How does the rapid growth of bots change the open web? More than half of the web’s traffic comes from bots: Imperva’s Bad Bot Report 2024 reveals that almost 50% of total internet traffic wasn’t human in 2024. Trend: declining. Cloudflare’s Radar shows ~70% human traffic and 30% from bots. Akami reports that 42% of…
We tend to craft budgets based on major objectives and real-world business timing. This makes sense, as our real-world priorities should influence where we put our marketing dollars and at what velocity. However, many don’t take the ad platform mechanics into consideration when setting initial, growth, and lower priority budgets. This can mean successful campaigns…
Google has quietly introduced a new AI Search experiment called Learn About, which summarizes content and offers navigational menus to explore related subtopics. This new way of exploring content uses drill-down navigational menus called Interactive Lists and if the user scrolls down far enough they will eventually find links to human created content. This new…
WP Engine escalated its Federal complaint by citing Automattic’s publication of the WP Engine Tracker website as evidence of intent to harm WP Engine and exposing customers to potential cybercrimes. The updated complaint incorporates recent actions by Mullenweg to further strengthen their case. A spokesperson for WP Engine issued a statement to Search Engine Journal…
Link building is a complicated art form with many different tactics and approaches. Despite being one of the most mature processes in SEO, there’s still much disagreement about what makes a “bad” or “good” link building strategy, including effectiveness vs. risk, and what tactics Google can detect or punish a website for. This post will…
To remain the most popular search engine in the world, Google has to continuously update its algorithm to continue delivering users useful results. To this end, Google also makes available Google Search Essentials, so everyone from web developers to SEO professionals knows the rules of the game. Of course, there are plenty of people who…
SE Ranking sponsored this post. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own. Wondering how AI is affecting your traffic? Want to learn how to get into the AI Overview at the top of SERPs? Miss the days when you could appear as the top result on a SERP? It’s possible to relive…
Google sent out an update to its Customer Match policy to advertisers yesterday, going into effect in January 2025. Customer Match allows advertisers to use their first-party data to reach people across many different campaign types, making it one of the most valuable features available for brands. The new policy change introduces new standards designed…
One of the most common questions in PPC management is how to determine the “right” budget and investment for campaigns. As a business leader investing in paid media, your PPC budget isn’t just about how much you spend. It’s about how strategically you use those resources to grow your business. For small to medium-sized businesses…
Automattic’s WP Engine Tracker website was temporarily blocked by Cloudflare over the weekend as a suspected phishing site, sparking cheers from members of the WordPress subreddit. Meanwhile, someone registered the typosquatting domain WPEngineTracker.com to protest against Matt Mullenweg. Automattic, presumably under the direction of Matt Mullenweg, recently created a website called WP Engine Tracker on…