Stephen Mahaney's Articles

Stephen Mahaney

CEO & Founder of Planet Ocean
Virtual Space

Stephen Mahaney founded Planet Ocean in 1990, published 'The UnFair Advantage Book on Winning The Search Engine Wars' in 1996 (the Web's *original* $97 eBook) and established SearchEngineNews.com—the longest running membership-based publication site on the Internet—in 1997.

These days he's traveling and living in virtual space.

Articles by Stephen Mahaney

1. Google's Liz Reid on Search, AI, and the Future of the Web: A Candid Review (With Receipts)
2. Google Charged $400 for a Current Client Call
3. Why You Should Care About Claude's Expanding Coding Capabilities
4. AI Chatbots & Advertising
5. Google Says Opting Out of AI Overviews Is a "Huge Engineering Project"
6. Why AI Detection Will Never Scale Universally
7. The Inevitable Pivot: Why SEO Is Becoming GEO
8. Remembering
9. Schema + LLMs: What It Means for AI Visibility
10. The Slow, Inevitable Death of Google’s Profit Model
11. AI Mode—Already Creepy, Potentially Evil?
12. ChatGPT's Politeness Problem: Sycophantic, Expensive, & Maybe All Your Fault
13. Train Your Staff to Use AI & Watch Your Sales Skyrocket
14. Google Shopping's AI Vision Match
15. Why Classic SEO is More Vital Than Ever for AI Search Optimization
16. Google's Reverses Policy Against Fingerprinting
17. DeepSeek—Interview With A Chatbot
18. 28 Years of SEN
19. The 12 Days of OpenAI: A Holiday Tech Wonderland
20. Leveraging ChatGPT for SEO
21. The Verge Is Laughing at Google's Guidelines
22. The Man Who Killed Google Search
23. The Answer Engine That Just Might Give Google A Run For Its Money!
24. Beware The Japanese Keyword Hack
25. 27 Years of SEN
26. How to Build Your Own GPT Without Any Coding
27. Bing Chat Introduces Multimodal Visual Search & Enterprise Pricing for Copilot
28. Report: Generative AI is Quickly Evolving Superpowers
29. Google Releases New AI Tools to Help Small Businesses
30. ChatGPT Development Being Challenged by Advocacy Group
31. A.I. Vaults Image Creation to a Whole New Level
32. The Algo Masters Who Pick the Winners
33. A.I. Bots Can Improve Your Work But They Cannot Critically Think
34. A Virtual Army of A.I. Tools Are Marching Us Into the Future
35. Interview with ChatGPT
36. 26 Years of SEN & Counting
37. Google Is Good! ...Very Good — but not as good as they pretend to be
38. And the Award for 'Lame Advice of the Year' goes to...
39. Lead Generation Sites Report Problems with Performance Max, and then...
40. 5 Great Keyword Discovery Tools You Can Use for FREE
41. Be Careful That AdBlockers Aren't Blocking Your Images
42. Google's Launches Helpful Content Update
43. Never Give Up!
44. John Mueller Tells Us What He Really Thinks
45. Google Updates Quality Rater Guidelines
46. Google's Data Grab Masquerading as Minority Empowerment
47. Google is Picking Winners & Congress has Noticed
48. Startpage – Google Results Without Google's Crap!
49. Finally! A Secure, Encrypted Email Provider That Doesn't Exploit It's Users
50. If You Aren't Using a VPN, Maybe You Should Be
51. Local Search Update in March Corrects "Vicinity" Update
52. Never Mind Market Research, Just Pay Attention & Follow The Leader
53. It's Time to Focus Your Efforts on Collecting First Party Data
54. When Alt-Text is a Story in The NYTimes, THAT's Your Wake-Up Call
55. Be Careful Your "Stop Lines" Aren't Crippling Your Conversions
56. 25 Years of SEN & Counting
57. Beware the Graphic Artist!
58. Rare Penalty Limbo Can Last Several Years
59. November Core Update 2021
60. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for November 2021
61. Google says 'NeverMind' to Mobile-Indexing Deadline
62. Google Officially Says Mixed Reviews Are More Trustworthy
63. Google Logo Structured Data Changes
64. Why do my pages keep falling in and out of Google's index?
65. Can Googlebot crawl speed be controlled to avoid server overload?
66. GMB becomes GBP
67. High Profile Sites Slamming the Brakes on AMP Pages
68. WordPress Sites At Risk Due to Plugin Vulnerability
69. Do bold tags help SEO?
70. Bonus Bytes from John Mueller
71. Official Googlebot IP Addresses Now Available In JSON File
72. Page Experience Algorithm Coming To Desktop
73. How Key Moments Work In Videos In Search
74. Place Videos on Dedicated Pages For Maximum Exposure
75. MS Advertising Introduces Microsoft Clarity Insights
76. UPI Limited Enforcement in Google Merchant Center
77. Help Documentation Changes for October
78. Google Aligns Search Console Testing Tools with URL Inspection Tool
79. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for October 2021
80. Never "Meta" Worse Company in My Life!
81. The Google "Unannounced Updates" Buzz for October
82. Search Analytics API Now Supports Discover, Google News, and Regex
83. Manual Deep Linking No Longer Required for Google Ads App Campaigns
84. Microsoft Advertising Partners with Shopify
85. BigCommerce Merchants Can Now Sync Product Catalogs to Google
86. Job Posting Structured Data Errors Report Changes in GSC
87. Search Quality Raters Guidelines Updated
88. The One True Google Competitor Over Next 10 Years?
89. Get Faster Indexing with IndexNow
90. Google Search Adds Continuous Scrolling on Mobile
91. On ecommerce pages, should the product name be put into headline tags?
92. How can I prevent Google from showing specific content in my search result description snippet?
93. Search On '21 Reveals New Features, More Details About MUM
94. New Budget Report in Google Ads
95. Mysterious Google Search Ranking Algorithm Update?
96. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for September 2021
97. Google Adds Some Data, Drops Some Data In Search Terms Report
98. Unique Product Identifiers Now Required on Free Merchant Listings
99. New Ecommerce SEO Guide Documentation
100. Google Reveals How YouTube Recommends Videos
101. Lighthouse 8.4 Upgrades LCD, FID, PageSpeed Insights
102. Page Experience Tutorial - Improving First Input Delay
103. Google Expands 'About This Advertiser' Initiative
104. Is shared hosting ok?
105. How long should it take for a site to get re-crawled and re-ranked after cleaning out low quality pages?
106. What's the best way to redirect a short domain name to a longer one without having duplicate content issues?
107. Titlepocalypse Update
108. The SEO Impact of WordPress Themes
109. Google Shows How to Optimize for Discover's Follow Feature
110. Which page title is Google using for ranking, my original or their autogenerated one?
111. GSC Permanently Loses Performance Report Data for August 23rd and 24th
112. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for August 2021
113. Google Publishes Video on Getting a "Great" Page Experience
114. Reporting Channel for Indexing Bugs in the US Now Available in GSC
115. Titlepocalypse! Google Updates How They Generate Web Page Titles
116. Google Removes Safe Browsing and Ad Experience Widgets from Page Experience Report
117. Behind the Curtains of Google Search Console Insights
118. Large Images in Discover Improve CTR and Increase Traffic
119. 15 Tips for Getting the Most Out of Google Trends
120. Why are most of my site's pages missing in a Google site query?
121. Will changing an IP address or DNS cause us to lose our first page rankings?
122. What's the best type of website for SEO optimization purposes?
123. Why your GMB listing might be filtered out of Google Maps
124. CWVs More Than "just" A Tiebreaker
125. Google Publishes Copyright Guidelines Video
126. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for July 2021
127. Multiple Instances of Fact Check Markup Not Allowed
128. How to Succeed With Google Posts: Case Study
129. Facebook Expanding Access to AR Try On
130. Facebook Pay Extends Availability to Streamline Checkout on Your Site
131. Microsoft Advertising Now Offering Video Extensions
132. Multimedia Ads Now Available on Microsoft Advertising
133. Microsoft Ads Expands Verticals For Dynamic Remarketing
134. Link Spam Update Rolling Out Until Aug 10th
135. Showcase Product Promotions Across More Surfaces during Seasonal Shopping Moments
136. GSC Links AMP Debugging to AMP Page Experience Guide
137. AdSense Releases Faster New Embed Code
138. Google Graphs & Explains Search Traffic Drops
139. Ad Policy Violators: Three Strikes, Yer Out!
140. Google Announces New Privacy Sandbox Timeline
141. Google's Search Rankings Explained
142. How long should a 301 redirect be kept in place?
143. July 2021 Core Update
144. How can product schema be added to a page when the price of the product is variable?
145. Are Local Services Ads a good deal for service type businesses?
146. Are reciprocal links OK if they are relevant and useful?
147. Here's How Long It Takes to Get New Content Indexed
148. Core, Page Experience, & Spam Updates All Rolled-out in June
149. New Guidance - Redirects, HTTP Status Codes, Network Issues, & DNS Errors
150. WordPress 5.8 adds WebP Support
151. Facebook's Publishes Ad Review Process Guidelines
152. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for June 2021
153. AdSense Site Approvals Video Tutorial Series
154. New Tutorial Workflow Shows SMB's How to Advertise on YouTube
155. Google Expands GMB Profile Editing & Adds Pointy for FREE
156. Create A Web Story in 5 Steps in 5 Minutes
157. You Can Now Edit Robots.txt in Shopify
158. RSS-Powered Follow Button Being Tested in Chrome Canary
159. Sunsetting the Generic Rich Results Search Appearance on GSC
160. Google Updates GSC Help Docs For Robots.txt & Structured Data
161. Google Limits FAQ Rich Results to Two Max Per Snippet
162. PageSpeed Insights Showing More Field Data
163. Lighthouse 8.0 to be Released With Chrome 93 in August
164. Google Adds Negative Match Option to RegEx Filter
165. Google Launches Search Console Insights
166. Google Pauses FLoC & Extends Third Party Cookie Support Until Late 2023
167. Yelp Releases New Yelp for Business Features
168. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for May 2021
169. May 7th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
170. May14th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
171. May21st Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
172. May 28th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
173. Project Starline Brings The WOW Factor to Video Conferencing
174. MUM's The Word On Search
175. Breakthrough in Conversation Technology - LaMDA
176. Google Reveals Four Pillars of User Experience
177. Google Wants Everyone to Just Get FLoC'ed!
178. Google I/O Showcases Data-Hungry Apps & Long Overdue Privacy Controls for Android 12
179. 17 Pro-Tips You Need to Know About Core Web Vitals Going LIVE
180. Facebook Rolling Out New Ad Measurement Protocols
181. Indexing Issues Can Now Be Reported to Google
182. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for April 2021
183. Google Discover Nixes Satire
184. The Only Reasons Google Will Remove a Page
185. Algorithm Update - Google Product Reviews
186. Google Updates Cumulative Layout Shift Scoring
187. Page Experience Algorithm Launching Mid-June
188. Google Is Going All-IN on Web Stories
189. April 23rd Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
190. April 16th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
191. April 9th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
192. April 1st Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
193. March 26th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
194. March 19th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
195. March 12th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
196. March 5th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
197. WordPress Elementor Vulnerability
198. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for March 2021
199. Static Headlines Now Available for Dynamic Search Ads
200. Bing URL Submission Plugin for WordPress
201. Bing Upgrades Search to Include Visually Rich Imagery
202. Sketchy One Star "Fake" Review Ratings Win in Court
203. New GMB Review Management Tool
204. Check your Business Profile Performance in GMB
205. Best Practices For Videos
206. Mueller on Image Optimization
207. How To Get Your Products Into Search
208. HTTP/2 Magically Improves Core Web Vital Scores
209. Core Web Vitals: How Prepared Are Leading Industries Today?
210. Google Ads Developer Blog Summary for February 2021
211. Facebook Breaks the News in Australia to Prove a Point
212. Facebook Knew for Years Ad Reach Estimates Were Based on 'Wrong Data' But Blocked Fixes Over Revenue Impact
213. Facebook Puff Piece Stirs Controversy For NYTimes Writer
214. GMB Auto Populating Services
215. GMB Messaging Rolling Out For Desktop
216. Years in Business Feature Added to GMB
217. GSC Changes To Web Story Performance Report
218. Search Console Discover Report Adds Chrome Data
219. Updated Metric Boundaries for Core Web Vitals
220. Use 503 To Avoid Losing Rankings While in Social Statement Mode
221. Official Google Video On Duplicate Content
222. New Manual Action Penalties for Google News and Discover Policy Violations
223. Google Expands Phrase Match To Include Broad Match Modifier Traffic
224. Google Launches Passage Ranking
225. Google Announces Price Enforcements for Merchants
226. February 26th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
227. February 19th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
228. February 12th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
229. February 5th Digest - John Mueller's Hangouts - Search Central Office Hours
230. WebSite Cleanup Tips for a faster, better-indexed site
231. How to relocate a GMB attorney listing
232. Tips for getting listed in People Also Ask
233. Does using the disavow tool indicate to Google that a site might be shady?
234. What, exactly, is Core Web Vitals?
235. DuckDuckGo Hits 100 Million Searches Per Day -- Updates Privacy Protections
236. GMB Updates Flag Review Options
237. Google to Invite Advertisers to Test Alternative to 3rd Party Cookies
238. URL Removal Tool in GSC Doesn't Actually Remove Pages
239. Price Drop Added to Google Rich Results
240. Google to Stop Collecting Ad ID's To Avoid Pop Up Warning in iOS Apps
241. Google Notifies Site Owners About New HTTP/2 Protocol Crawling
242. Google Wants Web Stories, not Web Teasers
243. Google Threatens to Leave Australia
244. WordPress Launches New Website Building Service
245. High-severity Vulnerability in WordPress Plugin Contact Form
246. Facebook Moving UK Users to US Privacy Terms & Conditions
247. Facebook Attacks Apple's Plan to Give Users a Privacy Choice
248. Twitter Relaunching Verified Accounts
249. Update on the Structured Data Testing Tool
250. Noindexed Pages Can Impact Core Web Vitals
251. Google Placing UK Users Under U.S. Jurisdiction
252. Why Ad Heavy Pages Might Still Rank Well in the SERP
253. Copied Content is Sometimes More Relevant
254. Request Indexing Tool Reenabled in GSC
255. Google Rolls Out Dec 2020 Core Algorithm Update
256. Top Google Searches for 2020
257. An Important Message from The Founder of Planet Ocean / SEN
258. Would owning a new top level domain (TLD) with keywords provide a ranking advantage?
259. Are keyword heavy titles a problem?
260. Free Online Video Converter Tools
261. Editorial: Subscribe With Google / The Google News Initiative
262. Google for Jobs is LIVE & Based on Schema Markup
263. Google Launches 'Ad Experience Report Tool' in their Fight Against "Bad" Ads
264. Google Launches Free 'Website' for GMB Participants
265. AdWords Expands Language Options for Structured Snippets Globally
266. Need to Know Details of 'Ads Added by AdWords'
267. SEO for Voice Search: Digital Assistants
268. SEN Celebrates 20 Years!
269. OMG! Here Comes A Whole New Can Of Black-Hat Whoopass!
270. Why is America so polarized? ...it's the Echo Chamber!
271. A Virtual Paradi$e of Low Hanging Fruit
272. Search Engine Book - Chapter Eleven
273. Search Engine Book - Chapter Ten
274. Search Engine Book - Chapter Nine
275. Search Engine Book - Chapter Eight
276. Search Engine Book - Chapter Seven
277. Search Engine Book - Chapter Six
278. Search Engine Book - Chapter Five
279. Search Engine Book - Chapter Four
280. Search Engine Book - Chapter Three
281. Search Engine Book - Chapter Two
282. Search Engine Book - Chapter One
283. How to track customers without hurting your Local Listings in Google
284. Once They Find Your Page How Do You Get Them to Take Action?! Common Mistakes Marketers Make.
285. Once They Find Your Page How Do You Get Them to Take Action?
286. The Missing Link To Writing Effective Ad Copy
287. The Missing Link To Writing Effective Ad Copy
288. How to Easily Analyze your Competition in Seconds Using the Site Strength Indicator Tool
289. The 'Local Search' Gold Rush Begins
290. The Top 12 Link-Offenders You Should Avoid Like A Ticking Bomb!
291. Google's Local Business Center
292. Advanced SEO Tutorials
293. Essential Title Tag Strategies for Top Ranking Pages in 2009
294. Entrepreneurial Thoughts on the so-called Financial Meltdown
295. 7 Ways to Boost Your Sales and Build More Links By Increasing Your Site's Speed!
296. 9 Critical Steps to Evaluating Incoming Link Quality
297. Proof Positive that Run-of-Site 'Paid' Links are BAD for your Website!
298. How to Use Flash in Top Ranking Pages
299. Your 4 Week Step-by-Step Link Building Task Planner
300. Wikia Search Launch
301. The Ultimate Link Building Quick-Start Guide, Part II
302. How to Legally and Instantly Download All of Your Competitor's Top-Secret PPC Keywords!!!
303. How to Leverage Your Company's Most Powerful Asset
304. How to Automatically Build an AdWords Campaign
305. How to Craft a Money Making Home Page
306. There are Some Lists You Just Don't Want to be On
307. "The Most Effective, Yet Overlooked, Marketing Strategy on the Internet"
308. Are you ignoring 350,000 potential customers?
309. Check your Popularity!
310. Guide to Infoseek's ESP Search Engine
311. How to get your pages to "Stick" in Excite
312. The Best Kept Secret on the Internet?
313. Making Money the Easy Way
314. The Best Way to Sell Products or Services On The Internet
315. Mining "Gold" from your "Back-End" Market
316. Creating Web Sites that Load Fast & Sell
317. Once they find your page how do you get them to take action?