Handstand On Google NYC’s Rooftop 05 September 2019 Website Marketing News Online marketing is an ever-changing landscape and keeping up with the latest trends is vital to your success. Google’s search engine continues to become more sophisticated in order to give its users the best experience, and you need to know what it’… Copyright 2020 High Level Studios LLC.
Google Posts Help Advice For Sites Impacted By Core Updates Finally, we knew this was coming, and now it is here, Google posted advice on what you can do it help your site perform better in the Google search rankings in the days of Google’s core algorithm updates. This is despite Google saying there is no fix, they repeated, there is no fix, but Google is trying to help site owners focus more on overall quality. First of all, this reminds me about the post about update about updates — updates to our search algorithms. Double Down on No Fix. Google said it again, there is no fix. Google wrote “We know those with sites that experience drops will be looking for a fix, and we want to ensure they don’t try to fix the wrong things. Moreover, there might not be anything to fix at all.” Google added “As explained, pages that drop after a core update don’t have anything wrong to fix. This said, we understand those who do less well after a core update change may still feel they need to do something.” Google added this: There’s nothing wrong with pages that may perform less well in a core update. They haven’t violated our webmaster guidelines nor been subjected to a manual or algorithmic action, as can happen to pages that do violate those guidelines. In fact, there’s nothing in a core update that targets specific pages or sites. Instead, the changes are about improving how our systems assess content overall. These changes may cause some pages that were previously under-rewarded to do better. One way to think of how a core update operates is to imagine you made a list of the top 100 movies in 2015. A few years later in 2019, you refresh the list. It’s going to naturally change. Some new and wonderful movies that never existed before will now be candidates for inclusion. You might also reassess some films and realize they deserved a higher place on the list than they had before. The list will change, and films previously higher on the list that move down aren’t bad. There are simply more deserving films that are coming before them. Got it – no fix. Here Is What You Can Fix. Okay, so you can’t fix anything but since us annoying SEOs don’t stop pestering you about advice, you decided to give us some advice. What is that advice? Three folds (1) look at the Panda advice, (2) here is a list of stuff you can think about not in the Panda advice and (3) look at the quality raters guidelines and focus in on the EAT section. (1) Panda advice: Google points to the advice it gave in 2011 named More guidance on building high-quality sites saying “a starting point is to revisit the advice we’ve offered in the past on how to self-assess if you believe you’re offering quality content.” (2) Updated list of advice : Here is an updated list of advice from Google “with a fresh set of questions to ask yourself about your content” broken into (a) Content and quality questions, (b) Expertise questions, (c) Presentation and production questions and (d) Comparative questions: (A) Content and quality questions Does the content provide original information, reporting, research or analysis? Does the content provide a substantial, complete or comprehensive description of the topic? Does the content provide insightful analysis or interesting information that is beyond obvious? If the content draws on other sources, does it avoid simply copying or rewriting those sources and instead provide substantial additional value and originality? Does the headline and/or page title provide a descriptive, helpful summary of the content? Does the headline and/or page title avoid being exaggerating or shocking in nature? Is this the sort of page you’d want to bookmark, share with a friend, or recommend? Would you expect to see this content in or referenced by a printed magazine, encyclopedia or book? (B) Expertise questions Does the content present information in a way that makes you want to trust it, such as clear sourcing, evidence of the expertise involved, background about the author or the site that publishes it, such as through links to an author page or a site’s About page? If you researched the site producing the content, would you come away with an impression that it is well-trusted or widely-recognized as an authority on its topic? Is this content written by an expert or enthusiast who demonstrably knows the topic well? Is the content free from easily-verified factual errors? Would you feel comfortable trusting this content for issues relating to your money or your life? (C) Presentation an production questions Is the content free from spelling or stylistic issues? Was the content produced well, or does it appear sloppy or hastily produced? Is the content mass-produced by or outsourced to a large number of creators, or spread across a large network of sites, so that individual pages or sites don’t get as much attention or care? Does the content have an excessive amount of ads that distract from or interfere with the main content? Does content display well for mobile devices when viewed on them? (D) Comparative questions Does the content provide substantial value when compared to other pages in search results? Does the content seem to be serving the genuine interests of visitors to the site or does it seem to exist solely by someone attempting to guess what might rank well in search engines? (3) Quality raters guidelines and EAT: Then Google says you should really dig into the quality raters guidelines with a focus on the EAT section. Google said “If you understand how raters learn to assess good content, that might help you improve your own content. In turn, you might perhaps do better in Search.” “In particular, raters are trained to understand if content has what we call strong E-A-T. That stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness. Reading the guidelines may help
Daily Search Forum Recap: August 1, 2019 Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web. Search Engine Roundtable Stories: Signs Of Another Google Search Ranking Algorithm Update I am seeing signs both in terms of early chatter within the SEO community and industry and the automated tracking tools of an update brewing. The update may have started some time last night, but let’s say this is currently an unconfirmed August 1st update. Google has not pre-announced any core update but who knows. Google My Business Has People Also Search For Feature? Keyser Holiday shared screen shots in the Local Search Forums showing how a local knowledge panel had the people also search for / people also ask feature in the local knowledge panel for a business listing. What is even more confusing is that you can edit the contents of what the people also search for as well! Interesting Google Search Ranking Tidbits From A Private Dinner In 2017 With Gary Illyes Dan Shure posted on his podcast his audio notes from after a private dinner with Gary Illyes of Google from April 4th 2017. Basically, they had a dinner, after the dinner when Dan got into his car, he took audio notes of what he remembered from that dinner. Google Suggested Clips Play In Search, No Longer Take You To YouTube Google has recently changed it so the suggested clip, where Google search jumps you to a portion of the video with the answer you are looking for, no longer takes you into YouTube.com. Instead, it overlays a window, a modal, that plays the video in a black frame above the Google search results. Beware: Google Ads Expands Broad & Phrase Match To Include Keyword Close Variants Yesterday, Google announced that in the coming weeks broad match modifier and phrase match keywords will also begin matching to words within the search query that share the same meaning as the keyword. The SEM/PPC community is not surprised but still very frustrated by this news. Google Wolf Wall Google has a room in its Dublin office with a wolf coming out of it, or at least some sort of artistic looking wolf. I wonder if people walk into it by accident when walking to the other side of the Other Great Search Forum Threads: Related searches carousel within medical knowledge panel #google #serp #mobile https://t.co/BP0euNu0IA, Valentin Pletzer on Twitter Chrome 76 Blocks Flash by Default, Has Better PWAs Installs, WebmasterWorld Chrome’s Lighthouse now shows costly third-party resources in your page and the size/time to load them: https://t.co/FYpJT9P7C9. Available in the extension today or DevTools in ~Chrome 77: https://t.co/7Usf0s3Ewe https://t.co, Addy Osmani on Twitter Google getting planet scales wrong https://t.co/wq5Bs4wuuT https://t.co/BDMsUmrpq6, Space Facts on Twitter August 2019 AdSense Earnings & Observations, WebmasterWorld I completely lost my trust in “Content Is King”, BlackHatWorld Search Engine Land Stories: Demystifying visibility metrics in Google Ads New guide–Local Marketing Solutions for Multi-Location Businesses Bing is asking for feedback on its Webmaster Guidelines Google extends same-meaning close variants to phrase match, broad match modifiers Video: IBM’s SEO, Tanu Javeri, on importance of internal linking and video SEO Google App campaigns expand to Discover feeds, AdMob testing ads on app loading screens Other Great Search Stories: Analytics A new way to unify app and website measurement in Google Analytics, Google Blog Digital Debrief – New App + Web Properties in Google Analytics, Krista Seiden Industry & Business Google widens holdings for downtown San Jose transit village, Mercury News Links & Promotion Building Producing Holiday Content That Performs, Searchmetrics Building your outreach list, Builtvisible Local & Maps Apple Maps in iOS 13: Sights Set on Google, MacStories Low-Hanging Technical SEO Fruit for Local Ranking, Street Fight Google Maps 10.22.0 Beta Is Available To Download With Bug Fixes And Improvements, TechHX Google Tweaks Local Scroll Pack Yet Again, Mike Blumenthal Have you claimed your Apple Maps listing?, BizWest Mobile & Voice Get help from the Google Assistant on your DISH Hopper, Google Blog Google Assistant Updates feed adds music, weather cards, 9to5Google The complete list of Google Home and Google Assistant commands so far, CNET SEO The Local SEO Data Jackpot You Missed: Google Analytics – Search Console Integration, Local Visibility System PPC New innovations to grow your app business with ads, Google Blog 3 Common Reasons Marketers Don’t Invest in CRO, PPC Hero Search Features 100 million people free up phone space with the Files app, Google Blog Copyright 2020 High Level Studios LLC.
What webmasters should know about Google’s “core updates” What webmasters should know about Google’s “core updates”Each day, Google usually releases one or more changes designed to improve our search results. Most aren’t noticeable but help us incrementally continue to improve. Sometimes, an update may be more noticeable. We aim to confirm such updates when we feel there is actionable information that webmasters, content producers or others might take in relation to them. For example, when our “Speed Update” happened, we gave months of advanced notice and advice. Several times a year, we make significant, broad changes to our search algorithms and systems. We refer to these as “core updates.” They’re designed to ensure that overall, we’re delivering on our mission to present relevant and authoritative content to searchers. These core updates may also affect Google Discover. We confirm broad core updates because they typically produce some widely notable effects. Some sites may note drops or gains during them. We know those with sites that experience drops will be looking for a fix, and we want to ensure they don’t try to fix the wrong things. Moreover, there might not be anything to fix at all. Core updates & reassessing content There’s nothing wrong with pages that may perform less well in a core update. They haven’t violated our webmaster guidelines nor been subjected to a manual or algorithmic action, as can happen to pages that do violate those guidelines. In fact, there’s nothing in a core update that targets specific pages or sites. Instead, the changes are about improving how our systems assess content overall. These changes may cause some pages that were previously under-rewarded to do better. One way to think of how a core update operates is to imagine you made a list of the top 100 movies in 2015. A few years later in 2019, you refresh the list. It’s going to naturally change. Some new and wonderful movies that never existed before will now be candidates for inclusion. You might also reassess some films and realize they deserved a higher place on the list than they had before. The list will change, and films previously higher on the list that move down aren’t bad. There are simply more deserving films that are coming before them. Focus on content As explained, pages that drop after a core update don’t have anything wrong to fix. This said, we understand those who do less well after a core update change may still feel they need to do something. We suggest focusing on ensuring you’re offering the best content you can. That’s what our algorithms seek to reward. A starting point is to revisit the advice we’ve offered in the past on how to self-assess if you believe you’re offering quality content. We’ve updated that advice with a fresh set of questions to ask yourself about your content: Content and quality questions Does the content provide original information, reporting, research or analysis? Does the content provide a substantial, complete or comprehensive description of the topic? Does the content provide insightful analysis or interesting information that is beyond obvious? If the content draws on other sources, does it avoid simply copying or rewriting those sources and instead provide substantial additional value and originality? Does the headline and/or page title provide a descriptive, helpful summary of the content? Does the headline and/or page title avoid being exaggerating or shocking in nature? Is this the sort of page you’d want to bookmark, share with a friend, or recommend? Would you expect to see this content in or referenced by a printed magazine, encyclopedia or book? Expertise questions Does the content present information in a way that makes you want to trust it, such as clear sourcing, evidence of the expertise involved, background about the author or the site that publishes it, such as through links to an author page or a site’s About page? If you researched the site producing the content, would you come away with an impression that it is well-trusted or widely-recognized as an authority on its topic? Is this content written by an expert or enthusiast who demonstrably knows the topic well? Is the content free from easily-verified factual errors? Would you feel comfortable trusting this content for issues relating to your money or your life? Presentation and production questions Is the content free from spelling or stylistic issues? Was the content produced well, or does it appear sloppy or hastily produced? Is the content mass-produced by or outsourced to a large number of creators, or spread across a large network of sites, so that individual pages or sites don’t get as much attention or care? Does the content have an excessive amount of ads that distract from or interfere with the main content? Does content display well for mobile devices when viewed on them? Comparative questions Does the content provide substantial value when compared to other pages in search results? Does the content seem to be serving the genuine interests of visitors to the site or does it seem to exist solely by someone attempting to guess what might rank well in search engines? Beyond asking yourself these questions, consider having others you trust but who are unaffiliated with your site provide an honest assessment. Also consider an audit of the drops you may have experienced. What pages were most impacted and for what types of searches? Look closely at these to understand how they’re assessed against some of the questions above. Get to know the quality rater guidelines & E-A-T Another resource for advice on great content is to review our search quality rater guidelines. Raters are people who give us insights on if our algorithms seem to be providing good results, a way to help confirm our changes are working well. It’s important to understand that search raters have no control over how pages rank. Rater data is not used directly in our ranking algorithms. Rather, we use them as a restaurant might get feedback
At this point, your company is probably investing time and money into social media, but a key component still missing from most social media marketing efforts is an employee advocacy program. These stats show why that’s likely a big shortcoming. Read the full article at MarketingProfs Copyright 2020 High Level Studios LLC.
Can Your Content Marketing Compete? Trends for a Strong Strategy in 2019 and Beyond Content marketing helps shape your company’s place in the marketplace. The key to creating content that drives website visits, improves conversion, and creates brand lift is understanding what your audience needs and how you can best provide it. Make sure your content marketing can compete. Read the full article at MarketingProfs Copyright 2020 High Level Studios LLC. Content Marketing Evolution Trends Overview The world of content marketing is constantly evolving, and staying ahead of the curve is crucial for success. In 2019 and beyond, several emerging trends are shaping the landscape of content marketing. One such trend is the increasing importance of personalized content. With advancements in technology, marketers now have access to vast amounts of data that can be used to tailor content to specific audiences. This personalized approach helps to create a deeper connection with consumers and drive engagement. Another significant trend is the shift towards interactive content. Traditional blog posts and articles are no longer enough to capture and retain audience attention. Consumers now expect more immersive experiences, such as quizzes, surveys, and interactive videos. By incorporating interactive elements into their content strategies, businesses can foster greater engagement and provide a memorable user experience. Strategy Importance Having a well-defined content marketing strategy is essential in today’s competitive landscape. A clear strategy ensures that your efforts are aligned with your business goals and target audience. It allows you to consistently deliver valuable content that resonates with your customers. To enhance the effectiveness of your content marketing strategy, it is important to adopt a data-driven approach. Analyzing data can provide valuable insights into consumer behavior, preferences, and trends. By leveraging this information, you can optimize your content to better meet the needs of your audience and achieve higher conversion rates. Furthermore, storytelling plays a crucial role in creating a compelling content strategy. Storytelling allows businesses to connect with their audience on an emotional level and convey their brand message effectively. By crafting narratives that resonate with consumers’ values and aspirations, businesses can build trust, loyalty, and ultimately drive customer action. Competitive Landscape In order to stay ahead in the market, it is essential to evaluate competitors’ content strategies for benchmarking purposes. Analyzing what others in your industry are doing can provide valuable insights into successful tactics and areas for improvement. By understanding the strategies that are working for your competitors, you can adapt and refine your own approach to gain a competitive edge. Utilizing competitive analysis tools is an effective way to gather data and gain a comprehensive understanding of your competitors’ content strategies. These tools provide valuable information on keywords, backlinks, social media engagement, and more. Armed with this knowledge, you can make informed decisions about your own content marketing efforts and identify areas where you can differentiate yourself from the competition. Identifying unique selling points is crucial for standing out in a crowded marketplace. By highlighting what sets your business apart from competitors, you can attract and retain customers who resonate with your brand values and offerings. Whether it’s through innovative content formats, niche expertise, or exceptional customer service, finding your unique selling points will help you carve out a distinctive position in the market. Original Content Creation Authenticity Key To compete in the ever-evolving landscape of content marketing, authenticity is key. In a world where consumers are bombarded with information, it’s crucial to prioritize authenticity in order to build trust with your audience. People want to connect with brands and businesses that they perceive as genuine and transparent. One effective way to incorporate authenticity into your content is by sharing real-life stories. These stories add credibility to your content and help establish an emotional connection with your audience. Whether it’s a testimonial from a satisfied customer or a behind-the-scenes look at your company’s journey, these narratives can make your content more relatable and trustworthy. Showcasing transparency in your content creation processes can further enhance authenticity. Letting your audience in on the behind-the-scenes aspects of creating content demonstrates that you have nothing to hide. This could involve sharing insights into how you develop ideas, conduct research, or collaborate with others. By being open about your process, you invite your audience to be part of the journey and foster a sense of trust. Creativity Techniques In order to stand out from the competition and capture the attention of your target audience, it’s important to implement innovative content creation techniques. Traditional blog posts and articles are still valuable, but exploring different formats can help captivate the audience. Consider experimenting with formats like infographics and videos. Infographics are visually appealing and can effectively convey complex information in a concise manner. Videos, on the other hand, provide an engaging medium for storytelling and can leave a lasting impression on viewers. To generate creative content ideas, encourage brainstorming sessions within your team. Create an environment that fosters collaboration and allows for free-flowing ideas. Sometimes the most innovative concepts arise from bouncing ideas off one another and building upon each other’s creativity. Audience Engagement In today’s digital landscape, audience engagement is crucial for a successful content marketing strategy. It’s no longer enough to simply push out content; you need to foster two-way communication with your audience. One effective way to engage with your audience is through interactive content. This could include quizzes, polls, surveys, or interactive videos. By involving your audience in the content creation process, you create an immersive experience that encourages active participation and increases engagement. Another powerful tool for audience engagement is user-generated content. Encourage your audience to create and share their own content related to your brand or industry. This not only boosts engagement but also helps build a sense of community around your brand. Lastly, personalization is key when it comes to resonating with diverse audience segments. Tailor your content to address the specific needs, interests, and pain points of different segments within your target audience. This can be done by creating buyer
Signs Of Another Google Search Ranking Algorithm Update I am seeing signs both in terms of early chatter within the SEO community and industry and the automated tracking tools of an Google search ranking update brewing. The update may have started some time last night, but let’s say this is currently an unconfirmed August 1st update. Google has not pre-announced any core update today but who knows. Let’s not forget the last August 1st update that was on August 1, 2018, which I ended up naming the Medic update and Google later confirmed as a core update. This August 1, 2019 unconfirmed (currently) update does not currently seem as big as the one a year ago – so no need to panic. Here is some of the chatter from the ongoing WebmasterWorld thread: Anyone seeing anything mental this morning? Yes. Traffic just fell for me drastically today. Our average rank has completely dropped It is still early but I am seeing some people asking me on Twitter: @rustybrick Hi Barry, you noticed any signs of a G update? just seeing some earlier signs for some UK based SERPS I follow ‘” aidan ward (@aidanward25) July 31, 2019 Here are screen shots from the automated tools: Mozcast: SERP Metrics: Algoroo: Advanced Web Rankings: AccuRanker: RankRanger: Cognitive SEO: SEM Rush: Are you noticing traffic and ranking changes today from Google search? Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld. Google Algorithm Basics Core Updates Analyzing recent core updates from Google, which include helpful content, product reviews, and changes in web pages, is essential for understanding the serp volatility in search rankings. These updates are major adjustments to the Google search algorithm that can have a significant impact on website visibility, organic traffic, and SERP volatility. By staying informed about core updates from Google, website owners and SEO professionals can adapt their strategies to maintain or improve their search rankings and provide helpful content for sites and product reviews. It is crucial to evaluate the impact of these updates on search rankings on Google, product reviews, helpful content, and web pages. Core updates can lead to fluctuations in rankings, with some websites experiencing significant drops while others may see improvements. By monitoring these changes, website owners can gain insights into how their websites are affected by the page experience update, helpful content update, and search news from Google Search, and make necessary adjustments to regain lost visibility. To adapt effectively to core updates, it is important to implement strategies that align with Google’s guidelines and helpful content. This includes creating high-quality content that provides value to users on sites, optimizing on-page elements such as titles, meta descriptions, and headers for Google search, and ensuring a positive user experience on the website. Review Changes Monitoring and documenting changes in search ranking algorithms, including the page experience update, google, the product reviews update, and the helpful content update, is an ongoing task for SEO professionals. By keeping track of these changes on helpful content, reviews, and sites, they can identify patterns and trends that help predict future updates in days. Regularly reviewing algorithm changes, helpful content updates, product reviews updates, and google search allows website owners to stay ahead of the curve and make proactive adjustments to their SEO strategies on sites. Evaluating the frequency and scale of recent updates by Google provides valuable insights into the evolving nature of search algorithms. Some updates may occur more frequently than others, indicating areas of focus for Google in improving search results and sites. Understanding the scale and duration of these updates helps prioritize efforts in optimizing websites for better visibility on google search. Identifying patterns in review changes on sites enables SEO professionals to anticipate future algorithm updates in Google search. By analyzing historical data, reviews, and observing common characteristics among previous updates on sites, they can make educated predictions about potential changes in the future. This foresight allows them to prepare strategies that align with upcoming algorithm shifts announced by Google search. Page Experience Google’s product reviews update in determining search rankings for sites within days. Google prioritizes websites that offer a positive user experience, including factors such as loading speed, mobile-friendliness, interactivity, and visual stability. Optimizing these aspects of a website improves its chances of ranking higher in Google search results. Enhancing user experience starts with optimizing loading speed. Slow-loading websites can frustrate users and result in high bounce rates. By optimizing images, minimizing code, and leveraging caching techniques, website owners can improve loading times and provide a smoother browsing experience on sites. Mobile-friendliness is another important aspect of page experience. With the majority of internet users accessing websites through mobile devices, it is crucial for websites to be responsive and adapt well to different screen sizes. Implementing a mobile-friendly design ensures that users can easily navigate and interact with the website on their smartphones or tablets. Google announced a core update that improves interactivity and visual stability, enhancing the overall user experience. Websites should have intuitive navigation, engaging multimedia elements, smooth scrolling, and Google announced a core update to keep users engaged. Minimizing unexpected layout shifts ensures that users can consume content without interruptions or frustrations. Spam Analysis Regularly conducting spam analysis, especially after Google announced a core update, is essential for maintaining website credibility and avoiding penalties from search engines. Identifying and eliminating spammy content or backlinks helps ensure that a website remains in good standing with Google’s guidelines during a core update. Google announced a core update, Google announced a core update, website owners should regularly review their content for any signs of spam. This includes checking for keyword stuffing, hidden text or links, irrelevant redirects, or other blackhat SEO tactics announced by Google during a core update. Google announced a core update that removes such spammy elements, improving the website’s credibility and enhancing the user experience by providing relevant and valuable content. Backlink profiles should also be analyzed to identify any low-quality or suspicious links pointing to the website, as Google recently announced
Google My Business Has People Also Search For Feature? Keyser Holiday shared screen shots in the Local Search Forums showing how a local knowledge panel had the people also search for / people also ask feature in the local knowledge panel for a business listing. What is even more confusing is that you can edit the contents of what the people also search for as well! Here is the first example he showed for this business (but he showed more): Then you can edit it and the people also search for content: No one else in the thread, nor myself, can replicate this. It is just weird and I don’t get it. You should not be able to edit this type of stuff. Can you replicate this? Forum discussion at Local Search Forums. Copyright 2020 High Level Studios LLC.