Industry News

Lots of great planning advice in this First Round article. There are two things related to Strategy that I especially like. First, this definition (Strategy is not a vague vision statement!):

Strategy is the sequencing of how you take a very long-term end goal and break that down into more digestible components. Done right, it gets you a really clear picture of what’s in your long-, mid-, and short-term plans, where you stack up in the market, and how you’ll win.”

And then, the...

The Google November 2024 core update started rolling out Monday, November 11, at 3:30 pm ET and we saw some movement begin around Wednesday/Thursday but it was not that widespread. Now, over the weekend, this core update seems to be casting a wider net.

James Stanier has a good argument for why deadline-driven development is so… difficult:

Given that non-technical people don’t understand why software is hard, dates become the stick that they beat you with when you don’t deliver on time. Don’t ask me why, it’s just human behavior. I’m sure you’ve done it when roadworks have taken longer than were specified on the sign, or if a delivery of a package was late. Dates mean something to people, so handle them with care. In fact, perhaps we...

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today...

Google launched the November 2024 core update earlier this week, and we are now starting to see movement and ranking shifts because of it. Google AI Overviews is testing using real hyperlinks, instead of paperclips. Google cautioned...

Google Maps will now show you if you can find products nearby, like you'd see in directly in Google Search and Google Shopping. This "Products nearby" carousel now shows up directly in the Google Maps app, the company announced.

Google has released a native app for Google Gemini for iPhone devices. This comes after Google added Gemini to the Google app on iOS, created a native Gemini app for Android and also had it available on the web.

Google sent emails to some Google Merchant Center advertisers and free users about a new feature in Chrome where the Google web browser will showcase your promotions directly in the browser. It will pop up promotion codes during the holiday shopping season.

Google seems to be testing a new AI chat feature for e-commerce searches and retailers that is titled "Get help from Google's sales assistant." This will launch an AI chat feature that gives you AI-based product results based on your chat session.

Bing Search has updated its autosuggest (auto complete) search bar to include rich entity cards and popular follow-on searches directly in the suggestion pane. Jordi Ribas, the Head of Search at Microsoft said on X, "The large images with additional context help users easily jump to their intended topic with less typing."