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Hi Chris,

I was just referring to the task of a link audit, which would include downloading your links from Google Search Console and/or third-party sites, auditing them to identify the toxicity, and then disavowing the toxic ones.

From what I can tell, map packs are NOT considered in the new Search Console data.

I have a client who is killing it in Maps, but is still recovering from an organic penalty making the site basically non-existent in organic ranks for anything that isn't brand. None of what the website ranks for in Maps is being counted from what I see, since the Search Console is only showing branded stuff.

Yeah, I figure it's a glitch, but never seen it before, and with their mobile stuff rolling out, I could see them testing title shortening tactics.

Still happening in incog every time, and never when I'm logged in.

Beginning today, when I search in incognito mode, Google is giving me extremely limited titles, and not really going off of the title tag. The results are horrible for users, and make me nervous as an SEO. Image attached below:

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Just that one significant change in my client pool, but it's also the only client that had a large discrepancy between Google reviews and Yelp. My other clients have consistent averages, and it seems like there would only be a noticeable spike if there was a discrepancy.

Any word on if Google is using those reviews less in the local ranking algorithm?

I have a client who has an average 4 stars on most sites, but had a much lower score on Yelp. Last night, he spiked in maps for some big keywords, almost like Yelp wasn't being considered anymore.

Associating with Yelp is my first thought too, but it seems unlikely.

If I had to guess, maybe a competitor or disgruntled employee destroyed an existed listing that had strength a ranked well? If that's the case, this listing should drop off soon.

It could settle. Also, there's a "crawl control" feature in Bing webmasters, if you haven't tried that yet.

Are you running paid search ads as well? If so, I usually notice Bing bot being very active at the beginning of a campaign.

Keep in mind, if you want to use this character, a lot of people may not see it in the SERPs, and it could just make your site look glitchy like the attached image.

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The focus keyword is just a little tool to help you in the backend. You can focus on more than one keyword if you'd like, just check each keyword individually in the tool if you want to use it.

The Yoast SEO plugin is a good one to go with. Your title tags are changing in the code, so it's not the plugin.

Sometimes (and more often in recent months), Google will rearrange or rewrite a title for their search results. The most common way I see them do it is: "Brand Name: Title Content." You can only attempt to change this with the title tag, but Google still might alter it depending on the query searched to find the site.

Thanks Kate!

I didn't know that about the Facebook relationship. I'm seeing some improvement, and it looks like it's due to changes like the ones you're mentioning. It's like Bing/Yahoo are just a couple years behind and are still using factors Google has moved past or doesn't pay as much attention to.

EMDs do seem to have more significance in Bing, but that doesn't help me optimize his existing site.

Thanks for the input.

Thanks for the input. This is client that cannot be convinced to change his focus from Yahoo! and his ranks are great on Google.

Everything I research, and my other clients' performances, suggest good SEO isn't search engine specific, but it appears to be in his case.

I have a client who is very focused on getting ranks in Yahoo! Convincing him that focusing on Google is much more important isn't going to happen. He uses Yahoo! He ranks very well in Google, and his site is relatively well-made with no glaring on-page issues. His backlink profile is also not an issue.

I'm trying to find ways to rank specifically for Yahoo! since we're ranking well in Google and the client cares a ton about Yahoo! I know Yahoo! uses Bing's algorithm, but results aren't identical in the two engines.

Does anyone know of big, glaring difference in the two algorithms that would result in great Google ranks, but almost non-existent Yahoo! ranks?

I have him in Bing webmasters, his local SEO and citations are good, his backlink profile is good, and his on-page is decent.

Then you'll need to go off the data you have. The keyword planner is still a good tool to use, it just can't be 100% trusted. You can also play with the Google auto-suggest (waterfall) that pops up as you type things in. The suggestions are based on search volume.

There are also keyword research tools out there that can help. SEMRush, SpyFu, etc.

Also look at competitor sites that already sell the product. See what they are targeting in their title tags and H1s.

It's important to look at webmaster and analytics data for this. The keyword planner isn't exactly accurate. I see traffic coming from keywords all the time that don't have a search volume in keyword planner, or have a vastly different number in keyword planner when compared to the data I get other places.

I think it takes a bit more digging than that, and you also need to consider the long-tail effect from the keywords you're optimizing for.

Asking some of the clients of the business how they search or look for your products can be very helpful.

With that being said, keywords with high volume in the keyword planner do usually offer much more traffic, but also much more competition.

To Google, there is not. The R=301 at the end of the rewrite rule defines it as a 301 redirect, so it's practically the same thing. For a one-off redirect I wouldn't use the rewrite format. This is usually for when you need to grab big chunks of URLs and redirect them all at once. Still, if it works this way, there's really nothing wrong with it from the redirecting standpoint. If there was, when people used it for large quantities of redirects, it wouldn't work.

When you say "Tab" I take it you mean the anchor text of the homepage link in the navigation. If that's the case, I think keeping it as "Home" is just fine. The additional keyword specific anchor text juice you get from that change doesn't outweigh user experience. People know and expect there to be a "Home" type button. Changing it may confuse people when they don't need to be.