is indexable (e.g. tabbed content). If Javascript is used to load content on the page, Googlebot would likely miss this content.
Adding Noindex To Pages Further Down In Paginated Series Is Fine
It is ok to noindex further down in a paginated series. This can be noindexing all pages after the first couple or first hundred, it is up to the webmaster. However, crawl budget will not be impacted as Googlebot still crawls these noindex pages.
Submit Sitemap With Updated Last Modification Date For Faster Crawling of Updated Pages
Submit a sitemap file with an updated last modification date to speed up the process of crawling and indexing of pages that have been changed.
Mark As Fixed Feature In GSC Is Only For User’s Benefit
The mark as fixed feature in GSC is only for the user’s benefit so they don’t see an issue anymore. The feature doesn’t let Google know the issue has been fixed or indicate that they need to recheck the page in question.
