So far today, our Google traffic has dropped a good 30% from the all time lows it was yesterday.

Yes, dropping like a stone this week from Monday onward. Today search is -28%. It seems to pick up the 2nd half of the day though. In my case, all of the main category pages on my site have huge drops while the traffic is being pushed to the lowest level content pages. Arcane tag pages are receiving much more traffic in a nonsensical way, and people are arriving at page 2 or 3 of a category instead of the first page. That type of traffic pattern never converts in my experience...

@ichthyous

Most of our drop is specific to product detail pages. However it looks like a deep crawl has just started, which thus far is isolated to product pages, so it's possible a small update specific to products is occurring. Our information pages seem to be relatively stable at the moment with the new lows Google has been sending for quite a while.

Reddit for example has doubled its visits and there people do nothing but argue and troll.

UGC has always had is ugly side. You'd think Google would know better after hosting USENET newsgroups for so many years.

From RustyBrick, a.k.a. Barry Schwartz of Search Engine Roundtable:

Google Search Ranking Algorithm Update Hits On February 14 & 15 (Unconfirmed)
[seroundtable.com...]

Yep, Google said they weren't going to confirm any more updates; Unless, of course, they change their mind. ;)

They said they won't confirm any future REVIEW updates specifically. The other ones they will confirm.

Re: Reddit

I did not want to believe it was easy, but it is. I have an aged Reddit account tied to my business, along with it's own subreddit titled the same as the business name. I wrote my very first post in that 5-year old subreddit on Friday last week, and focused the topic and content on a new tool I created on the website, along with an image and naked link to the page with the tool. After writing the post, I ran the url through a Pagespeed CWV check via Google WebDev, so "help" it be found quickly. (This usually provides instant indexing)

That Reddit post ranked #1 in the perspectives tab nearly immediately and it still ranks #1 today, even with no other comments, likes, etc. The general SERP does not spawn any Reddit links and they are only in the referrals tab for this specific query. Of course, Google itself has a similar tool on top of the SERP for this query, which is why they relocate everything else.

Copilot is answering better the questions and no ads there!

Gemini does a good job but not integrated yet like bing’s copilot!

Free traffic will only exist via Copilot and Gemini soon!

Well done everyone.

@mosxu I would like to know how many people use gemini, copilot or ChatGPT instead of a search engine. I try to use them every now and then, but they answer any question, often in a wrong way even if the tone can make you think that the answer is right. Why should I use it if I already know that the answers are inaccurate? I put myself in the shoes of any user and if he is not one who passes for good anything he reads then he goes back to the search engine and never returns to the chatbots.

Actually I was determined not to use them but hey I do more and more against my principles :))

I was determined not to use them but hey I do more and more against my principles

The ad spam is so extreme in search it may push users into AI just to escape the ads. We know the lack of ads in AI will be short lived as these search engines eventually drop the ad spam hammer and make their AI products just as cluttered as they have done with search.

The ad spam is so extreme in search it may push users into AI just to escape the ads. We know the lack of ads in AI will be short lived as these search engines eventually drop the ad spam hammer and make their AI products just as cluttered as they have done with search.

Or it will be expensive for the user because access will generally cost money.

@mosxu I can’t use something knowing that the answer could be wrong. It doesn’t make sense to use it. Then it’s true that AI can be used for many things, but for the answers it seems useless and only a way to spread falsehoods

Or it will be expensive for the user because access will generally cost money.

It may be ad-free for now as part of their onboarding strategy to gain user acceptance. But for the average user, paying a fee won't be something well-received especially in the current economic environment. I wouldn't mind paying a small fee for AI powered search, providing I could fully customize answers/results. But after all that has happened in the last year and a half with Google, I'd rather continue to be bombarded with ads in Bing then give Google a penny. But quite honestly I don't see Google being able to deliver. Just looking at Google's search results we can see what a mess they have made. Seeing such weakness at Google is prompting OpenAI to work on their own search engine as recent reports suggest. Maybe new leadership at Google could turn the boat around, but for now it looks like Google's leadership has the Google boat sailing full speed ahead straight toward a category 5 hurricane.

Huge drop in USA traffic today...-58% at 11:30am. Canada also ended the day -44% yesterday, UK - 30% and UAE same. Today UK and UAE have recovered and USA is way off. Once again, it's traffic to major landing pages that is taking a hit...so the most competitive terms. It seems that there is no winning...one week of decent traffic but zero conversions, followed by this week of terrible traffic since Monday, but at least a few inquiries and a sale.

@mosxu I use Copilot for the English translations of what I write here, but I would never take for granted any answer to a question that it gives me.

I would like to know how many people use gemini, copilot or ChatGPT instead of a search engine. I try to use them every now and then, but they answer any question, often in a wrong way....

There's a lot of focus on answers these days (e.g., the notion that Google is turning into an "answers engine," as opposed to a "search engine"), but we need to remember that not every searcher is looking for an answer to a specific question.

Take the person who wants to know more about chocolate souffles, or riding the tourist riverboats in Widgetburg. That person may well be looking for Web sites, not just highly targeted mini-essays. (It's like the difference between browsing the shelves in a public library and asking a question at the reference desk. Clearly, there's a place for both.)

IMO, if Google were to abandon its roots and turn into nothing more than an AI-driven "answer engine" (which I consider to be highly unlikely), there would be an opening for a new search engine that helped people find content of interest on the Web.

if Google were to abandon its roots and turn into nothing more than an AI-driven "answer engine" (which I consider to be highly unlikely), there would be an opening for a new search engine that helped people find content of interest on the Web.

Google abandoned its roots long ago. Google isn't an AI-driven answer engine quite yet, but has been an ad engine in our industry for over a year. Seeing that opening for a new search engine you speak of, OpenAI is reportedly working on their own search engine as I posted yesterday. Who knows if a search engine owned by OpenAI will be competitive, but they have the success blueprint to follow that Google originally created only to abandon in a quest to maximize profits at any cost.

The discussion about OpenAI's project is here: [webmasterworld.com...]

Yes, it was posted here first, but AI discussions are in the GPT and AI Topics forum.

AI is the future.

After the decimation by Google, Bing + DDG are now 30% of my organic traffic. Surprisingly enough, I see visitors from those two engines converting way better than those from Google, on average.

Needless to say, since ~3 days or so ago there's been a further -15% to my already paltry traffic.

I see visitors from those two engines converting way better than those from Google, on average.

Google uses a variety of tactics to keep users searching and clicking on ads instead of answering their searches, which we see in Google's extremely poor traffic quality. Even after removing the garbage traffic coming from Google, the conversion rate from Google traffic is so bad it can reach 1/20th of other search engines some days. That shows how bad Google is toying with their users to wring the most ad clicks out of them they can.

Bing, DDG, Yahoo etc are just a small fraction of my traffic...maybe 3% total. The rest is all Google. There's no way around Google's stranglehold on search and it definitely is not at all what it used to be in terms of referring traffic and customers. It's gotten very bad this year. One would think it's a recession...the inquiries from UK, Australia and Canada have stopped completely. Europe is low, UAE dropped completely. Now only very poor quality low budget and delusional people in usa inquiring about things far beyond their price range.

You have to give them credit at Google, they have found a way to determine intent very well since they are sitting on the data. They find a way to always get those real buyers to places where they make money and never to organic sites. What will happen over time is that people will stop investing in their websites as there is no payback. Users will stop trusting small organic sites and instead acquiesce to whatever google feeds them.

We have to look at the bigger picture...this is really about monopoly and decimation of small business. AI search won't be any different, it will eventually be monetized. Someone needs to step in and actually regulate...that's why those who call for no regulation and a completely unregulated market are just dupes really.

A is the future.

"I want to say just one word to you: 'Plastics.'"

You have to give them credit at Google, they have found a way to determine intent very well

I guess this depends on ones niche. Google has pretty much spammed Amazon ads in my niche with products that are similar but not precise to a fine-tuned search. The organic results are a sloppy mess, but since few users scroll down to see them it doesn't appear worth Google's time to fix it.

Ouch, the devaluation continues. When I look at my Seo tool, I can only shake my head. Once again many keywords lost, mostly replaced by generic garbage. It's also sad to see that the impressions on Google News are increasing, according to Search Console, but there are still zero clicks. But I'm not sure whether ican trust the data from the console at all.

@Micha...I am also seeing a drop in keywords today, after a slow rise for some time. Traffic is higher today, while it was lower when they were rising. Ultimately it depends on the page dynamics...how many ads, widgets, and also how the site link is presented. Google figured out that giving sites too many pretty image carousels makes people gravitate to organic sites, so they removed them and down traffic went.

@Ichthyos That's right, the traffic really looks better today than on other Sundays, but that doesn't help if the overall numbers are declining.

They find a way to always get those real buyers to places where they make money and never to organic sites.

I don't know what they did with them but I can tell you they are not in google Ads...

Plastics.

Ah yes, being of a certain age I can remember when plastic bags saved the trees from the evil paper bag and all us humans from the next ice age...

This seems to be like the October HCU update. Since Feb 14th traffic is slowly disappearing.