Digital Marketing Week in Review by Four Dots (October 2019, Week 1)

Welcome to Four Dots Digital Week in Review digest where you can find our wrap-up of the most relevant news and developments we came across whilst strolling through the ever-changing digital marketing landscape. 

This time around we have an interesting batch of engaging pieces of industry-related news, so – read away.

 

Facebook Stories Turn into Powerful Advertising Weapons

Facebook advertisers now have the opportunity to utilize Facebook Stories as a brand new ad channel. This means that businesses can add Facebook, Instagram and Messenger stories to start ad-induced conversations and drive more visibility and generate more leads. 

Facebook Story ads work like this: “Users can swipe up on Stories ads that have the new “Send Message” call to action to start a conversation with the business in Messenger without leaving the app they’re in.”

The new integration adds another layer of ad engagement, and with over 40 million active businesses present on Facebook (which translates into a 1.3 billion user base), this new advertising mechanism can indeed make a difference, especially in the long run. 

 

New Search Console Interface Now Has The “Change of Address” Tool

When moving from one (sub)domain to another, it is important to inform Google about your migration, as it helps your business maintain its ranking positions in the search results. Luckily, the new Search Console interface now features this useful utility. 

Here’s what Google’s Search Console team had to say:

“When you file a change of address request using Search Console, it tells Google to emphasize crawling and indexing your new site over crawling your old site. It also forwards various signals from the old site to the new site, and tells Google to prefer the new site over the old when determining canonical pages. These actions continue for 180 days after you start migration in Search Console.”

You should bear in mind that this Change of Address tool is to be used only in cases when you are changing the entire address of your website, not for moving from HTTP to HTTPS, for example. 

 

Google Ads’ Switch to Standard Delivery; API Update 

Back in August, Google Ads revealed the plan to remove the accelerated ad delivery option for Search/Shopping campaigns and shared budgets. Last week, Google officially reminded its users about the switch, while also issuing an updated list of error codes that will be returned for API and scripts users.

Microsoft follows suit as well. 

Starting on November 1, Microsoft’s Advertising Search, Dynamic Search Ads and Shopping campaigns will automatically switch to standard delivery.

 

Google Chrome Browser to Start Blocking Mixed Content

Starting from December 2019, Google Chrome will be blocking web pages containing mixed content. Mixed content refers to a secure web page (loaded through HTTPS) that also contains:

• Scripts
• Styles
• Images
• Other linked content

…that is served through the insecure HTTP protocol.

We recommend publishers check their content site-wide to make sure no resources are being loaded via the insecure HTTP protocol. “Mixed content degrades the security and user experience of your HTTPS site. Using these resources, an attacker can often take complete control over the page, not just the compromised resource,” say over at Google. 

Read more on why you need SSL on your site in Four Dots blog post: Use SSL/HTTPS To Rank & Look Better on Google.

 

WordPress 5.3 Adopts the UGC Nofollow Link Attribute

About a month ago, the link building landscape was shaken when Google announced their idea to evolve nofollow links. Now, the WordPress team revealed the upcoming WordPress 5.3 will be supporting Google’s UGC Nofollow attribute by default, which basically means that the links located in the comments section will automatically be using the UGC nofollow link attribute.

In a nutshell, the UGC Nofollow link attribute is a code that informs Google about links (in the context of user generated content) telling it these links should not be trusted.

 

Google Tag Manager gets a Community Template Gallery 

Good news for Google Tag Manager users as Google recently created a Community Template Gallery – an open platform where Google Tag Manager partners can share their tag templates. This gallery and its intuitive UI is expected to significantly reduce incorrect tag implementations. 

Google Tag Manager’s Community Template Gallery is available in both Tag Manager and Tag Manager 360.

 

Google Says H1 Are Not Critical (But They Are Useful)

During the recent Google Webmaster Hangout, John Mueller tackled the issue about H1 and their role in SEO. Apparently, H1s are not exactly the technical aspect of your content that can make or break your article. However, they are indeed useful, and tackling them properly can help your content rank better. Read more about the importance of H1 in this SEJ article. 

 

See you next week with more engaging news from the digital marketing industry!