Google Ads PMax Asset Group Theming

Google Ads is rolling out asset group theming for Performance Max campaigns. This lets you copy an asset group and apply this theme to your text and images using Google AI.

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Google May Call, Text or WhatsApp To Confirm Business Details

Google is sending out emails with updates on how Google Business Profiles may verify your business details. Google said it may "reach out using automated messages via call, text, or WhatsApp to the verified phone number on your Business Profile."

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Google Chimes In On Teen SEO Wants To Save Family Spain Vacation Rental

Google's John Mueller chimed in on Reddit when a teenager of a family vacation rental business said he was trying to save his family business through SEO after being burned by previous SEOs. In short, it seems the family has a vacation rental in Spain, and business is significantly down due to the loss of Google traffic.

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Is Google Ditching Blue Background For AI Citations?

New test places AI Overview citations on a white background without throwing any shade behind it.

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Bing Gives Product Ads Some Cushion

Bing spotted testing more listings in the sponsored product section at the top of its results.

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Google Ads Expanding Loyalty Program

Google Ads and Merchant Center is expanding the Loyalty program features to highlight key perks, expand local and regional visibility, expand internationally and within AI Mode and Gemini.

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Google March 2026 Core Update Is Rolling Out - First Core Update Of Year

Google officially announced the rollout of the March 2026 core update early Friday morning at around 5:14 ET. This core update is expected to take up to 2 weeks to roll out. Google said this "is a regular update designed to better surface relevant, satisfying content for searchers from all types of sites."

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Google Ads PMax Audience Exclusions & New Reporting

Google announced several new steering updates for Google Ads Performance Max including first-party audience exclusions, budget reporting, full audience reporting and network segmentation in placement reporting.

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Bing Testing Rounded Corners On Short Videos

Microsoft Bing is testing using rounded corners on short videos and normal videos within the Bing search results interface. Bing used to show these as squared-off edges.

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Google To Expand Shopping Ads To 15 New European Markets

Google is reportedly expanding Shopping Ads eligibility to 15 additional European markets. This is a two phase roll out over the coming months...

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Google Ads Retires Several Old Ad Format Requirements

On March 17, 2026, Google retired some of its Google Ads policies on Ad format requirements. These are specific to "old ad formats that are no longer in use are also being retired," Ginny Marvin of Google.

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Google AI Mode Tests Changing Some Links To Overlay Cards - Reducing Clicks

Google is testing changing out some of the links within AI Mode to show as overlay cards, instead of take you directly to the website it is mentioning. This obviously will result in fewer direct clicks to those websites.

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Google Tests Reply To Reviews With Al

Google is testing encouraging business owners to reply to reviews using AI. There is a new option in the Google Business Profile dashboard that is showing for some businesses that says "Reply to reviews with AI."

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Bing Webmaster Tools AI Performance Reports Add Grounding Queries To Pages

In February, Bing rolled out new AI Performance reports within Bing Webmaster Tools. Bing announced a new feature for this report that connects the Grounding Queries and Pages views within the AI Performance report.

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Local Ads Coming To Apple Maps

Apple is reportedly launching local ads within Apple Maps, as soon as this month. "Apple Inc. is preparing to introduce advertising in its Maps app, part of a broader push to generate more money from services," Bloomberg wrote.

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Google Business Profiles Gains Place Page Attributes

Google seems to have added a new section to the Google Business Profiles section named Place page attributes. Place page attributes allows you to let customers know more about your business by showing attributes on your Business Profile. These may appear publicly on Search, Maps, and other Google services.

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First ChatGPT Ads Share Little Data To Advertisers

The Information wrote "OpenAI's First Advertisers Can't Prove ChatGPT Ads Work." In short, the ChatGPT ad platform from OpenAI shares almost no data with advertisers. It is low tech, there is no ad performance data, and it also has very limited ad targeting features.

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Google Using AI to Create Title Links on SERP

Google confirms it is using AI to create title links on the SERP instead of headlines from news publishers, sometimes.

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Google Adds Google-Agent User Agent

Google has added a new user-agent to the user-triggered fetchers named Google-Agent. Google said the "Google-Agent user agent is rolling out over the next few weeks, and will be used by Google agents hosted on Google infrastructure to navigate the web and perform actions upon user request."

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AI Overviews Showing For Breaking News More Often And Above Top Stories

News publishers will not be happy to learn that AI Overviews seem to be ranking for breaking news more and more. I noticed this several times recently and shared about it on X yesterday...

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Daily Search Forum Recap: March 19, 2026

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web. A lot of you are emailing me where did the newsletter go. You may not have seen it, but I need several days off...

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Google Expands Personal Intelligence As Jarvis Approaches

Google announced that Personal Intelligence is expanding across AI Mode in Search, the Gemini app, and in Gemini in Chrome to all users in the U.S. When Personal Intelligence first rolled out...

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Google "Developing" Opt-Out of Generative AI Features in Search

A new response from Google to the UK's CMA revels that Google is working on developing an Opt-Out for Generative AI search features.

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Bing Business Profiles With Image Slider

Microsoft Bing now has an image slider in the Bing Business Profiles local panel. So when you find a business listing and that business listing has photos associated with its Business Profile, Bing will let you slide through those images on the search results page.

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Live Sports Data In Google AI Mode

Google's AI Mode is showing entity cards with a live score of ongoing sports events.

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Google Officially Removes "What People Suggest" Health SERP Feature

In March of 2025 Google announced a new SERP feature that would organize and surface health conversations from online discussions. For example, from Reddit, X, Facebook...

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Are Local Packs Losing Their Call Buttons?

A new study points to there being a low rate of call button appearances in Local Packs.

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Google News Support Team Still Advices You Go To Search Liaison For Updates

As you know, Google's Danny Sullivan stepped down from his role as the Search Liaison, and that support channel closed down on August 1, 2025. That isn't stopping Google News support team from advising publishers to follow the Google Search Liaison account for updates.

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PMax Channel Reporting Gets Video Segmentation Option

Hana Kobzova has spotted a new segmentation option within the Performance Max (PMax) Channel Reporting that allows advertisers to view data from ads with video as well as without video...

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Store Tab Appearing in Google Shopping

Google appears to have added a "Stores" button in Google Shopping.

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New Google Business Profile Playbooks With Local Optimization Tips

Google just emailed site owners about new Google Business Profile Playbooks containing recommendations for optimizing local listings. Daniel Hale pinged me on LinkedIn about this the other day after receiving the email...

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Is Google Hitting Self-Promotional Listicles Hard Again?

Is continuing rank volatility again impacting sites focusing on self-serving listicles? Industry chatter seems to indicate so.

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Google Ads Hold Music Driving Some Advertisers Crazy

Have you ever waited on hold for support with Google Ads? Do you enjoy the hold music that Google selected for your wait time? Well, some advertisers say it can drive you crazy.

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Google Tests Instagram Knowledge Panel Design

Google is testing a new knowledge panel design for when you search for an Instagram account of a notable person. Google will display the individual's knowledge panel, promoting the Instagram card higher up in that panel.

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Googleâs AI Mode Checking For Personalized Information

A look at how personalization without opt-in to connect other Google properties, such as Gmail, appears in AI Mode.

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Branded Queries Filter Rolling Out in Search Console

Branded queries filtering is now available for all eligible sites within Search Console.

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Google Launches Merchant Center For Agencies

A new agency-dedicated experience Merchant Center experience from Google should streamline management

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Google Search Your Related Activity Adds Chart

Google has offered this feature that shows you your past searches, including being able to see your related activity searches from the Google Search results. Now, it seems, Google added a chart to show that search activity over time.

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Survey Says: PPC is Harder Than It Was 2 Years Ago

A new survey from the aptly named PPCsurvey.com shows that the majority of PPC practitioners believe that PPC is getting MORE difficult.

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Google Search Console Crawl Stats Date Toggle/Selector Buggy

Google seems to have a bug with the Crawl Stats report in Google Search Console. The date selector appears to be acting a bit weird, where it doesn't let you select the before or after date.

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Google Ads Sends Notices For European Union Political Ads

Google has sent notices to some advertisers asking them to confirm whether their campaigns contain European Union political content. The deadline to confirm is by March 31, 2026.

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Bing With Asian Owned Labels On Microsoft Ads

A few years ago, Microsoft Advertising the support of Asian owned labels and attributes on its search ads within Bing. Google has a similar attribute, by the way. Honestly, I've never seen the label on Bing, until now.

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Google Ads Customer Match Data Uploads Changes Coming April 1

Google sent out emails to some advertisers about changes coming to the Customer Match uploads in the Google Ads APl. After April 1, 2026, those data uploads are no longer going to work in the Google Ads API and must be done in the Data Manager API instead.

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Google Adds Build to Order Attribute For Vehicle Listings

Google has added a new attribute to the Google Merchant Center availability options within vehicle listings. The new one is named "Build to order" and only works for Google Vehicle ads.

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Google Tests Bold Site Names In Search Results

Google is testing bolding the site names in the search results. We've seen Google bold many other elements of the search result snippet, but I don't think I've covered Google testing bolding the site name portion of the search snippet.

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Google Confirms Discover Feed Shows More Social Posts

Google has reportedly confirmed that the Google Discover feed has recently increased how often it shows social media posts in the feed. We covered this in January, and while we know Google does show social media in the Discover feed, it seems Google is more likely to show these social media posts more often now.

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Google Knowledge Panels With Colored Table Elements Sections Rolling Out

Google seems to be rolling out colorful sections in the knowledge panels. Sometimes you will see gray, sometimes blue, sometimes orange and sometimes green and maybe more. We saw this on mobile over a decade ago, so this does seem new, especially on desktop.

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Google Help Document On Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) Checkout

Google has published a new help document titled About the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) and UCP-powered checkout feature on Google. This was published in the Google Merchant Center help documentation section.

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Google Search Ranking Volatility Heated Into March

Google Search rankings remain heated into March - I mean, I can post about this every day but now I am at the point of just doing it weekly. We thought things might be cooling a bit, but the volatility really has not cooled much at all.

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Google Ads Label: Sponsored Options In The Area

Google Ads has often used dynamic labels for some of the ad groupings. I mean, we've seen tons of variations of these and I am not sure if they mean anything specific. But here is one that caught my eye, this is titled "Sponsored options in the area."

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