Many people who don't work in the web assume that website operators have the ability to control how search results for their web properties are displayed in Google search. This is fundamentally not true. Google provides only limited ability for website operators to control how Google displays search results.
Because of this, if you operate a website, always be clear with your stakeholders that you cannot guarantee any particular outcome when it comes to Google search results. If you have web content that you would like removed from search results, or you are seeing search results that seem outdated and you would like Google to update them, the following tactics are recommended by Google and often (but not always) work--eventually.
Getting Google to Update Search Results for a Web Page
Use this approach if you have updated the content of a web page and want Google to update the search results it displays for that page.
Caution: Understand that this process is not absolute. Avoid committing to stakeholders guarantees or timelines about how Google will update search results.
- Sign in to Google Search Console and follow both the 'URL Inspection' method and the 'Submit Sitemap' method described in Ask Google to Recrawl your URLs.
- Check Google Search Results daily and monitor Google Search Console for status updates.
Removing a Web Page from Google Search
Use this approach if you notice a web page in Google Search, and you would like Google to no longer include it.
Caution: Understand that this process usually works, but there is no guarantee. Avoid committing or guaranteeing any specific outcome on any specific timeline.
- Sign in to Google Search Console and follow the directions described in the Temporarily Block a URL section of their help page.
- Wait a day and check the Google Search Console Removals report for status messages and verify removal in Google Search results. Note that if the page still exists and no other steps have been taken to block Google from indexing that page, the page is likely to re-appear in search results within approximately six months.