False recoveries and dead-cat bounces: the traps

False recoveries and dead-cat bounces: the traps
This week on the radar: why early 'recovery' often isn't.

Read this
— Search Engine Roundtable — logs the mid-rollout swings where sites recover, then drop again before the update completes.
— Moz — analyses warning against celebrating day-3 movement during a multi-week rollout.

Chatter
— Practitioners describe the 'dead-cat bounce': a partial rebound during rollout that reverses by the end date. Reading it as recovery leads to wrong conclusions about what worked.

The even-handed rule of thumb: don't measure recovery until the dashboard marks the update 'completed', then give it a settling week.

One to bookmark: Roundtable's daily rollout logs — they capture the intra-update whipsaw most dashboards smooth over.