As we approach the end of the year, it just seems Google is getting more and more volatile with its search results. Google also confirmed that “openness” as a local ranking signal was strengthened. On Thursday morning, Google had delayed indexing issues for some sites, but Google confirmed it hours later. Google’s Danny Sullivan collects and submits reports of low-quality and problematic search results. Sullivan also wants Google to use licensed images instead of sourcing and attributing publisher images in some cases. Google explains why spam reports don’t lead to immediate penalization in search. Google also explained when to use hierarchical site structure versus flat. Google said double slashes in the URL can cause crawling confusion. Google also explained what to do when you use special characters. Google said no SEO is ever perfect. Google Ads is testing headlines in ad descriptions, which is leading to super long, ugly ads. Google Search Ads for publishers will enforce consent management requirements. Google Merchant Center is testing browsing experience beta cards. Google Merchant Center identifier exists won’t lead to listing disapprovals. Google is testing site snippet overlays on hover over. Google has removed the December 2023 end **** for the SGE labs experiment. Bing is on a holiday lockdown for new features. Google launched its Christmas decorations in search. And if you want to help sponsor those vlogs, go to patreon.com/barryschwartz. That was the search news this week at the Search Engine Roundtable.

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