Rajan Patel, the VP of Engineering for Search, said on X that Google is making "changes to ranking" to remove prediction content from showing up in the Google Search top stories and news sections. This comes after some sites are posting "p?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-remove-prediction-news-news-407...

Over the past few weeks, Google has been showing AI Overviews for local packs, leading some businesses to see huge drops in visibility for their Google Business Profile and local listings. Some businesses are seeing 50% declines or more bec?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ai-overview-local-pack-drops-40...

Microsoft Advertising announced a slew of new features including new customer acquisition goals as an open beta, Share of voice (SOV) metrics, Asset group-level URL options and tracking templates, increased Search Theme limit, enhanced asse?
https://www.seroundtable.com/microsoft-advertising-new-features-407...

Google Ads has made the Campaign total budgets officially live as an open beta for any advertiser to sign up and use. Campaign total budgets are now available in Search, Performance Max and Shopping campaigns within Google Ads.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ads-campaign-total-budgets-4077...

Google Ads has reportedly streamlined the selection capability of Manual CPC bidding during the campaign setup. Now the option can be found under the "Conversions" goal, labeled as "Manually set bids."
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ads-manual-cpc-bidding-40770.html

Google is rolling out what it calls "Personal Intelligence" in the Gemini app and it will soon also come to Google Search within AI Mode. Google announced that Personal Intelligence in Gemini "connects Gmail, Photos, YouTube and Search in a?
https://www.seroundtable.com/personal-intelligence-google-gemini-40...

Earlier this week, Google announced Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) and it has a lot of the industry worried. Once SEO named Ramon Eijkemans said, "I hate to bring this, but SEOs: we're gonna be f$@*ed." John Mueller from Google responded?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ucp-wont-kill-seo-40766.html

While a number of Google Search features are impacted by Google's core update, favicons showing up or not is not one of them. Yes, your site can drop in the rankings, or not show up in Google Discover, or be removed from Top Stories and oth?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-core-updates-favicons-40767.html

We have seen ads in AI Mode before but there may be a new Google Ads format coming to AI Mode results, not the just the Direct Offer ads, but Explore guides and article ads.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ai-mode-ads-explore-guides-and-...

Google has added Gemini to the Google Trends Explore page to help you find new and fresh search terms. It will also compare those search terms automatically for you, all in a new design. This is rolling out now, but you might not see it ju?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-trends-explorer-gemini-40763.html

The other day, I saw the Google News channel on X respond to claims that Google is going to allow merchants to overcharge you for products sold through the new AI checkout protocol. I found it crazy because Google has checks and balances to?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-prohibits-different-prices-4076...

Google's John Mueller was asked if it was acceptable to link your brand websites together on a brand page to communicate to your users that the company owns multiple brands. John said, it is pretty common to do so and if done as a reasonabl?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-linking-brand-websites-40761.html

I am seeing a spike in complaints from Google AdSense publishers of earnings dropping again over the past 24-hours or so. This is similar to last week, and it also coincides with an unconfirmed Google search ranking update.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-adsense-earnings-drops-ecpm-rpm...

For the past few weeks, Google Ads has been rolling out a new and faster way to set up an account by using an existing campaign. The option reads, "Create an account with campaign for faster setup."
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ads-create-an-account-with-camp...

The Microsoft Advertising team released a new PDF guide named "From discovery to influence: AEO A guide to and GEO." This guide offers "Practical data strategies to empower retailers for AI search, AI assistants and AI browsers."
https://www.seroundtable.com/microsoft-advertiser-guide-to-aeo-geo-...

It is now official, Google confirmed it has entered "into a multi-year collaboration" with Apple to power Apple Intelligence features and Siri with Google's Gemini models and cloud technology.
https://www.seroundtable.com/apple-intelligence-siri-via-google-gem...

Microsoft Advertising has expanded the number of search themes it allows to 50 search themes for Performance Max campaigns. This should be live now but Microsoft will announce it sometime this week.
https://www.seroundtable.com/microsoft-advertising-allows-up-to-50-...

I am seeing signs of a possible Google search ranking update or volatility around January 12, 2026. This is weird in that most of the tools, not all, are mostly calm, but the chatter has picked up and many SEOs are noticing ranking fluctua?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-search-ranking-volatility-janua...

Google Shopping is updating its promotions policy to now allow for promotions on subscription fees and abbreviations. This was updated as of this month, January 2026.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-shopping-promotions-subscriptio...

Google seems to have a bug that prevents searchers from leaving hotel reviews directly in the Google Search desktop interface. It works fine within Google Maps and Hotel search interfaces but not in the web search interface.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-hotel-knowledge-panels-posting-...

Google's Robby Stein reiterated that Google's AI experience, such as AI Mode and AI Overviews, integrates Google's core search signals. This helps Google provide more useful and helpful responses to users in the AI experiences. But it doesn?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-core-search-signals-in-ai-40735...

In a rare Sunday launch, Google announced new AI Mode ads named Direct Offers. Google also announced branded AI agents and a new open standard for agentic commerce it calls Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP).
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ai-mode-direct-offers-ads-ucp-4...

Google Ads has a new experiment feature for Performance Max campaigns that lets you A/B-test assets. This allows you to compare the performance of 2 different sets of assets within the same asset group to find out which creative combination?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ads-pmax-ab-testing-assets-4073...

Google announced new Business Agents, branded AI Agents, a "new way for shoppers to chat with brands, right on Search," Google said. "It's like a virtual sales associate that can answer product questions in a brand's voice, enabling retaile?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-merchant-center-business-agent-...

Google Ads seems to be slowly rolling out a new Google Ads experimental feature in the Google Ads Lab section named Brand Linking. Brand linking lets you "Link customers to brands," it reads.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ads-brand-linking-40737.html

In September, we posted about a number of local pack design tests from Microsoft Bing. But now, Bing might be testing a more retro, older-looking interface for the local pack in the Bing search results.
https://www.seroundtable.com/bing-retro-local-pack-40700.html

This week, yep, we had another story on Google Search ranking volatility. I posted the Google webmaster report for January 2026. Google Discover seems to be showing too many...
https://www.seroundtable.com/video-01-08-2026-40727.html

Microsoft announced its AI-agents agentic experiences under the names of Copilot Checkout and Brand Agents. Copilot Checkout lets you shop and checkout directly in the Copilot chat experience and Brand Agents lets you add AI-chat experience?
https://www.seroundtable.com/microsoft-copilot-checkout-brand-agent...

Google's Danny Sullivan and John Mueller spoke on the Search Off the Record podcast about whether hiring an AEO/GEO or buying an AI-optimization tool is any different than hiring an SEO or buying an SEO tool. In short, the advice is the sa?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-hiring-geo-aeo-ai-optimization-...

Navah Hopkins, the Microsoft Ads Liaison, posted a reminder on LinkedIn, encouraging advertisers to ensure the email settings are all configured properly. You can get monthly invoices, billing alerts, account notifications, ad and keyword?
https://www.seroundtable.com/microsoft-advertising-email-settings-4...

Google's Danny Sullivan said on the Search Off the Record podcast that was published yesterday that Google does not want you to turn your content into bite-sized chunks to rank well in LLMs. He said, "we don't want you to do that" and he e?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-content-bite-sized-chunks-40728...

Microsoft is hiring a "very" Senior Product Manager who will initially work on fighting spam across Bing and Copilot. Fabrice Canel said this is a "very" senior PM role and the job description says the "initial focus on reducing Spam in Co?
https://www.seroundtable.com/microsoft-senior-pm-fight-spam-on-bing...

Greg Gifford, a veteran automotive and local SEO, published a hard warning to vendors suggesting that they tell automotive dealerships to set up separate Google Business Profile department listings for separate services. He said, do not, d?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-business-profile-auto-departmen...

Adam Wathan the creator of Tailwind CSS posted that he had to let go of 75% of his engineering team because of AI. He said traffic to the Tailwind help documentation is down 40% and that is where most people learn about his solution and the?
https://www.seroundtable.com/tailwind-css-google-drop-40725.html

Google seems to be testing showing call assets on Vehicle Ads within Google Search. So on the Vehicle Ads there is a way to call the dealer or seller, like you see on some other ads.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-vehicle-ads-call-assets-40717.html

There are a number of SEOs and site owners complaining that they saw a large drop in Google Search rankings yesterday, January 6, 2026. This unconfirmed Google update does not feel as widespread as some of the previous ones we reported on?
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-search-ranking-volatility-jan-6...

Google will update how it handles multi-channel products, products sold both online and locally in the store, to help with managing inventory. Google emailed merchants that this applies to and the changes go into effect this March.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-merchant-center-multi-channel-p...

Microsoft is testing a much larger "Ask Copilot" button on the Bing home page. Normally, Bing only has a small Copilot logo on the right of the search box but in this test, Bing writes it all out - "Ask Copilot" with the logo.
https://www.seroundtable.com/ask-copilot-button-bing-40713.html

Google's Robby Stein confirmed (again) that Google is personalizing some of the AI experiences, including AI Overviews and AI Mode. He said this on the CNN, Terms of Service podcast with Clare Duffy.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-personalizing-ai-answers-40711....

Google is hiring a Chief of Staff on Search Intelligence, Strategy and Operations. This job is to "help architect the next era of Search with AI," Rajan Patel, the Vice President of Search Engineering of Google, posted on LinkedIn.
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-hiring-chief-of-staff-search-in...