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As previously indicated, new MCM MI sub-publishers will soon need to verify their identity and address before ads can be distributed on their websites. MCM will consider updating MCM MI on completing these necessary steps in the ‘MCM Ready’ section. Note that this process will only affect new MCM MI sub-publishers. Additional details will be shared closer to the launch date. Learn more about the verification process.
Now, you can use custom distribution to provide guidance on how you want distribution to deviate in a campaign, such as increasing the number of distributions during certain time periods, distributing custom distributions provided by you to calculate the corresponding target rate based on actual and reduced distribution below that level.
In March 2024, Google Ads will update the section on Unacceptable Business Practices in the Misrepresentation Policy to include enticing users to share money or information by impersonating or implying false relationships or endorsements from a public figure, brand, or organization.
Google has addressed this: “We are aware of a very narrow issue that has caused temporary fluctuations in search results for a few websites. The issue has been resolved and websites will no longer see its impact.
Google is introducing a trial feature in Google Maps using AI to help users discover local businesses that meet specific needs.
Google also announced:
Google has stopped displaying Web Stories in image search, carousel view in Google Discover, along with the grid view now being the carousel view in Google search results. Additionally, Google has made some other changes regarding the availability of Web Stories.
Google has added a new “Feature Availability” section to the Web Stories section in Google’s documentation.
Google Analytics 4 (GA4) has added new details about trend detection, highlighting “small but long-term and significant changes in your data.”
The new feature works similarly to anomaly detection, helping identify changes in data. When the anomaly detection feature detects sudden increases or decreases, the trend detection feature focuses on slower changes occurring over longer periods.
According to John Mueller: Data collection budgets are really only an issue for large websites. If you’re having issues there and your website isn’t really large, then Google may not see much value in collecting more data. That’s not a technical issue.”
=>Reason for incomplete data collection
Google’s John Mueller explained the purpose of verifying 404 errors in the search console:
“It’s better if you accidentally encounter a 404 error and fix it. Clearly, you don’t need to fix 404 errors that you want to be 404. Additionally, this is a way of tracking for you (‘I fixed this error, let me know when you see it fixed’).
A 404 response is called an error because the website is requested from a non-existent URL and therefore the request is erroneous rather than Google finding and erroring on the website needs to be fixed. Technically, if the 404 status is determined to be permanent and the website never returns, the correct response is to display a 410 status code. But Google handles 404 and 410 responses almost the same. The 410 response removes the website from Google’s search index a bit faster. But the end result is the same.
For external links to non-existent URLs, Mueller suggests that fixing those links is not worth pursuing, but I think most SEOs would disagree if the link is from a legitimate website. It would be very reasonable to pursue fixing links to there by creating a 301 redirect from the incorrect URL to the correct URL.
Google’s Gary Illyes sparked some controversy when commenting on the importance of HTML structure as “not very important” for SEO doesn’t mean “not important at all.”
HTML structure is still 100% important for accessibility. However, accessibility is not a direct ranking factor. If your website is not accessible, there is little chance that people will link to it or click on it in the future, so it could affect your SEO ranking.
