Google is currently in the process of rolling out one of its biggest updates in a long time and if you own a website, it’s likely to affect you.

Google holds around 90% of the search engine market share, with the majority of online traffic coming from the Search Engine any updates they make to search results usually affect how much traffic your website receives.

The updates are aimed at targeting the rise in AI-generated content and several other areas of areas where Google believes webmasters are manipulating search results.

What should you do as a business?

Here are all the things you should be aware of that Google is targeting in this latest update:

Mass-generated AI content (Scaled content abuse)

Google specially is looking for low-quality or unoriginal content at scale to manipulate search rankings which is a clear reference to the rise of AI-generated content at scale.

If you’ve been publishing AI-generated content at mass with no real process around proofreading or editing then you could be hit with a penalty.

Expired domain abuse

This is a common tactic used when wanting to give a new website a ‘boost’ in authority where an expired domain is purchased (usually with a good backlink profile) and then redirected to your new site and passed on that authority.

There are instances where this can be done responsibly, but Google has now stated that ‘Expired domains that are purchased and repurposed to boost the search ranking of low-quality content are now considered spam’ meaning that it’s likely a LOT of websites will be affected.

Creating content ‘just for clicks’

This update involves Google refining their ranking systems and looking at webpages on an individual level to see if they are created just for search engines or actually for people.

An example of this would be someone buying a domain such as bestrunningshoes.com to try and rank for the keyword ‘best running shoes’ faster than you would do with say a branded domain.

Site reputation abuse

There’s been a rise over the last few years of affiliate marketers ‘renting’ areas of websites to build out their directories and ride the authority of a much larger website to get their content ranking faster and generating affiliate sales.

If Google are worried about these kinds of practices it’s not only the ‘black hats’ they should be going after, but also having a conversation with these large websites that are renting out their websites for this kind of activity.

Here’s an example of Forbes renting out an area of their site for affiliate purposes https://forbes.com/advisor

What you can do

If you or your team have been using any of the tactics above then you should be keeping an eye on your Search Consoles this month as Google runs its core update.

For any questions about your SEO strategy or uncertainties about what you’ve been implementing over the past year, you can follow Google’s Search Status Dashboard or contact a Digital Marketing Agency to consult on best practices for your online business.

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Google is updating its algorithm, here’s what you need to know

Getting your business in front of the right people has always been one of the biggest hurdles when acquiring new customers online, and in an ever competitive world it’s only becoming more challenging.

A recent study has estimated that on average, people see 10,000 adverts (yes you read that right) per day with only a quarter or less of them being relevant to the consumer.

Attention spans are dwindling, and trying to grab the attention of a potential customer in today’s online world involves a skillset that requires constant education and adaptation of the changing markets that we face.

There’s a whole host of channels to market to your audiences such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and more. But today I’m going totally about marketing on the OG marketing channel that is everyone’s go to, and that is Google.

Why Google is still number one

Unlike channels such as Facebook where you’re pushing ads to your customers, Google has over 8.5 billion searches per day from people who are actively searching for information, products or services.

This means that if you can get your business on the first page of Google, whoever clicks that link to your website is highly likely to be in the stage of choosing a company to do business with and wants to find out more information.

If you rank on that first page in one of the top three positions on Google, you get over 50% of clicks, meaning that the chances of potential customers making a purchase are even higher.

When you take this into consideration alongside the fact that 56.5% of internet users aged 16 to 64 buy something online every week, you can clearly see the endless opportunity out there in order to help scale your business through online channels.

How do you get to the first page on Google?

Through SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) you can help get your website into the first page of google.

This can be done inhouse or through collaboration with an SEO Agency. This will depend on your knowledge and resources, but the following information should help you decide on the best route you can take.

Doing it yourself – What to know?

The basics of SEO have always remained constant, no matter how the conversation may divert online. One thing that is great about the industry is the amount of incredible resources out there such as free SEO courses that give you access to everything you need to know but sometimes the hardest thing is knowing where to begin.

In short, there are 3 main elements. They are as follows:

SEO Element 1: Technical SEO

Technical SEO involves a full analysis of your current website setup to ensure that it can be accessed and indexed correctly by Google.

In order to audit your website you’ll need access to tools such as Screaming Frog & Google Webmaster Tools that can provide you with the information needed to run a full analysis of your website and put together an action plan to fix any issues that are holding you back from ranking on Google.

Some examples of common technical issues include:

• Duplicate content

• Mobile responsiveness issues

• Technical setup issues that block your website from being read by Google

Once these issues are identified it’s advisable to use a professional web developer to fix the issues, as if done wrong you can cause damage to your website.

SEO Element 2: Link Building

Link Building is the process of getting other reputable websites to link back to your website in the form of a hyperlink.

These links work as a reputation indicator to Google to tell the Search Engine that your website is a reputable source for information and can in return reward you site with higher authority, higher positions in the search page and more traffic to your website.

A good example of this is if you owned a pet food store. If you had lots of different pet blogs writing articles that linked back to your website about pet food then Google would see all these links back as an indicator that your store is trustworthy and in return increase your authority.

SEO Element 3: Content

Publishing regular, high quality and informative content is one of the most important elements of an SEO Strategy.

There’s lots of tools online you can use to research the types of search terms (or keywords) people are searching for online to help put together your content strategy but the most important elements you need to consider when creating content are:

• Writing for user intent

• Where possible, use experts to write (Especially in niches related to health, finance etc)

• Write evergreen content, and if the content is not evergreen then ensure it’s updated regularly

• Regularly audit your website and remove any outdated or irrelevant content

The biggest takeaway I can give from this is do not write content just to write content. Make sure it’s informative, useful and actually provides value to the reader otherwise it’s going to be a waste of time and resources to create.

Wrapping up

With more and more businesses coming online everyday, staying still in the SEO game is like moving backwards.

I would advise any service or product based business that has an online presence to look into what options there are out there in SEO and look to start including it as part of their marketing strategy for 2024 if they haven’t already.

It takes time to work, and results are not usually seen for 6-12 months from the start of a campaign so the earlier you’re able to begin the faster you’ll start to see the return on investment.

Read more:
The Importance of Getting Your Business On the First Page of Google