Jill Whalen’s SEO Legacy Still Shapes The Industry
Jill Whalen, who recently passed away, championed an ethical approach to SEO that continues to influence the industry.
About
I have 25 years hands-on experience in SEO, evolving along with the search engines by keeping up with the latest research, patents and what’s happening in the search results.
Need a consultation? Contact me at roger@martinibuster.com or use the contact form at: Martinibuster.com
I recently presented at Pubcon Vegas in October and March 2024, and over the past 20 years have presented at search conferences across the United States: Pubcon, SMX, Affiliate Summit & SES (Search Engine Strategies) and have served as a Head Judge at the U.S. Search Awards .
Articles
Yoast SEO Plugin Bug Inserts Hidden AI HTML Code
Yoast fixed an AI-related bug that injected unintended HTML classes into content generated by its SEO Premium plugin.
Wix Acquires AI Platform That Enables Anyone To Create Software
Wix acquired Base44, an AI platform that enables users to build software using natural language prompts in a chat-based interface.
Yoast SEO WordPress Plugin Adds Support For LLMs.Txt
Yoast has added a one-click llms.txt feature designed to guide AI tools like ChatGPT and Gemini to important website content.
OpenAI Rolls Out Update To ChatGPT Search
OpenAI quietly updated ChatGPT search to improve its ability to understand user queries and to answer increasingly complex questions.
Recipe Intent Keywords Are Triggering Google AI Overviews
Google AI Overviews is surfacing AI-generated search results for queries with recipe intent.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai Discusses Fate Of The Human-Created Web
Google’s CEO addressed concerns about AI search replacing traditional web links in its ongoing evolution of Search
Google Shows Why Rankings Collapsed After Domain Migration
Google’s John Mueller showed how to diagnose a search visibility issue that was apparently triggered by a domain migration.
Google Responds To Site That Lost Ranks After Googlebot DDoS Crawl
Google responds to a publisher’s concern about crawl budget and rankings due to Googlebot’s requests for non-existent pages
WordPress Co-Founder Mullenweg’s Reaction To FAIR Project
WordPress co-founder cautioned that the FAIR project’s distributed plugin and theme repositories could undermine WordPress.org’s ability to manage trust and reliability
Google Local Search Research Paper On Business Type Extraction
A Google research paper confirms that a local search indexing system has been in use for over a year in Search and Maps
Google’s Update To Recipe Structured Data Confirms A Ranking Criteria
Google confirms that Recipe Rich Results and text search results select images using different criteria.
Newly Released Data Shows Desktop AI Search Referrals Dominate
New data shows that AI search traffic overwhelmingly comes from desktop devices rather than mobile.
Respected SEO Rockstar Deconstructs SEO For Google’s AI Search
A respected SEO expert calls out marketers who overstate the complexity of Google’s AI search
WordPress Plugin Platform Offers Proactive Security Scanning
New security platform announced by Patchstack enables plugin developers to maintain a proactive security approach against vulnerabilities
WordPress Shares How AI May Play Stronger Role In Web Publishing
WordPress plans to support AI agents and publishers by exposing tools, content, and interactivity to external systems.
WordPress Performance Team Releases New Plugin
WordPress has released a plugin that achieves smooth transitions between pages without the tradeoffs of Single Page Applications
Google Publishes Guidance For Sites Incorrectly Caught By SafeSearch Filter
Google has published official guidance on how to recover a website that is incorrectly filtered by the SafeSearch filter
Microsoft Clarity Announces Natural Language Access To Analytics
Microsoft Clarity announced a Node.js-based MCP Server that enables natural language querying of analytics via AI
Claude’s Hidden System Prompts Offer a Peek Into How Chatbots Work
Anthropic published the hidden system prompts underlying the Claude AI model, showing how to get the best responses from it.
Google Patent On Using Contextual Signals Beyond Query Semantics
Recent Google patent shows how five kinds of real-world context can influence AI-generated answers
New AI-Assisted Managed WordPress Hosting For Ecommerce
Bluehost introduces managed WordPress hosting plans with AI-assisted tools that make launching online stores easier for entrepreneurs and content creators.
WordPress Finally Takes Steps To Integrate AI
Two Google employees are helping lead WordPress’s new AI Team, which is focused on integrating AI through canonical plugins first
WordPress Unpauses Development But Has It Run Out Of Time?
WordPress development has resumed after a four-month pause, following years of lagging behind market trends and technological innovation
Google’s Query Fan-Out Patent: Thematic Search
Google’s Thematic Search patent describes a system that closely parallels how AI Mode’s Query Fan-Out technique generates summaries
Google’s CEO Says AI Overviews Website Referrals Are Increasing
Google CEO Sundar Pichai fails to read the room, insisting that “no one sends traffic to the web the way we do”
Google’s Sergey Brin Says AI Can Synthesize Top 1,000 Search Results
The Google co-founder explains that search is shifting from link retrieval to AI-powered synthesis of information.
30-Year SEO Pro Shows How To Adapt To Google’s Zero-Click Search
Google’s AIO is wiping out mid-funnel user behavior data. Here are effective responses to zero-click SERPs for SEO.
Use IndexNow For AI Search And Shopping SEO
IndexNow, paired with structured data, is an ideal way for online stores to get product data into AI-powered search.
Does Google’s AI Overviews Violate Its Own Spam Policies?
Google’s AIO rewrites articles without adding unique analysis or insights, essentially meeting the definition of low-value content.