In mid-August, SEOs started reporting a significant increase in Google rewriting page titles in the SERPs. While Google often adapts page titles to make them more relevant to user queries, the frequency and extent of changes being reported in the second half of August were extreme – and, at times, erroneous.
On 24 August, Google confirmed an algorithm update that adapted the search engines process for generating web page titles in SERP results.
“Last week, we introduced a new system of generating titles for web pages. Before this, titles might change based on the query issued. This generally will no longer happen with our new system. This is because we think our new system is producing titles that work better for documents overall, to describe what they are about, regardless of the particular query.” – Danny Sullivan, Search Liaison at Google
Regardless, the chatter from SEOs on social media suggested most were unhappy about losing further control over how their page titles show in search. On 27 September, Google updated its announcement of the update, thanking SEOs for the feedback and confirming that further changes had been made to the new system.
As a result, the frequency and degree of changes to page titles calmed from their peak in mind-August but Google still has more power over your page titles than before the update. Google insists that a “focus on good HTML title tags” is still important and published new guidelines for website owners on the Search Central website.
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