Google rolled out its Helpful Content system update in mid-September.
This update means you need to do 2 things:
- Review your search data for changes made since September 19.
- Review all your content to make sure it’s useful, high-quality, and experience-based.
This applies to every website, regardless of changes in your search volume and traffic.
What is the Useful Content System Update?
This is how Google explains it useful content system update:
In other words, create content for people – not content for search engine rankings.
EEAT update
In December 2022, Google updated its guidelines for quality assessment prioritize experience. Google’s human quality raters evaluate your content based on how it communicates: experience, expertise, authority, and trustworthiness.
Do you have direct experience with the topic you are writing about? Are you a trusted expert on the subject? Have you used the product or service you are writing about? Do you have real customers? Have you conducted independent research on the subject?
Your Useful Content Checklist
Your search volume, traffic, clicks, conversions, and sales all depend on consistently publishing valuable, high-quality, experience-based content.
Use this helpful content checklist to check whether your content is hurting or helping your search traffic:
1) Check your search data for changes made since September 19..
Use Google Analytics, BrightEdge, SEMrush, or your search traffic tool of choice to review your search data. Pay attention to your organic and branded search traffic, page visits, and your ranking in search engine results.
2) Audit your content to ensure it meets Google’s expectations for useful content.
Google has explicit instructions on how to rate and review the usefulness of your content. Make sure you create people-focused content. Google describes this as follows: People-driven content refers to content created primarily for people and not to manipulate search engine rankings.
Can you answer Yes to these questions?
Don’t create content for search engines. Your content should aim to help your readers. If you can answer yes to any of the questions in the section titled Avoid creating search engine-focused contentyou need to change your approach to content creation.
Think beyond keywords. Useful, high-quality, experience-based content answers readers’ questions, provides them with new information they can’t find elsewhere, gives insights only you can provide, focuses on search intent, and includes keywords.
Don’t start writing content based on keywords – start with search intent. What problems or questions do your readers have? Do I have the experience and expertise to answer these questions? If yes, write the content. When you write like this, you naturally use the keywords that match the search intent.
3) Rate your content for EEAT.
This is particularly important for YMYL websites. Any website in the fields of health, nutrition, supplements, fitness, food or medicine are YMYL sites.
Each page must clearly demonstrate experience, expertise, authority and trust.
The importance of experience is amplified in the latest useful content update. And for Google, experience and trust are linked. Do what Google says: read the guidelines.
Make sure your content is experience-based – without experience you can’t build trust.
4) Focus on who, how and why.
Who creates the content? Who are you creating content for?
How is content created? If you’re using AI tools to help you create content, make sure you’re very clear about it. People trust other humans – so be very careful when using AI tools to write your content. And remember, people don’t like being lied to or cheated on. So if you are using AI tools to create content, you need to be upfront and honest about it.
How did you arrive at the conclusions, ideas, and thoughts contained in the content? Have you conducted independent research, do you have medical training or experience in the field, are you a recognized leader in this field – be clear about your expertise and experience.
Why are you creating this content? The answer to this question should be to help people. Here’s what Google says about the Why of your content:
5) Update all content that does not comply with Google’s content guidelines.
If you have thin pages that don’t provide any value, update them.
If you have blogs without an author or bio, add this.
If you have pages that are confusing and don’t really say anything, edit them.
If you make scientific, health, or medical claims that are not supported by science, update this content and add endnotes referring to the science.
If you used AI tools to write your content, include a statement that communicates this clearly.
If you’ve created content for search engines, update it to be useful, high-quality, and experience-based.
