March 2025 Core Update Rolling Out

[newcustomeroffer]

Google have confirmed that the March 2025 Core Update is rolling out and will take around 2 weeks to complete: https://status.search.google.com/inc...wifjDjfrVdaZUx

[casionmark]

It's been in the post for a while. Saw some very big changes last week of Feb. See if they stick now.

[baldidiot]

Yeah as always the changes started a week or two ago, so I had a feeling this was about to be announced.

[newcustomeroffer]

Yeah it's funny how the fluctuations start way before they announce the update now, whether that's to try to put SEOs off the scent as much as possible or genuine pre-update tweaking impossible to tell. Maybe a bit of both.

[allfreechips]

Not seeing much, lil increase across the board on all sites but nothing to be excited about

[newcustomeroffer]

Some notes on the update from Barry Schwartz plus some soundbites from a few around the web: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-...ate-39060.html

[baldidiot]

Yeah it's funny how the fluctuations start way before they announce the update now, whether that's to try to put SEOs off the scent as much as possible or genuine pre-update tweaking impossible to tell. Maybe a bit of both.

Quite often it seems that by the time they announce it, it's almost fully rolled out.

[casionmark]

AI Overviews looks like its getting bigger and more detailed for some queries.

Also noticing it creeping in for transactional searches in gambling. e.g. 'best slot sites', 'online slot sites'. Its more like a super-charged featured snippet or a mini affiliate page created on the fly. Takes all its recommendations from OLBG, Gambling_.com and WhichBingo so channeling any clicks their way.
Wonder if they'll start adding a click direct to the casino to bypass the affiliate completely?

[PaulEchere]

Quite often it seems that by the time they announce it, it's almost fully rolled out.

Probably quite true, as many here have pointed out that changes and fluctuations started quite some time ago.

[bpmee]

AI Overviews looks like its getting bigger and more detailed for some queries.
....
Wonder if they'll start adding a click direct to the casino to bypass the affiliate completely?

It's getting close to that already, and it's happening in multiple industries. Worse if you used to review retail products: now Google stacks the top of every SERP with its own carousel, shopping results, and AI summaries. You need to scroll a mile just to find the 3-4 sites it scraped to produce the results.

If Google does begin bypassing affiliates, they'll need to get licensed in the USA if they intend to make money. Otherwise, they'll be giving away players for free.

Not seeing too many disruptions yet, though it appears most US gambling SERPs are now some combination of:
1. FanDuel, DraftKings, BetMGM
2. GDC
3. Covers, SBR reboot
4. BettorCollective here and there.

That's about it.
ETA: SEO work at any of the above is life on easy mode unless you have a C-Suite exec intent on owning the #1 spot for trophy keywords.

[casionmark]

Yes, no question this is the direction of travel, speeding up by looks of things. Haven't seen ads mixed into AI overviews yet but maybe its coming.

Also, they might not link direct to the casinos from AI / carousels, but back to branded search results where they hope to pick up a paid ad click instead. Many brands bid on their own brand keywords.

[eenzoo]

Baidu is a great example how Google will look like in no time. 15% of "natural" serps in best case who deliver a fraction of clicks.
But again, Google is a profit organization, just buildt to make profit, not to do someone (unneeded affiliates) a favor.
Search behavior is correleting. Its more navigational than really an open search.
If someone is looking for 5 good online casinos, (imo) no one is up to read nonsenseless 2000 words reviews.
Just to get some ok results is ok for majority. AI search will answer the deeper questions.

Honestly, i dont care about Google updates anymore. This SEO/content based business its over.

[bpmee]

Sadly, that may well be the track we're on. With AI's ability to spin content while simultaneously updating is LLM (Large Language Model) using readily available free content, trying to compete at very a generic level would be self-defeating.

[Manpreet Iyer]

Another week 2 times there has been a noticeable update to the rendition. Let's see what has changed in these 2 weeks.

[casionmark]

It's getting close to that already, and it's happening in multiple industries. Worse if you used to review retail products: now Google stacks the top of every SERP with its own carousel, shopping results, and AI summaries. You need to scroll a mile just to find the 3-4 sites it scraped to produce the results.

If Google does begin bypassing affiliates, they'll need to get licensed in the USA if they intend to make money. Otherwise, they'll be giving away players for free.

Not seeing too many disruptions yet, though it appears most US gambling SERPs are now some combination of:
1. FanDuel, DraftKings, BetMGM
2. GDC
3. Covers, SBR reboot
4. BettorCollective here and there.

That's about it.
ETA: SEO work at any of the above is life on easy mode unless you have a C-Suite exec intent on owning the #1 spot for trophy keywords.

Looks like links back to further search results are being embedded in AI Overviews already:

https://www.seroundtable.com/google-...lts-39074.html

Predictable.

[baldidiot]

Looks like links back to further search results are being embedded in AI Overviews already:

https://www.seroundtable.com/google-...lts-39074.html

Predictable.

For google it's a incredibly smart decision. Rather than just linking out to the site, you loop them back to branded search results and get people to click on the ads for that brand. It's actually a very elegant solution to the problem of monetising AI summaries.

Sucks for us, but I don't think google really care too much about that...

[wonderpunter]

Not seen any movemnt on my sites, I see that some massive sites got smashed to bits.. Techopedia and like , mostly Reputation typoe abuse sites being delat with

[bpmee]

For google it's a incredibly smart decision. Rather than just linking out to the site, you loop them back to branded search results and get people to click on the ads for that brand. It's actually a very elegant solution to the problem of monetising AI summaries.

Sucks for us, but I don't think google really care too much about that...

I predict Google eventually becomes an AI information provider and engine similar to ChatGPT. The classic 10 search results - as we know them - will disappear entirely and give way to AI panels with almost non-existent source citations. GoogleBot will continue crawling the web to power the AI results.

Ironically, people will begin blocking GoogleBot because they aren't making money from the content they've produced.

Then, the battle will be between AI information providers and an atomized galaxy of 3rd party information providers comprising affiliates, journalists, bloggers, and the vast majority of small to mid-sized businesses.

Either something rises to index and organize the 3rd parties, or they slowly die out collecting whatever scraps of type-in traffic they can get from media buys, or the occasional bone thrown to them by an AI source citation.

It may also be the case that general knowledge and somewhat specialized knowledge text authorship is almost dead, like calling a typist to organize handwritten notes. Let's be honest, there's not much "original" knowledge in the gambling space as most of it is derived from probability and stats for closed systems like casino games. What's unique and new in sports or horse racing are mostly picks, predictions, news, and questionable "systems" ultimately subject to same mathematical constraints already explained decades ago.

There's really not much "new" under the sun when it comes to gambling content. What's "new" is how you acquire customers. I suspect organic SEO is now an "old" and dying acquisition method subject to innovative pressures. I'm curious to see what's next...

[baldidiot]

I predict Google eventually becomes an AI information provider and engine similar to ChatGPT. The classic 10 search results - as we know them - will disappear entirely and give way to AI panels with almost non-existent source citations. GoogleBot will continue crawling the web to power the AI results.

If that happens they will lose at least some of their market share. I don't use chatgpt at all and I don't really like AI search results so I just skip over them. This is nothing to do with running sites, I just don't like a random mish mash of information and would rather read it from one source (and know who it's from).

So if that's what google becomes, then I'd probably find another traditional search engine.

And, like you say, the other thing to bear in mind is that if search traffic from google becomes too low, people probably would block it, which reduces what it has available as a source.

This doesn't really matter for casino review sites or slot blogs that cover info that's been covered 1000 times before, but when it comes to unique or novel information it could be a problem. Especially for things like news.

I suspect there will be some kind of equilibrium. Google will send just enough traffic to people to keep them happy with googlebot crawling their sites.

Either that or an alternative form of monetisation - it's not beyond imagination to see a scenario where people are paid for content by google. This has been discussed many many times, including in court, and has led to things like this: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy4pvgjklevo

This model is exactly what ahrefs are using for their search engine as well: https://yep.com/about/

[newcustomeroffer]

This update has been marked as complete as of the 27th March: https://status.search.google.com/incidents/zpmwuSwifjDjfrVdaZUx