Google announced yesterday that today, 3rd June 2019, would see a broad update to their core search algorithm. This change isn’t targeted at a particular sector or type of website, making it broad and likely affecting much of the web.
What does this mean?
As this is a core update, this means that it is a fundamental update to how the Google algorithm ranks websites. However, this may not be as big of a shakeup as you might imagine.
Google is constantly tweaking its core algorithm in order to deliver the best possible search results for users. These updates are usually so small, that there is no need to announce them. However, in this case, Google has made the announcement before the change is implemented. The reason for this seems to be that Google expects many rankings to change with the update and wants to warn website owners of this.
As with other core algorithm updates we expect this change to be more of the same from Google, rewarding websites that deliver great content and user experiences. As with any update, this will create winners and losers. The sites delivering value to users will be rewarded with higher search positions while those that do not will be pushed down in the rankings.
How do I know if my website has been affected?
The obvious place to see how this update has affected your website is to look at the organic Google rankings before and after for your keywords. Ideally, all of your important keywords would be tracked using software to easily monitor this (and should be if you pay for an SEO service). From here, you can tell which keywords have gained or lost rankings and assess the landing pages of these keywords to see if the content and user experience could be improved on those pages.
If you currently do not track your rankings in Google then it is recommended you set this up to allow for more data to use in the future. Until then you can use both Google Analytics and Google Search Console to see which keywords and pages are gaining or losing impressions/clicks/visits. Then these pages can be analysed to see if they can be improved.
What can be done about this?
If your website is continually improving the content and user experience then simply continue the good work and reap the rewards. However, if you have lost rankings and traffic then there are improvements to be made.
First, assess the page as if you were landing on it for the first time – is the page giving you all the information you would expect relating to the search term you are targeting? If not then this is the place to start, increasing how useful the page is to users will always benefit SEO.
Second, look at your competitors – are they doing anything different to yourself? Do they rank higher than you for the same terms? If so it may be worth taking this into consideration and putting your own unique content relating to this on your own website.
Third, if you have tried to improve your pages in this way but there isn’t any progress in terms of rankings, then it’s time to call in the experts. Colewood offers bespoke SEO packages and a full audit to look into why your website isn’t performing as it should in the search engines. There may be other factors holding your website back, for more information contact us.
