Playbook: prove a drop is an update, not seasonality

Playbook: prove a drop is an update, not seasonality
Before you blame a core update, rule out the calendar. The checklist most teams skip:

— Step 1: Pull a year-over-year overlay in GA4, not week-over-week — Search Engine Land notes WoW hides Q4/Q1 demand swings that mimic algo hits.
— Step 2: Segment by query intent in GSC — if only commercial queries fell while informational held, that points to algo, not demand.
— Step 3: Check brand vs non-brand split — brand-search collapse usually means a PR/seasonality issue, not ranking loss.
— Step 4: Overlay the official Google ranking-updates page dates on your impression graph.
— Step 5: Compare to a control page you didn't touch.

Order matters: confirm the date alignment last, after you've excluded demand. A drop that started 6 days before the rollout isn't the update.

One to bookmark: Google's Search Status Dashboard for confirmed rollout windows to anchor your timeline against.