An update to the Google index last week has been described as one of the most significant for many years. If you’re seeing your Google search traffic fall, it’s important to be monitoring the search terms which have been hit (use Google Search Console). Working out what has changed in the incomprehensiby complex Google algorithms is impossible nowadays – all we can do is to compare ourselves with sites which are doing better and to try to work out why. Remember, every search should be assessed on its own merits, so think about why Site A does well for ‘blue widgets’ and Site B for ‘red widgets’. Relevance? Backlinks? Presentation? Sheer quality of content? Top results will usually have all of these and more. Can you emulate or even improve on what they’ve got?
Some SEO experts are claiming that low quality ‘thin’ content has suffered in this update, others that branded content has been given a boost. The truth is, nobody knows, and yet entire businesses can be made or broken by these changes. I know many who get most of their incoming enquiries from search engines. I hope you have a broader spread of enquiry sources than that, but if you’re affected badly, don’t panic. Often these changes get adjusted after unwanted effects are identified, so things could take weeks to settle down. However, it reinforces the importance of being on top of your data.