Everyone is all worried and up in arms about (every) update ever. Especially the Google Core update that just happened this March. Meanwhile, I’m over here without a care in the SERPs world, armed with oodles of SEO tips! (Just in case you forgot: SERP stands for search engine result pages.)

Why am I not worried?
Because for my own website AND clients, we’ve always prioritized serving over SERPS-ing.
OBVIOUSLY, search engine optimization matters, and the things you do to GET good search engine rankings matter. I love to teach you how to blend the art of serving your people well on a regular basis WITH a non-scary SEO strategy.

Read on as I break down what EXACTLY this Google Core update is, why it matters, and who it is impacting. And then I will give you 7 practical content and SEO tips to not just survive, but thrive during this update (and future Google updates).

What IS the Google Core March 2024 Update?

Per Google this update is to:

• Reduce low-quality un-original content
• Keep more spam web pages out of your results
  • Scaled content abuse- using AI alone/ or primarily to create massive amounts of content
  • Site reputation abuse- the fix there is to NOT host content about something other than what your site is about
• Expired domain abuse- when someone goes in and buys up an old domain to boost low-quality, unoriginal content

All of these updates are to target spam and AI content that clog up the search engines and make it harder for “real” people and website pages to get found. So, yay! This is GOOD thing!

Read more about it here: https://developers.google.com/search/updates/core-updates

What Has Been the Impact?

• Lots of completely AI sites that are gone, 100% de-indexed, or have lost ALL of their traffic.
• Organic traffic numbers for SOME other types of sites have dropped…BUT… most of the sites that I have seen with massive drops in numbers were either:
  • Creating massive amounts of content using a lot of AI
  • Creating around very small keywords
  • Didn’t really have any EEAT (experience, expertise, authoritativeness, trustworthiness)

Side note: since this update is fairly new, the full scope of the impact probably has not been felt yet. But overall, the update is mostly affecting AI-heavy sites, people who are going for super tiny keywords, or content creators who are just regurgitating information and don’t have authority on the\ topics they’re speaking/writing about.

How to check if your site has been de-indexed:

To check if your site was impacted by the Google update, look for your website in Google by typing “site:website.com” and see if you are showing up in the search results.

7 SEO Tips to Prevent This- and Future Updates- From Negatively Impacting You.

1. Don’t try to get around the rules!

• Please please PLEASE don’t try to use shady or spammy tactics to try and outsmart the search engine algorithms.
• When you create content with the intention of serving your people well, and then sprinkle in some SEO, most search engines (and potential customers) recognize that.

2. Prioritize serving your people and original, thoughtful, well-structured content.

• If you can’t say something helpful, don’t say anything at all. Don’t put content out just for the sake of having a piece of content.
• Ask yourself “Is this helpful to my target audience?” before you hit publish. Remember, your story, your spin, and your point of view are different than anybody else’s.
• WELL STRUCTURED BLOGS! Think back to the 5 paragraph essays from high school with a clear intro, body, and conclusion. Make sure your blog posts are well-structured, clear, and have a good flow. Make your English teacher proud!

3. Quality over quantity- but this might mean LONGER blogs than you have previously been writing.

• Google seems to be prioritizing high-quality content that THROUGHOULY answers the question- so much so that whoever clicks on your content doesn’t have to go back to Google and click on another site or link in the SERPs page.
• To beef up your content, try asking lots of questions around the question, i.e. who, what, when, where, why, and what else do they need to know?
• If you’re having a hard time writing LONGER, more thorough content, try using Answer the Public (yay free tool!) to generate more ideas around that target keyword phrase.

4. Don’t be afraid to niche down- but not too far.

• Search engines are getting smarter- meaning that if someone types in “popular hairstyles for spring 2024” and you’ve targeted the keyword “popular hairstyles for women” and updated it in 2024- google search results should match you up. In previous years, you might have had to focus the whole of your content around that specific “popular hairstyles for spring 2024” long-tail keywords.
• If you are creating a bunch of content that’s all over the board, Google’s algorithms are seeing you as NOT an expert (looking at you, baby blogger Faith).

5. Keep creating new content- but also build smart.

• Depending on where you are in your business and what resources you have available (time and money), you might need to have more than one form of long-form content for lead generation.
• This also looks like doing an exceptional job of serving your email list well!

6. Prioritize the overall user experience on your website.

• Look at things like branding, design, layout, load time, how this page is connected to other pages, etc. These can make a huge difference to website visitors.
• Ask yourself: does this flow? Does this make sense? Does the content on this page logically flow? Does it link logically to other pages?

7. Prioritize 1hr/ week to work on small SEO fixes.

• Small SEO fixes can make a big difference, but they can also be zero fun and take a ton of time to do. Our strategy here this year is to set aside 1 hour per week to fix little things like broken links, redirects, orphan pages, file sizes, etc. Usually, I like to do this on a Friday when my brain is mush and all my creative juices for the week are used up.

Get More SEO Tips Tailored Specifically for Your Business

Ok, do you feel better about this update now? Has your panic lessened a little bit, now that you know it’s really trying to just target AI and spammy content? If you still are freaking out, and ready for super zoned in SEO and keyword strategy, the first step is to go ahead a book a 1:1 coaching call! If you’re not ready for a coaching call yet (and really, that’s ok!), go grab my SEO Cheat Sheet, and my Content Strategy Cheat Sheet that I have up for free. Also make sure we’re email buddies because every Friday I send out really tangible content, business growth, and SEO tips that I don’t hand out to just anybody.

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