Industry News

I am seeing some early signs that there may be a Google search algorithm update rolling out this morning. There is some early chatter in some of the forums and some, not all, of the automated tracking tools are also showing changes.

I feel like Google has to spend more time telling SEOs to stop obsessing about specific details then helping with technical SEO issues and I called it with this one. Google's John Mueller had to say in this mornings hangout "quality rater guidelines is not one-to-one our ranking algorithm."

Since I posted about the the story the other day that Google does not use the BBB, Better Business Bureaus score or reviews as well as other third-party trust sites in their ranking algorithm it caused a lot of interesting and unexpected debate in the SEO industry. John Mueller from Google was asked again and he said they are not used as direct ranking factors in Google search this morning.

Google seems to have just rolled out a redesign for their Google PageSpeed Insights tool. The new design shows a lot more graphical reporting, the speed score uses lab data analyzed by Lighthouse and Google is showing a lot more detail. In addition, scores that I had at over 90, some are down to 50 or so. So things have changed with this report.

Chris Jones describes his favorite product manager interview question, but in the spirit of “know thyself” I think this is an exercise everyone should go through for themselves:

The question comes late in the interview, but early in the overall hiring process. The setup goes like this: “Now that I know you a bit, I’d like to give you a list of 4 broad work attributes. You’re a product manager, so I already expect that you’re strong in each. But I highly doubt that you consider...

Earlier this month we reported about a Google algorithm update that happened Halloween night through November 1st and seems to be continuing on all week long. It is a creepy update that seems to be gaining momentum as the days go on.

Here’s a pragmatic approach to roadmaps that I can get behind. Escape From the Feature Roadmap to Outcome-driven Development:

You’re exploring new lands. You know where you want to get to — that’s your outcome — but there’s no established route to get there. So you’ll probably set out, and if you’re measuring yourself correctly and you’ve got good feedback loops in place, you’ll be able to course correct and quickly iterate towards your outcome. But you could only draw the complete...

I really like the this Mountainsides approach to software projects from the Postlight team:

It’s sort of like a Gantt chart that was left on the stove too long, leaving all those neat and tidy bars melting into one another.