🐹 Hamsterdam Part 89: Weekly SEO & AI News Recap (3/9 to 3/15, 2025)
By Ethan Lazuk
Last updated:
A weekly look-back at SEO & AI news, tips, and other content shared on social media & beyond.
Opening notes, thoughts, and musings:
- Welcome to another new week of Hamsterdam! 🐹
- I appreciate you being here, and look forward to sharing the week’s news! 🙌
- Twitter embeds are still a little buggy. Hopefully they load for you!
If you’re in a rush, hop down to the news portion. 📰
Or continue reading for two vocabulary lessons plus an introduction.
And we’re off …
🧑💻 Marketing word of the week: “X-factor”
There’s not a lot of words in marketing that start with X, but X-factor is one of them.
An X-factor is a unique quality that makes a brand, product, service, or individual stand out. It’s something that can’t easily be replicated by competitors. An X-factor is often intangible, as well.
Examples of an X-factor could be Apple’s simplicity of design or Nike’s emotional branding around empowerment. (Yes, ChatGPT came up with those.)
A key benefit of having an X-factor is differentiation. It can help brands cut through the noise, especially in crowded markets.
🤖 AI word of the week: “XGBoost (eXtreme Gradient Boosting)”
XGBoost is an open-source machine learning algorithm used for classification and regression tasks due to its accuracy, efficiency, and speed.
How it works, in simple terms, is it builds a strong predictive model by combining many weak prediction models (usually decision trees), each improving upon the errors made by previous trees.
In other words, XGBoost uses a technique called gradient boosting to combine multiple simple decision trees sequentially. Each new tree corrects errors from the previous one, making predictions increasingly accurate.
😄 Introduction to week 89: Core update time
Welp, we have a core update in progress. Who’s excited?
That’s it. That’s the intro. LOL.
Thank you for supporting Hamsterdam and the cause of SEO & AI learning. 🙏
Enjoy the vibes:
Missed last week? Don’t worry, I got you! Read Part 88 to catch up.
🌟 Other great sources of weekly SEO news:
- The SEO Weekly – Garret Sussman, iPullRank
- SEOFOMO – Aleyda Solis
- Weekly Video Recaps – Barry Schwartz, SER
- Weekly SEO News YouTube channel – Olga Zarr, Seosly
- Niche Surfer – Yoyao Hsueh
Time for our weekly review of SEO social posts, articles, & more …
Now, let’s step inside the white flags of Hamsterdam …
⏩ Jump to a section:
- News, Google updates, & SERP tests
- SEO tips & tidbits
- Fundamentals & resources
- Articles, videos & case studies
- Local SEO
- Technical SEO
- Content marketing
- Local SEO
- Data analysis & reporting
- AI, LLMS, & machine learning
- Miscellaneous & general posts
- Older stuff that’s good!
Or keep scrolling to see it all. ⏬
📰 SEO news, Google updates, SERP tests & notable posts
Notable updates or news related to Google Search or related SEO topics.
🍟 SEO tips & tidbits
Actionable tips, cool tidbits, and other snackable findings and observations that can be teaching moments.
Essential information, concepts, or resources to learn about SEO or AI.
Longer-form content pieces shared on social, in newsletters, and elsewhere.
🧑💻 Technical SEO
Everything from basics to advanced moves (and also tools).
✍️ Content marketing
From what is helpful content to user journeys and beyond.
📍 Local SEO
From Google Business Profiles or reviews and more!
📊 Data analysis & reporting
Showing that what you’re doing is helping.
🤖 AI, machine learning, & LLMs
News related to models, papers, and companies.
🤔 General marketing & miscellaneous
This is for great content that isn’t necessarily SEO or marketing-specific. PPC, PR, dev, design, and social friends, check it out!
💎 Older stuff that’s good!
Not everything I find worth sharing is new as of this week, so these are gems I came across published in the past.
Great job making it to the end. You rock! 🪨
🤝 Want help with your SEO strategy?
I’m an independent SEO consultant focusing on custom audits and holistic strategies for brands. Don’t hesitate to reach out, or visit my about page for more information.
Let’s connect!
Hit me up anytime via text or call at 813-557-9745 or on social or email:
Cheers! ✌️
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