Daily Search Forum Recap: February 11, 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.

Bing officially rolled out a preview of the new AI performance reports in Bing Webmaster Tools. Google updated its Googlebot crawler file size docs once again. Google added "sign in to customize" the top stories section. Google Business short names are being removed from profiles. Google lets you remove your sensistive information…

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Search Engine Roundtable

Google Updates Google’s Crawler File Size Limits Doc Again

Earlier this month, we reported that Google updated two of its help documents around Google’s crawler file size limits. Well, Google made a clarification to one of those documents the other day after some confusion within the SEO industry.

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Search Engine Roundtable

Meta Kicks Off New Data Center Project in Indiana

Meta’s 30th data center in the U.S. will help to power its AI ambitions.

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Social Media Today – Latest News

How Trend Spotting Helped One Supplement Company Stay Afloat after COVID-19

Naturecan, a supplier of high-quality CBD products, found that their organic traffic began to fall in 2020 — see how they used Exploding Topics to make a profitable, longlasting pivot.

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Unknown Source

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Ahrefs – Medium

Threads Expands Manual Algorithm Control Option

The option gives you the capacity to change what you see in your Threads feed.

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Social Media Today – Latest News

Anonymized Queries Make Up Nearly Half of Google Search Console Traffic

In April 2025, anonymized queries made up 46.77% of website traffic.

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Data & Studies – SEO Blog by Ahrefs

ChatGPT Has 12% of Google’s Search Volume but Google Sends 190x More Traffic to Websites

ChatGPT made headway into search in a short amount of time, even passing longtime search rivals like Bing.

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Data & Studies – SEO Blog by Ahrefs

Bing Webmaster Tools AI Performance Reports Go Live

A couple of weeks ago I reported Bing was beta testing a new AI performance report within Bing Webmaster Tools. These reports are now available as a public preview for all to see. Plus, Bing Webmaster Tools has a whole new slick design.

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Search Engine Roundtable

Google Business Short Names Being Dropped

Google will stop showing the business short names on Google Business Profiles in Search and Google Maps. The short name will still work, if you have one, but going forward, the link in your Google Business Profile will no longer be displayed to you or searchers.

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Search Engine Roundtable

Snapchat Adds AI Generated Bitmoji Option in Lens+

The new option will generate a Bitmoji for you, based on an image.

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Social Media Today – Latest News

How AI-driven shopping discovery changes product page optimization

Product pages supply the data AI uses to recommend products. Learn which details matter most for AI shopping discovery.

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Search Engine Land

Google releases preview of WebMCP – how AI agents interact with websites

Is this the new technical SEO frontier?

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Search Engine Land

What 4 AI search experiments reveal about attribution and buying decisions

AI search rarely appears in analytics, yet it shapes trust, shortlists, and sales velocity. These experiments show where measurement breaks.

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Search Engine Land

OpenAI details how ads will work in ChatGPT

OpenAI’s Assad Awan says ChatGPT ads let advertisers reach Free and Go users safely, with relevance and privacy built in.

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Search Engine Land

Claude Opus 4.6 vs. GPT-5.3 Codex: How I shipped 93,000 lines of code in 5 days

I tested GPT-5.3 Codex vs. Claude Opus 4.6 on real code, shipping 44 PRs in five days to see which AI model actually works best

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Lenny’s Newsletter

Why video is the canonical source of truth for AI and your brand’s best defense

A five-minute video provides more data for an LLM than most blog posts. Here’s how to maximize your brand’s surface area for AI retrieval.

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Search Engine Land

SEO Content in 2026: The Trends Marketers Can’t Afford to Ignore

Discover the SEO content trends set to define 2026, including key tactics you need to adopt to remain competitive and build visibility.

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Digitaloft

YouTube Expands Text of Variable Subscriber Notifications

YouTube will send you fewer channel notifications if you don’t engage with them

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Social Media Today – Latest News

Why Everyone Prompts AI Differently (Even When They Want the Same Thing) – SparkToro

Recently, I ran a tiny experiment. I asked eight mom friends — people very similar to me socioeconomically and with kids around the same age — to look up

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SparkToro

TikTok Launches Local Feed in the US

TikTok US brings its local content display to American users.

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Social Media Today – Latest News

Instagram Looks to Tap Into the Mini Drama Trend

Mini dramas are having a moment on TikTok, and Instagram’s now taken notice.

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Social Media Today – Latest News

Google Search Sign In To Customize Top Stories (Preferred Sources)

Google added a new button to the top stories section of Google Search named "Sign in to customize." This leads users who are not logged into Google to sign in, so those users can configfure there preferred sources in Google Search.

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Search Engine Roundtable

Give Google Your ID Numbers To Remove Results About You

Google announced a number of updates to help people find and remove personal information and sensitive imagery about themselves from Google. But you would need to give Google this information first, so Google can find it and then remove it.

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Search Engine Roundtable

Google Shares Coming AI-Powered Ad Innovations

Google’s head of ads and commerce has shared some insights into what’s coming.

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Social Media Today – Latest News

Google shares what’s next in digital advertising and commerce in 2026

Google’s GM of Ads outlines how AI and agentic commerce in 2026 will help advertisers create, target, and convert at the moment of decision.

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Search Engine Land

How to reduce low-quality leads from Performance Max campaigns

Performance Max often optimizes for cheap conversions by default. Learn how guardrails and better signals can improve lead quality.

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Search Engine Land

Google Ads simplifies product campaign tracking

Google Ads now shows per-product campaign eligibility, making gaps and overlaps easier to spot.

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Search Engine Land

Google Ads shows recommended experiments

Google Ads now suggests ready-to-run experiments, helping advertisers test optimizations faster and improve performance with less setup.

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Search Engine Land

PPC mistakes that humble even experienced marketers

From Friday launches to sloppy imports, PPC veterans share hard-earned lessons on automation traps, Google Ads Editor quirks, and more.

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Search Engine Land

Digital Marketing Operations Lead

At Qmatic, our purpose is clear: a world where everyone can access the services they need. For more than 40 years, we have shaped how people connect with essential servicesreducing friction, simplifying journeys, and enabling organizations across retail, finance, healthcare, and the public sector to deliver world-class customer experiences. Today, Qmatic operates as a truly […]

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In-house SEO jobs – SEOjobs.com

Digital Marketing Manager (SEO, SEM, Social, Programmatic)

Who We Are Oncourse Home Solutions (OHS) is a people-centric, $500M organization that is owned by private equity firm, Apax Partners operating under the brands American Water Resources, Pivotal Home Solutions and American Home Solutions. We do what is right for our people so they can do their best when serving our 1.9+ million customers […]

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In-house SEO jobs – SEOjobs.com

SEO/GEO/AEO Digital Marketing Manager

AppFolio is more than a company. We’re a community of dreamers, big thinkers, problem solvers, active listeners, and multipliers. At every opportunity, we set the pace while delivering innovation built to carry real estate into the future. One in which every experience feels effortless, yet meaningful. Where customers are empowered to take on any opportunity. […]

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In-house SEO jobs – SEOjobs.com

Sr. Manager of Digital Marketing (SEO, SEM, Content, Technical)

The Company: VeSync is a portfolio company with brands that cover different categories of health & wellness products. We wouldn’t be surprised if you have one of our Levoit air purifiers in your living room or a COSORI air fryer whipping up healthy and delicious meals for you every night. We’re a young and energetic […]

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Expert Level SEO Jobs – SEOjobs.com

Senior SEO Strategist

We’re looking for a Senior SEO Strategist to lead enterprise-level organic growth strategies across traditional search and modern discovery channels, including AI-powered SERPs, Google AI Overviews, and large language models (LLMs). In this role, you’ll own both strategy and execution for a portfolio of enterprise and high-growth clients. You’ll act as a trusted, client-facing advisor—translating complex technical […]

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SEO Agency Jobs – SEOjobs.com

Digital Marketing Project Manager (CSM)

As aDigital Marketing Project Manager (CSM), youll be responsible for developing and nurturing the client-agency relationship through professional, personal, and timely communication, working to maintain a collaborative partnership at all times. In addition, youll be responsible for being an extension of our client and coordinating all aspects of project management on our side. What You’ll […]

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SEO Agency Jobs – SEOjobs.com