Hey all,
I missed last week’s update, so here are the developments that actually matter from the past fortnight …
Google has been particularly busy - part search engine, part AI assistant and part enthusiastic furniture remover.
Enjoy 
Google Rolled Out an August Spam Update
Google completed a global spam update between 18 and 21 August. It has not revealed which spam systems were involved.
Review sites containing templated pages, automated supporting content or third-party publishing experiments are the obvious suspects to monitor. However, claims that Google specifically targeted AI content, links or parasite SEO remain speculation.
Google confirmed the update here.
What I’d do: Separate review pages, supporting content and parasite pages into different Search Console groups. Compare their performance from 22 August onwards before changing anything.
Rewriting half the site in a panic after three days of wobbling is where madness lies.
Some AI Visibility Data Was Wrong
Google also confirmed that a logging error understated Generative AI Search impressions from 13–17 August. Discover reporting was affected on 13 August too.
Google lists the reporting errors here.
What to do: Exclude those dates from comparisons and use traffic, affiliate clicks and conversions as supporting evidence.
Never draw a dramatic conclusion from broken data. Google already has enough people doing that for free.
Reddit Citations in ChatGPT Fell Sharply
Promptwatch reported that Reddit’s share of ChatGPT Search citations dropped from around 3.83% to 0.52% during mid-August.
That is an 86% fall, although the cause remains unconfirmed. Search Engine Land has the figures. I can definitely confirm I’ve been seeing the same thing in my travels.
Reddit can still rank in Google and influence buyers, but “mention the product on Reddit and wait for ChatGPT to repeat it” is clearly not much of a strategy.
What to test: Track 20 commercial product questions across ChatGPT and Google AI Mode. Record citations to Reddit, YouTube, your own sites and other publishers.
Citation sources can apparently disappear overnight without so much as a “cheers for your help.”
Parasite SEO Now Works Differently Across Europe
From 30 August, Google’s site reputation abuse manual actions stopped affecting results shown within the European Economic Area …
The UK is outside the EEA, so the demotion still applies here.
Inside the EEA, Google may instead separate the third-party section from its host and rank it independently. This is not necessarily a parasite SEO free-for-all. Google may simply remove the authority everyone was hoping to borrow.
Google explains the change here.
What I’d test: Monitor the same publisher-hosted review pages from the UK, Ireland and France. If their rankings diverge, we may now have two different parasite SEO environments separated by a short ferry journey.
Handy, really.
AI Overviews Are Getting Even Larger
Google is automatically expanding some AI Overviews instead of waiting for users to click “Show more”
That can place a fuller AI answer and an “Ask anything” box above the normal results. Google confirmed the experiment to The Verge.
A page can therefore keep its number-one ranking while being shoved considerably further down the screen.
… again, I can confirm seeing this quite a bit over the last 2 weeks - pushing my parasites even further down the page 
What to test: Track rankings, AI Overview size and CTR for 20 commercial queries. If position stays stable while CTR falls, the problem may be screen space rather than page quality.
Titles should promise something Google cannot summarise neatly: an original test, current pricing, personal results or a proper comparison.
Two Useful Automation Tests
OpenAI added a prompt-caching dashboard, making it easier to see how much repeated system instructions are costing. Put stable rules and schemas first, followed by the changing product information.
Google has also released Gemini 3.5 Transcribe, which can turn review videos into timestamped transcripts with speaker identification.
I’d test both on a small batch:
- Measure cache hits and cost per accepted article
- Extract claims, observations, FAQs and useful clips from existing videos
- Check everything before publication because “generally available” and “always works” remain distant cousins
The Main Takeaway
In a world where time doesn’t zoom by quite so quickly, my priorities would be:
- Separate the August spam-update impact by page type
- Ignore the faulty AI-reporting dates
- Compare parasite rankings inside and outside the EEA
- Measure SERP space and CTR - not rankings alone
Google can now leave your ranking untouched while placing an AI-generated novella above it.
Progress ??
Onwards!
- Rohan