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Magento News

Magento Marketplace moved to Magento Cloud
Magento has updated the Marketplace to run on Magento Commerce, AKA the Cloud. This change includes faster speeds, better search options, and improved differentiation between Magento 1 and Magento 2 extensions.

Magento Connect is closing
With this Marketplace update, and its ongoing success, Magento has decided to close Magento Connect and redirect traffic to the Marketplace. All extensions and themes should be moved to the Marketplace.

Solution Partners Reward Program
Magento has announced a new Partners rewards program, designed to recognize Magento community members who make significant contributions to the platform. The program will track these contributions by monitoring GitHub pull requests and using a point system. Awards will be made across four categories: quantity, complexity, special achievements, and area of expertise.

Google News

Search Console
This month, Google has been releasing new Beta features in Search Console to select users. The first is the Index Coverage report. This report is designed to help improve the sitemap area of Search Console by providing information on how many pages are indexed, why some could not be indexed, and how to fix these problems. The second feature is the AMP fixing flow, which will make it easier to find and fix AMP pages and have Google recrawl the site.

Maps
Businesses will now be able to have Questions and Answers in Google Maps for Android. This feature will allow businesses to post answer to frequently asked questions and will allow customers to post questions for a business to answer. By having these feature in Maps, users who are searching for your business will be able to find information quickly.

Chrome
We’ve been talking about the switch from HTTP to HTTPS for quite a while, and now the situation is becoming even more urgent. Starting in October, all HTTP web pages that have forms to input data will be marked as Not Secure. Most notably for eCommerce, this includes checkout pages where users enter shipping, billing, and payment information. More information about moving to HTTPS is available here.

AdWords
AdWords released three notable changes this month:
– Improved ad rotation: In a few weeks, ad rotation will have only “optimize” and “rotate indefinitely” settings. “Optimize” will automatically rotate ads to optimize for clicks, while “rotate indefinitely” will rotate them evenly.
– Landing Pages section: In the new AdWords experience, there is a new section underneath Ads & Extensions that will show you how your landing pages are doing. This page will show clicks and mobile-friendliness for each landing page URL, allowing you to optimize these pages for more conversions.
– Improved callout, snippets, and sitelinks on mobile: Mobile ad sitelinks will now be large buttons, making them easier to click. Callouts and snippets will be shown in-line in paragraph form, rather than below the ad.

Shopping Ads
Google image search results are now sometimes displaying images with a “Product” tag if the items is actually available for purchase. They are not paid shopping ads, but can display if merchants use the proper markup.