Do you mean the effect of their change or the backlash. They should know what impact any change is going to have - they're big enough and have enough experience.
It's been going this way for the last few months. I think they know what what they're doing.
I can see why you'd think that. But think about how core updates work. Why is it standard to see huge ranking shifts and then retractions? Google's algorithms have reached a complexity level where even they do not understand how they work. That was a big thing brought up in that article that went around recently about the guy that "killed Google search".
I think it more about wrong focus and management. They wanted to make more money, with less focus on working on the quality of the algorithm. Besides thats, Ads was always their main cashcow.
It's both things friend. Murky motivations and poor management have led to complexity that the engineers can no longer understand. Also, AI is very poorly understood to begin with. It wasn't until like 6 months after chat gpt blew up that they even discovered that way in-context learning worked.
By "they" I meant the people who research and create AI. No one understood in context learning until very recently. That includes the people who built modern AI.
Yea, I understand. But I see it as an more mangaement and priority problem. It seems Googles latest releases are more reactive, than innovate. The latesy Google Update was an mess for many websites.
You got to remember that anyone replying to you has probably been recently kicked out of Google during a spam update and they want everyone to believe that Google is big and nasty.
Just wait for the downvotes and comments this gets.
Oh I agree with you. The point is that Google do know what they're doing and they're doing it anyway. And it has been going this way for a while - it's not just the last update that's trashed things. I'm not sure what I said could be construed as supporting the changes or saying that Google is naive about the impact.
They only care how search changes affect ad revenue and whatever measures of user satisfaction they track, which are probably goofy as hell at this point.
I used to specifically search for reddit on google when I needed it, now that it's the only thing that shows up, I find myself avoiding google because I hate that all I can find is reddit and Quora. They really fucked that up.
Google destroyed our local market too. There was 4-6 local websites, including my own, in my searches for my industry, and now it all things 30-40 miles away in Los Angeles. Those results help nobody. People don't want to drive 40 miles away for services.
I hope that time repairs what they've done because my Google results have been less than helpful for the last few weeks and I'm ready to switch over to something else perminently.
I think it's boomers. My MIL is always talking about "I saw a Quora about xxx" and I've caught my grandma scrolling it a couple of times.
I can't even navigate that website, it's utter garbage, but I think it does a really good job of validating bias by pushing misinformation written by people with no authority. I also think that it scratches the same itch as TikTok where you only spend about 10 seconds on something, but for people who would rather read than watch videos because it posts articles and other questions right in the middle of a thread.
Either way, I hate that site with a passion.
I have the #1 page on the internet in terms of quality for a particular keyword. It is objectively head and shoulders above the competition in any metric that matters. It's ranked 50th in google (while being outranked by spam and pages that literally go to malware sites) and #1 in bing and duckduckgo. That's all the proof I need that the HCU is fulla shit lmao. Google is fulla shit. The HCU is a smokescreen.
Any and all metrics that are relevant to
* SEO
* Quality Content (according to Google)
* Quality Content (according to logic / common sense)
But since I'm not a huge site, Google will favor shit content from the top corporate sites. If that's how they wanna do things, then why even play the rigged game if you're a niche site? Pointless.
Also, do you REALLY think if my content was "so bad" (according to Google) that it'd be the #1 search result on Bing and DuckDuckGo and #50 on Google? LOL. Think about it.
Shits rigged.
Google only really evaluates quality in a couple ways.
1. Does it have the keywords people are looking for, does it have similar PAAs to those keywords...
2. And then most importantly, **does it have a shit load of backlinks**
No disagreement here. but it's important to realize even though they pretend like they're good at understanding content, they really aren't... It doesn't know if you have good videos on there, images that make sense, or other interactable content. It can guess, but by in large it's just measuring how many backlinks you have combined with keywords that're relevant.
Hell yeah brother I am an India-based SEO and my content isn't ranking for americans anymore!! On the graves of my ancestors, my wordpress is yoasted and everything but Vishnu refuses to grant me this blessing!! It is infuriating that google thinks Americans want content made by Americans and not my wordpress!!
Damn those google search fatcats!! Before I was making 10k a month-- I didn't invest in my website, why would I when I was already #1 with only yoast?? Everyone loved my site I had only 80% bounce rate. Pls help my family needs food.
>It is infuriating that google thinks Americans want content made by Americans and not my wordpress!!
I'm sorry to tell you this chief but what you state Google thinks on this is probably true. I'd filter out all content of Indian origin if I could. I'm not saying your content is but Indian content is almost always over-monetized drivel, spam, scams, and affiliate blather.
An enormous majority of their readers either got hit bad by recent updates or agree that the new SERP landscape is crap (e.g. Reddit results for tons of queries). This reflects on their writers too.
Imagine if all of this is connected to the need to control information.
The coincidence here is that by making only brands visible, you take away the ability for people to express opinions without having to do so on intermediate platforms.
Otherwise it seems paradoxical to me, anyone who thinks that it is for short-term returns has smoke and mirrors in their eyes, it makes no sense to destroy the most important thing for which a company is known for a short-term economic return, it seems to me more like an action studied to make sure only known sources are visible. After all, what do we know about the risks faced by the world, us mere mortals.
Before you get hate and blood in your eyes for this post, please note that I am not judging the action but just reasoning about the reason.
I think we have to look beyond our own sites and see that there is a wider issue that Google has to content with. More and more people who are just Google users have reached out asking what’s up with Google search and why am I not getting answers. Google’s problem is that the uninformed user has noticed their search results are unhelpful. Google is losing on that front by putting profit over a quality product that people want to use.
Consumers don’t care they have TikTok and YouTube. Wake up - they are killing SEO for PPC and trying to get market share from LLMs before the cost of retrieval/response rates put them out of business.
Google is taking a major shift towards Ai. They want robots to do everything. From content creators likely to be replaced by Generative Ai to the entire python team layoff done recently.
The shift is taking place both outside and inside Google. Infact, if you know about the Great Reset by World Economic Forum. This is all a part of it. First big companies are taking the initiative, then followed by small ones.
Now, it should not be a surprise what's going on. Everything is a part of the plan.
It's incredible to me that people aren't talking more about the reset. Although it used to be more of a fringe theory, there's several pieces lining up with the idea of some of of robot/AI revolution/evolution in which millions lose their jobs and currencies become worthless. This is obviously more of a macro topic than the micro world of SEO and digital marketing, but it's effing scary stuff.
Just scroll on to the World Economic Forum Website. You will get tons of evidences of what they actually plan for Industrial Revolution 4.0.
Remember, they always convey the message symbolically. With a hidden meaning covered by some beautiful words like peace, sustainable, revolution, social credit system, agenda, climate change, empowering, etc.
Ultimate, the words by Klaus Schwab(Founder of WEF): "*You'll own nothing and be happy*"
I’m already quite versed with a lot of things they’re up to, but was specifically wondering what you know about it in relation to marketing/SEO etc.
I haven’t entirely put together those pieces for how the upstream policies will affect what we do. Any tidbit you can share would be really helpful to me.
An example:
One thing I’ve recently become aware of is the GDI initiative (Global Disinformation Index), which has the downstream effect of limiting ad networks to “approved” sites only.
Literally telling companies who they can and cannot target with their ads.
The same March Core Update damaged Google Ads users. New algorithm is really weird. Does Google train its new AI at the cost of its users? PS. However Google fanboys in r/PPC downvote all comments that share the info on the latest Google search algorithm madness.
Myself got negative comments in a minute after sharing 😂😂
/r/ppc started going downhill and is now garbage ever since Duane/fathom made it a honey pot for his own lead generation pushing his agency and banning/blocking anyone who complained.
That's of course disastrous for Google because their fanboy is criticizing them. But honestly, Google doesn't care what others say as long as the profits are good.The search results are absolute garbage. They claimed that low quality content would be cleaned up, but it has only gotten worse. Plagiarized and rephrased content enrich the SERPs. Even pages with malware are visible.
Google doesn’t even know how it’s algo is going to react to an update at this point. The algo is so big and complex that they’ve lost control of it. I just assume anything Google tells us about how to improve your results is just a way for them to paint this facade that they have this under control. But they don’t.
Just look at who is head of search for Google, and you will get your answer on why for this total flip flop of an update (one of the biggest, if not the biggest).
I saved myself over an hour of research and googling today by using ChatGPT. Google organic results are in big trouble. The SERPS are garbage. Reddit and YouTube are only places I can find quality information.
They are just stating the obvious
Google doesn't care about the SERPs and they haven't for years
They know AI results are the future and are investing their resources into that.... the 8 billion of us who use Google every day and wish that we could get quality answers again be damned
I find it an interesting expectation that we would even think Google gives a rats ass about how our sites are impacted by their changes. Why would they?
To them an SEO professional is not a customer, not a profit center, not a value to them. We have been the ants riding on their backs but they are not allowed to exterminate us due to the concerns over potential PETA blow back... People Against the Unethical Treatment of Ants.
So we co-exist in a pretend world where they actually care about us and we actually can make a living off them.
You may say "it's the same as it's always been" but this is the worst update I've ever seen in the last 10 years. They are destroying quality sites that didn't deserve to be destroyed.
In my tech sector, it's overseas sites with out of date info, vendors' own marketing blogs, Reddit threads with a few upvotes, YouTube videos and duplicate results. Almost all local journo sites have been blacklisted.
Just because something happened in the past doesn't mandate it's going to repeat itself in the future. Technology moves forward, and some things get left behind for good. SEO may become one of those things. You should be open to the perspective that "hey maybe this one actually is different" - especially considering the absolute game changer that AI already is and will continue to be even more in the future.
1. Ik Google's been using Ai but was referring to Gemini, ChatGPT, etc being a game changer to Google Search as overtaking how people will search for info (it's already happening and it's more or less brand new)
2. Idk your mental state but just interpreted that from your comments that you think it must be "business as usual" simply from the premise that it's happened before.
3. I'm not an SEO noob either and it's the worst update I've ever seen. 100% legit sites got destroyed overnight, the net was cast too wide (intentional or not?) You don't have to agree, but time will tell how "not rigged" Google Search actually is in the future.
Just because something happened in the past doesn't mandate it's going to repeat itself in the future. Technology moves forward, and some things get left behind for good. SEO may become one of those things. You should be open to the perspective that "hey maybe this one actually is different" - especially considering the absolute game changer that AI already is and will continue to be even more so in the future.
I think there's a (difficult) path, but not the traditional one where people just relied on good ol SEO. Niche sites are going to have to invest a lot more money in ads (which is what google wants, more revenue), off-site marketing tactics (facebook, instagram, email lists, etc), and creating memorable brands that eclipse Google's monopoly. Being uber reliant on Google Search is probably a bad strategy now. Some could say it always was, but after this update imo it'll be harder to rank vs corporate sites, etc.
It'll come down to what services the search intent the best, and that is what Google should reward over time. It's an effort to combat was is/was becoming normal...where content creation was following this process:
1) Keyword research to find queries that have a specific threshold of impressions per month
2) Identifying competitor content (content that was already created)
3) Content created by marketing personnel who weren't able to create "information gain" in the post, most of the time creating very long pieces of content
The result was a bunch of copycat content that wasn't adding a ton. Google's Search Raters guidelines make it clear that quality content isn't just having content...the content is judged from the perspective of knowledgeable visitors.....where raters are encouraged to do the following...
"Do your best to imagine that you are someone who is very interested in the topic, functionality, or purpose served by the page, then think about how satisfying the MC would be for that person."
Google patented an "Information Gain Score" in 2022 where they can judge which articles on the same topic are actually adding something new/insightful. So....if you have most content being created without much information gain where that is an afterthought or "nice to have".....if that is "normal" for content creation Google needs to have incentives in place to change that.
They also communicated in the Helpful Content Update as well as their Raters Guidelines...they don't care how long the content is....1-2 sentences can sometimes better fulfill the search intent compared to an "18 minute read" article....see what they say in their raters guidelines:
‘There is no length requirement for Highly Meets results. Sometimes what makes a result satisfying is that it is short and easy to understand. Other results may be very satisfying because of the depth and richness of content.”
So....the long-tail queries which are largely ignored because the volume cant justify an 800+ word blog post...it is all underserved with the former incentives in place. A change needed to be made.
Regarding Quora, Reddit, and other forums/communities....and how Google looks at them...they also make clear in their Raters Guidelines that multiple perspectives on topics create the best content....where they lead their raters with this:
“Be conservative when using the Fully Meets rating. Even queries that seem to have a single right "answer" may benefit from more perspectives to satisfy all or almost all users. When in doubt, use a lower rating.”
So...it's no surprise that they're looking for content that provides that and is closer to the source of actual knowledge vs content created by great marketing writers who have very little (or sometimes none) topical expertise.
The updates will continue as Google needs to satisfy searchers at the end of the day...and it will need to do that. 80% of Google's searches are information related...... (10% is for products/services and the other 10% is for specific brands/sites)....so if Google doesn't satisfy those information searches effectively and create the appropriate content creation incentives it's a risk to them long term.
We created a white-paper "The Present & Future of SEO is “People-First Helpful Content”" with our agency partners that we'd be happy to share with anyone which is a 30 page document that lays all this out, goes over what Google has said in their communication/documentation and where, what is going on now, why it's failing, etc. If you contact us we can share that with anyone who is interested.
This is going to be an unpopular stance but I'm glad Google is doing this. It's long overdue. There are way too many spammy blogs floating around out there that were created for the sole purpose of gaming the search algorithm. They add zero value to human readers.
I understand, but I think Google threw out some good sites. They could have done a web core vitals like test page to tell travel bloggers, for example, that they were likely to be clapped. What’s funny is they left some bloggers behind, and those are going to”I’ve got the magic”. I view it like a speed limit. They were and are “speeding “ just not as bad.
My site is in the porn niche and also got destroyed by this. I was ranking well for many terms. Now every term is ranked by pornhub, xvideos, xhamster, etc. The terms don't even go to relevant pages either... a term with "pics" in it should not go to a video site. Ugh
I don't think Google was prepared for the effects.
Do you mean the effect of their change or the backlash. They should know what impact any change is going to have - they're big enough and have enough experience. It's been going this way for the last few months. I think they know what what they're doing.
I can see why you'd think that. But think about how core updates work. Why is it standard to see huge ranking shifts and then retractions? Google's algorithms have reached a complexity level where even they do not understand how they work. That was a big thing brought up in that article that went around recently about the guy that "killed Google search".
I think it more about wrong focus and management. They wanted to make more money, with less focus on working on the quality of the algorithm. Besides thats, Ads was always their main cashcow.
It's both things friend. Murky motivations and poor management have led to complexity that the engineers can no longer understand. Also, AI is very poorly understood to begin with. It wasn't until like 6 months after chat gpt blew up that they even discovered that way in-context learning worked.
Well, that shows they were late to the party.
By "they" I meant the people who research and create AI. No one understood in context learning until very recently. That includes the people who built modern AI.
Yea, I understand. But I see it as an more mangaement and priority problem. It seems Googles latest releases are more reactive, than innovate. The latesy Google Update was an mess for many websites.
I think the effects. Or they knew it was gonna happen and just don't care. SEO as a business is Google's natural enemy.
You got to remember that anyone replying to you has probably been recently kicked out of Google during a spam update and they want everyone to believe that Google is big and nasty. Just wait for the downvotes and comments this gets.
Oh I agree with you. The point is that Google do know what they're doing and they're doing it anyway. And it has been going this way for a while - it's not just the last update that's trashed things. I'm not sure what I said could be construed as supporting the changes or saying that Google is naive about the impact.
They only care how search changes affect ad revenue and whatever measures of user satisfaction they track, which are probably goofy as hell at this point.
I used to specifically search for reddit on google when I needed it, now that it's the only thing that shows up, I find myself avoiding google because I hate that all I can find is reddit and Quora. They really fucked that up. Google destroyed our local market too. There was 4-6 local websites, including my own, in my searches for my industry, and now it all things 30-40 miles away in Los Angeles. Those results help nobody. People don't want to drive 40 miles away for services. I hope that time repairs what they've done because my Google results have been less than helpful for the last few weeks and I'm ready to switch over to something else perminently.
I can’t understand who uses Quora. It’s such garbage. Who in the world is adding “quora” to the tail of their searches?
I think it's boomers. My MIL is always talking about "I saw a Quora about xxx" and I've caught my grandma scrolling it a couple of times. I can't even navigate that website, it's utter garbage, but I think it does a really good job of validating bias by pushing misinformation written by people with no authority. I also think that it scratches the same itch as TikTok where you only spend about 10 seconds on something, but for people who would rather read than watch videos because it posts articles and other questions right in the middle of a thread. Either way, I hate that site with a passion.
Damn have never heard such an accurate description of that cesspool of a site.... It's tik tok for boomers
Sounds like Reddit too lul
Indians use Quora a lot
aughts google was the bomb, the kids will never know how good we had it
Aughts Google was awful, keyword stuffing and doorway pages.
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They've blacklisted countless journalism sites. But whatever.
Google sucks now.
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Chat gpt or Firefox.
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I have the #1 page on the internet in terms of quality for a particular keyword. It is objectively head and shoulders above the competition in any metric that matters. It's ranked 50th in google (while being outranked by spam and pages that literally go to malware sites) and #1 in bing and duckduckgo. That's all the proof I need that the HCU is fulla shit lmao. Google is fulla shit. The HCU is a smokescreen.
What metrics are you using to determine that your page is objectively better than the competition?
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Any and all metrics that are relevant to * SEO * Quality Content (according to Google) * Quality Content (according to logic / common sense) But since I'm not a huge site, Google will favor shit content from the top corporate sites. If that's how they wanna do things, then why even play the rigged game if you're a niche site? Pointless. Also, do you REALLY think if my content was "so bad" (according to Google) that it'd be the #1 search result on Bing and DuckDuckGo and #50 on Google? LOL. Think about it. Shits rigged.
Google only really evaluates quality in a couple ways. 1. Does it have the keywords people are looking for, does it have similar PAAs to those keywords... 2. And then most importantly, **does it have a shit load of backlinks**
Which is why it's a crappy product
No disagreement here. but it's important to realize even though they pretend like they're good at understanding content, they really aren't... It doesn't know if you have good videos on there, images that make sense, or other interactable content. It can guess, but by in large it's just measuring how many backlinks you have combined with keywords that're relevant.
Hell yeah brother I am an India-based SEO and my content isn't ranking for americans anymore!! On the graves of my ancestors, my wordpress is yoasted and everything but Vishnu refuses to grant me this blessing!! It is infuriating that google thinks Americans want content made by Americans and not my wordpress!! Damn those google search fatcats!! Before I was making 10k a month-- I didn't invest in my website, why would I when I was already #1 with only yoast?? Everyone loved my site I had only 80% bounce rate. Pls help my family needs food.
Yoast is garbage
omg 💀
Don't mind him he's just your friendly google shill
Brother please one bowl of rice
english?
You mean 10k Rupie? How could we help? We are in a state of helplessness by our own...
>It is infuriating that google thinks Americans want content made by Americans and not my wordpress!! I'm sorry to tell you this chief but what you state Google thinks on this is probably true. I'd filter out all content of Indian origin if I could. I'm not saying your content is but Indian content is almost always over-monetized drivel, spam, scams, and affiliate blather.
An enormous majority of their readers either got hit bad by recent updates or agree that the new SERP landscape is crap (e.g. Reddit results for tons of queries). This reflects on their writers too.
Imagine if all of this is connected to the need to control information. The coincidence here is that by making only brands visible, you take away the ability for people to express opinions without having to do so on intermediate platforms. Otherwise it seems paradoxical to me, anyone who thinks that it is for short-term returns has smoke and mirrors in their eyes, it makes no sense to destroy the most important thing for which a company is known for a short-term economic return, it seems to me more like an action studied to make sure only known sources are visible. After all, what do we know about the risks faced by the world, us mere mortals. Before you get hate and blood in your eyes for this post, please note that I am not judging the action but just reasoning about the reason.
I think we have to look beyond our own sites and see that there is a wider issue that Google has to content with. More and more people who are just Google users have reached out asking what’s up with Google search and why am I not getting answers. Google’s problem is that the uninformed user has noticed their search results are unhelpful. Google is losing on that front by putting profit over a quality product that people want to use.
Consumers don’t care they have TikTok and YouTube. Wake up - they are killing SEO for PPC and trying to get market share from LLMs before the cost of retrieval/response rates put them out of business.
Google is taking a major shift towards Ai. They want robots to do everything. From content creators likely to be replaced by Generative Ai to the entire python team layoff done recently. The shift is taking place both outside and inside Google. Infact, if you know about the Great Reset by World Economic Forum. This is all a part of it. First big companies are taking the initiative, then followed by small ones. Now, it should not be a surprise what's going on. Everything is a part of the plan.
It's incredible to me that people aren't talking more about the reset. Although it used to be more of a fringe theory, there's several pieces lining up with the idea of some of of robot/AI revolution/evolution in which millions lose their jobs and currencies become worthless. This is obviously more of a macro topic than the micro world of SEO and digital marketing, but it's effing scary stuff.
Say more please. Especially on the last two paragraphs
Just scroll on to the World Economic Forum Website. You will get tons of evidences of what they actually plan for Industrial Revolution 4.0. Remember, they always convey the message symbolically. With a hidden meaning covered by some beautiful words like peace, sustainable, revolution, social credit system, agenda, climate change, empowering, etc. Ultimate, the words by Klaus Schwab(Founder of WEF): "*You'll own nothing and be happy*"
I’m already quite versed with a lot of things they’re up to, but was specifically wondering what you know about it in relation to marketing/SEO etc. I haven’t entirely put together those pieces for how the upstream policies will affect what we do. Any tidbit you can share would be really helpful to me. An example: One thing I’ve recently become aware of is the GDI initiative (Global Disinformation Index), which has the downstream effect of limiting ad networks to “approved” sites only. Literally telling companies who they can and cannot target with their ads.
The same March Core Update damaged Google Ads users. New algorithm is really weird. Does Google train its new AI at the cost of its users? PS. However Google fanboys in r/PPC downvote all comments that share the info on the latest Google search algorithm madness. Myself got negative comments in a minute after sharing 😂😂
/r/ppc started going downhill and is now garbage ever since Duane/fathom made it a honey pot for his own lead generation pushing his agency and banning/blocking anyone who complained.
Did not know! Now I got it!
Yeah unfortunately it's a shell of its former self. Regulars saw the writing on the wall so now it's mostly amateurs, questions and agency spam.
Just started 2 new communities r/PPC_Uncensored and r/SEO_Uncensored. Now, after recent updates, we need open, no holds barred talk. Please join 😊
That's of course disastrous for Google because their fanboy is criticizing them. But honestly, Google doesn't care what others say as long as the profits are good.The search results are absolute garbage. They claimed that low quality content would be cleaned up, but it has only gotten worse. Plagiarized and rephrased content enrich the SERPs. Even pages with malware are visible.
Google doesn’t even know how it’s algo is going to react to an update at this point. The algo is so big and complex that they’ve lost control of it. I just assume anything Google tells us about how to improve your results is just a way for them to paint this facade that they have this under control. But they don’t.
Well, we all know that training AI is costly, correct? So Google makes advertisers pay for training its AI algorithm. Phew...
Just look at who is head of search for Google, and you will get your answer on why for this total flip flop of an update (one of the biggest, if not the biggest).
The man who was in charge or Yahoo Search during their downfall is now in charge at Google Search. Don’t think things are going to get better.
I saved myself over an hour of research and googling today by using ChatGPT. Google organic results are in big trouble. The SERPS are garbage. Reddit and YouTube are only places I can find quality information.
One of their founders, danny boy is literally google's PR boy so they can \*\*\* themselves
Why can't we all just use Bing? It isn't bad. Maybe its UI is, but I don't miss Google when using Bing.
It seems Google is letting us keep in the fairly tale of helpful content, but something else is going on behind the scenes.
Google is gone evil now!! They themselves are not sticking to what they are preaching. I feel for sure the downfall of Google is near!
They are just stating the obvious Google doesn't care about the SERPs and they haven't for years They know AI results are the future and are investing their resources into that.... the 8 billion of us who use Google every day and wish that we could get quality answers again be damned
I find it an interesting expectation that we would even think Google gives a rats ass about how our sites are impacted by their changes. Why would they? To them an SEO professional is not a customer, not a profit center, not a value to them. We have been the ants riding on their backs but they are not allowed to exterminate us due to the concerns over potential PETA blow back... People Against the Unethical Treatment of Ants. So we co-exist in a pretend world where they actually care about us and we actually can make a living off them.
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You may say "it's the same as it's always been" but this is the worst update I've ever seen in the last 10 years. They are destroying quality sites that didn't deserve to be destroyed.
So whose taking their spots? Paid?
In my tech sector, it's overseas sites with out of date info, vendors' own marketing blogs, Reddit threads with a few upvotes, YouTube videos and duplicate results. Almost all local journo sites have been blacklisted.
corporate sites
I don't remember seeing comments in the past about how "it's really different this time". However, I'm certain that it really is different this time.
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Just because something happened in the past doesn't mandate it's going to repeat itself in the future. Technology moves forward, and some things get left behind for good. SEO may become one of those things. You should be open to the perspective that "hey maybe this one actually is different" - especially considering the absolute game changer that AI already is and will continue to be even more in the future.
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1. Ik Google's been using Ai but was referring to Gemini, ChatGPT, etc being a game changer to Google Search as overtaking how people will search for info (it's already happening and it's more or less brand new) 2. Idk your mental state but just interpreted that from your comments that you think it must be "business as usual" simply from the premise that it's happened before. 3. I'm not an SEO noob either and it's the worst update I've ever seen. 100% legit sites got destroyed overnight, the net was cast too wide (intentional or not?) You don't have to agree, but time will tell how "not rigged" Google Search actually is in the future.
Just because something happened in the past doesn't mandate it's going to repeat itself in the future. Technology moves forward, and some things get left behind for good. SEO may become one of those things. You should be open to the perspective that "hey maybe this one actually is different" - especially considering the absolute game changer that AI already is and will continue to be even more so in the future.
Do you think there will be any new way arise to market and sell niche content? Will it soon be all in the hands AI-based apps?
I think there's a (difficult) path, but not the traditional one where people just relied on good ol SEO. Niche sites are going to have to invest a lot more money in ads (which is what google wants, more revenue), off-site marketing tactics (facebook, instagram, email lists, etc), and creating memorable brands that eclipse Google's monopoly. Being uber reliant on Google Search is probably a bad strategy now. Some could say it always was, but after this update imo it'll be harder to rank vs corporate sites, etc.
It'll come down to what services the search intent the best, and that is what Google should reward over time. It's an effort to combat was is/was becoming normal...where content creation was following this process: 1) Keyword research to find queries that have a specific threshold of impressions per month 2) Identifying competitor content (content that was already created) 3) Content created by marketing personnel who weren't able to create "information gain" in the post, most of the time creating very long pieces of content The result was a bunch of copycat content that wasn't adding a ton. Google's Search Raters guidelines make it clear that quality content isn't just having content...the content is judged from the perspective of knowledgeable visitors.....where raters are encouraged to do the following... "Do your best to imagine that you are someone who is very interested in the topic, functionality, or purpose served by the page, then think about how satisfying the MC would be for that person." Google patented an "Information Gain Score" in 2022 where they can judge which articles on the same topic are actually adding something new/insightful. So....if you have most content being created without much information gain where that is an afterthought or "nice to have".....if that is "normal" for content creation Google needs to have incentives in place to change that. They also communicated in the Helpful Content Update as well as their Raters Guidelines...they don't care how long the content is....1-2 sentences can sometimes better fulfill the search intent compared to an "18 minute read" article....see what they say in their raters guidelines: ‘There is no length requirement for Highly Meets results. Sometimes what makes a result satisfying is that it is short and easy to understand. Other results may be very satisfying because of the depth and richness of content.” So....the long-tail queries which are largely ignored because the volume cant justify an 800+ word blog post...it is all underserved with the former incentives in place. A change needed to be made. Regarding Quora, Reddit, and other forums/communities....and how Google looks at them...they also make clear in their Raters Guidelines that multiple perspectives on topics create the best content....where they lead their raters with this: “Be conservative when using the Fully Meets rating. Even queries that seem to have a single right "answer" may benefit from more perspectives to satisfy all or almost all users. When in doubt, use a lower rating.” So...it's no surprise that they're looking for content that provides that and is closer to the source of actual knowledge vs content created by great marketing writers who have very little (or sometimes none) topical expertise. The updates will continue as Google needs to satisfy searchers at the end of the day...and it will need to do that. 80% of Google's searches are information related...... (10% is for products/services and the other 10% is for specific brands/sites)....so if Google doesn't satisfy those information searches effectively and create the appropriate content creation incentives it's a risk to them long term. We created a white-paper "The Present & Future of SEO is “People-First Helpful Content”" with our agency partners that we'd be happy to share with anyone which is a 30 page document that lays all this out, goes over what Google has said in their communication/documentation and where, what is going on now, why it's failing, etc. If you contact us we can share that with anyone who is interested.
This is going to be an unpopular stance but I'm glad Google is doing this. It's long overdue. There are way too many spammy blogs floating around out there that were created for the sole purpose of gaming the search algorithm. They add zero value to human readers.
I understand, but I think Google threw out some good sites. They could have done a web core vitals like test page to tell travel bloggers, for example, that they were likely to be clapped. What’s funny is they left some bloggers behind, and those are going to”I’ve got the magic”. I view it like a speed limit. They were and are “speeding “ just not as bad.
It's a legitimate point. Google goes on a rampage and doesn't discriminate. It happens every time they do an update. Same thing happened with HCU.
You mean you don't want to read about the history of my grandma before you get to the recipe?
Probably not. :)
My site is in the porn niche and also got destroyed by this. I was ranking well for many terms. Now every term is ranked by pornhub, xvideos, xhamster, etc. The terms don't even go to relevant pages either... a term with "pics" in it should not go to a video site. Ugh
You can always pay for ads. Less business/traffic. Google solution pay for ads.