...and we’re back!

Hello!

Getting my feet back under me in the newsletter department, putting my newsletter pants back on.

I’ve got a great list of the most important stories from last week for you, as well as three can’t-miss SEO tweets.

This newsletter ended up being short on memes, but I brought it on the can’t-miss info.

Before we get into that, I wanted to share two things I’m up to.

Two Things I’ve Recently Launched

1 - Ranks is now live

In May of this year I picked up Ranks.com, an absolutely stellar domain name. I put together a very cool, very specific service that I’ve trialed with a BIG client (10-figure, publicly traded company), and just closed a second client, publicly traded, a market-leader in their niche.

Yes, this is a high-level, capital intensive service for companies with big budgets that want to get organic traffic in ways not available to most businesses.

Check out my new acquisition SEO offer at Ranks (if you’re in-house or an agency, this is a great add-on service—we work VERY WELL with teams)…

2 - DFY Content Briefs — New Service!

This one is hot off the presses.

I acquired a white label agency this past summer and one offering that came with it was a content brief service.

I was blown away with the quality—it was miles ahead of anything else I’ve seen.

Last week I worked on acquiring a domain to launch this as a standalone service cuz it’s SO GOOD.

Happy to share that I picked up the exact match domain, and you can check it out here:

ContentBriefs.com

Use them in-house, use them for your clients, resell them IDC, but do check it out! Kind of a v1 website but everybody’s gotta start somewhere.

All right, that’s the end of my show-and-tell, here’s the last week’s SEO curated and summarized:

Google’s November Update—Release Timed to Cause Maximum Chaos, Has Finished Rolling Out

Google's November core update has finished its leisurely 24-day stroll through the SERPs. Nothing like pushing out an algo update right before (and then during, if you’re taking your sweet-ass time) peak shopping season to really take a dump on everyone…

The Main Thing:

Google says this update is all about "showing more content that people find genuinely useful and less content that feels like it was made just to perform well on Search."

JK this update was all about ranking Reddit higher in the search results, algorithmically speaking…

The Algo Details:

• Took 24 days to roll out (Nov 11 - Dec 5)

• Multiple volatility spikes, especially Nov 25-26

• Not as big as March's update, which Google called their "largest ever"

• Rolled right through Black Friday/Cyber Monday

• Google's advice if you got hit? Write "helpful content for people." Thanks, bud.

It’s like the old saying:

the best time to write helpful content was 10 years ago. The second best time is... it doesn’t actually matter, Google hates your content unless it lives on Forbes Reddit.

Google Search Data Reveals We're All Just Typing "YouTube" Into a Search Bar

Rand and the Sparktoro team analyzed 332 million queries and the results are... well, there are some interesting findings.

The Main Thing:

Everyone is basically using Google as a glorified navigation bar. A full third of all searches are just people typing in website names into the browser bar. The top searches? YouTube, Gmail, Amazon… lol

Some interesting data from the article:

• 44% of searches are for brands

• Only 0.69% of searches are actually trying to buy something

• The "long tail" of search ( < 11 s/m) we all obsess over? A measly 3.6% of total volume

• Arts & Entertainment lead in topical distribution with 17.46% of all searches

So Google search doesn’t really function as (or purely as) a discovery platform like it used to. Instead, it’s what people use after they find stuff ELSEWHERE—like me, when I see something interesting (or dubious) on TikTok and go to Google to investigate.

Big day for the build a brand crowd (it’s me, I’m the build a brand crowd).

Google's Site-Level Evaluations Are Totally Real (Despite What They Keep Telling Us)

In a plot twist that surprises absolutely no one who actually works in SEO, Google's recent claims about "page-level only" ranking signals have been thoroughly debunked by years of their own statements and documentation. It's like they forgot to check their own receipts.

The Main Thing:

Glenn Gabe, wielding what he calls the "Gabeback Machine" (essentially a collection of documents recording every time Google contradicts itself on this topic), has compiled overwhelming evidence that site-level quality absolutely affects rankings across entire domains. Ssssssssssssshhhhhocking.

Some of his evidence includes:

• Google's own documentation explicitly stating site-wide signals matter

• Multiple algorithm updates (Panda, Penguin, Pirate) that clearly tank entire sites

• Countless quotes from Googlers explaining site-level quality evaluation

• Their freshly updated ranking systems guide that literally describes site-wide signals

This whole thing started because Google's VP of Search claimed everything is evaluated at the page level (which contradicts everything SEOs have seen WITH THEIR OWN EYEBALLS)

Glen has written a meaty post with a lot of example cough HCU site-wide classifier cough that’s definitely worth checking out.

Bluesky: Propping Up Your Social Traffic

Remember when we all thought Threads would be the Twitter killer? Turns out the real MVP might be Bluesky, which is quietly crushing it in the engagement department while the rest of us were doom-Musking on another platform...

The Main Thing:

Publishers are seeing 3-4x higher engagement on Bluesky compared to other platforms with significantly smaller audiences.

Bluesky actually lets you post links without punishing you for it. Amazing…

Here are some interesting stats:

• Boston Globe seeing 4.5x more conversions to paid subscriptions via Bluesky

• The Guardian getting 2x more traffic than Threads

• Open source developers getting half the engagement with only 6% of their X following

• Zero visibility penalties for linking to a piece content (Elon, you coward)

So while Twitter is busy making everyone put links in replies because of "lazy linking," Bluesky is actually building a platform that doesn't hate publishers, developers, and anyone who actually loves the open web.

Twitter sucks now and I only use it to discover/read about SEO news, so you can catch me on BSKY if you want (say hi, I’d love to connect), where I’m @ranks.com

Tweets Of The Week

Yeah, I was just talking trash about Twitter, but it’s still where most of the marketers/SEOs I follow are, so until everyone takes my advice—at least for the sake of this newsletter, I will continue to be there as well…

Here’s the tweets:

1 - Is ChatGPT a 4-year old?

Big if true…

2 - Google says “users of a site” is now third party content

lol.

3 - SEO is easy

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Until next week…