In the past couple of years, Google have constantly updated their algorithms, in order to fix and smoothen up the unintended negative impacts on high quality websites. In contrast, Google is also known for making minor tweaks and rework to its algorithms, almost every single day.
Besides, Google have been putting out some major updates, formally known as “Core Algorithm Updates”, since the past few months. However, the effects of these changes are different for every site and totally random sometimes. As a result, some of the sites gain huge spikes in their traffic after the updates roll out, while totally reversing the cause for the other ones.
Here, we have rounded up some of the best tips and fixes; suitable for the websites that get hit by these algorithm updates to help them not only recover from the difficulties but apparently, would also make them gain more traffic from the future updates.
E-A-T should be effectively implemented
The main focus of new Google core update mostly deals with quality content and proper usage of E-A-T (Expertise, Authority & Trust). Specifically, YMYL (your money your life) websites that are related to mostly medical, financial or legal niches, have suffered the most due to lack of E-A-T. Therefore, Google have put on a great emphasis regarding trustworthy medical content to reach the audience. If your website is also YMYL based, make sure that E-A-T and content should be up to the mark.
Is E-A-T the only major factor for decline in performance of your website?
The answer is NO, because, despite being the most discussed topic in SEO communities after the recent updates, E-A-T is not the only factor affecting the websites as there would be many other issues to be considered.
1 Avoid using too much of “pop ups” and “opt-in” widgets
Even though pop up widgets is a great method for e-mail list building for webmasters, Google consider it a negative aspect on user experience, especially for mobile users it’s considered quite annoying. Most of the sites which get unfavorable results, frequently utilize misleading or forceful pop ups. If your site is having problems after the update, try disabling the pop up wizards from the site. Also, keep in mind that that if you are using it on your site it should be easy to close according to page margin. Similarly, for handheld devices the notification “Allow” & “block” buttons should be used.
2. Don’t use Excessive, Misleading or Deceptive ads
Many sites that got hit with the new algorithm update were frequently using misleading or disruptive ads. Moreover, they either had too many ads on the top fold of their webpage or repeated block of deceptive ads that seem to look like the related content of the page. On top of that, many of those sites were found to be using auto play video covering up most of the page. Reportedly, UK’s one of the prime newspapers “Daily Mail” lost 50% of tis Google Traffic due to the very same reasons.
Therefore, it is very important to get rid of these excessive ads. Also, if your site is using ads around the top fold of the web page, than you should consider removing it too. In addition, make sure to use “advertisement” label over the ad window to make it more user friendly and trustworthy.
3. Utilize real expertise and verified reviews
Generally, one of the most common recommendation to boost the E-A-T factor is to add the for author bios alongside their content to improve the transparency and legitimacy of the published content. However, despite being an important factor, it is certainly not the key aspect that affects the ranking of the page. Rather, it would be more beneficial to make sure that content on the site is written or assisted by real expertise related to the niche of the particular category.
Reportedly, it has also been observed that the websites with high gain often utilize the expertise reviews to increase the accuracy factor. So it is highly recommended to leverage the expertise reviews for your niche to score higher than the others.
4. Perform a major site audit and review technical issues
The proper optimization of E-A-T is definitely an important factor to consider for recovering from declined performance after the core algorithm update, however, the importance of technical SEO cannot be ignored. If your content is not getting indexed or crawled by Google than reviewing the technical issues must be done for proper optimization of the site.
Therefore, a detailed site audit must be done to check – page speed, crawling issues, AMP errors, broken links etc. for recovery and better performance.
5. Quality based content and easy to read text
Number of sites that were hit by the algorithm update tends to have poor quality content and issues related to readability. To overcome these issues make sure that your site is having a well written, unbiased and well researched. Also your content should have clear, readable and optimized text with short paragraphs and breaks to make it more users friendly.
These were some of the most common issues faced by many sites that saw a decline in performance after the core update rollout. Make sure to follow these steps to not only tweak up your performance but also to boost your traffic and to rank your website higher. If you have more tips or suggestion to share, drop a message in the comment section below.
