AdSense Auto ads vs manual placement
AdSense Auto ads vs manual placement: what Google's machine learning decides for you, what you give up in control and speed, and when to mix the two.
Writing
Notes from inside the data
We spend our days looking at what is actually ranking. Notes on niche research, Google updates, link prospecting and programmatic SEO — no listicles, and no predictions we cannot back with numbers.
How to find out who owns a website: 6 steps
How to find out who owns a website: run an ICANN RDAP lookup, expect redaction, ask the registrar or RDRS, then check legal pages, archives and records.
How to find when a page was published
How can I find when a webpage was published? Check the byline, structured data, sitemap lastmod and archive snapshots, and know why each can mislead.
Keywords a site ranks for: check yours or anyone else’s
See the keywords a site ranks for: Search Console shows real queries and average position for your own site; third-party tools estimate any other site.
How to check any website’s backlinks
How to check backlinks of a website, yours or a competitor's: what to read in a backlink report, how to run a link gap, and why tools disagree.
How to find all pages on a website: 5 methods
How to find all pages on a website: read the XML sitemap, run a site: search and a crawler, then check Search Console and your CMS. What each…
How to find a website’s sitemap
How to find a sitemap for a website: check robots.txt, try the common paths, read sitemap index files, and know when a site simply has no sitemap.
How to check if a page is indexed
How to check if a page is indexed by Google: URL Inspection for your own site, site: search for others, and why a passing live test is no…
Search Console verification, explained
Google Search Console domain verification needs a DNS record; URL-prefix properties have five methods. Which to use, and why verification can lapse.