The Ever Changing Google Algorithm Updates: How to Rank in 2020

Pose the question “How to do SEO for my website?” to any group of digital marketers and you’ll probably be met with different responses.

For the most part, you can classify what digital marketers know into these three categories:

Which is understandable, actually.

Whenever the topic of SEO comes up, the main consideration that has always been constant in conversations is how quick the standards change.
And of course, the seemingly endless questions regarding how to adapt to these changes.

The good news? All these updates come from a single entity: Google. The company who dominates 87.96% of the Search Engine market (as of October 2019) composed of more than 300 other entities.

The not so good news? Google updates their algorithm, their standards, at an average rate of 500 times per year. Yeah, you read that right. That’s around 1-2 times in a day.

As a website owner or a digital marketer who relies on organic traffic for your own website or your client’s, it would be wise for you to:

Don’t get me wrong, most of the updates that Google does to its algorithm does not break the internet. They’re mostly just upgrades or expansions to the current algorithm’s capabilities at the time they were released.

I did say “mostly”, though. There are some that change the SEO landscape for everybody.

However, whether they may be game-changing updates or just minor upgrades that fly under the radar of the personalities watching and waiting for these updates to roll out, having a clear understanding of what Google is trying to do and why they do it, is a very valuable prospect.

These statements basically boil down into two main things: Ease of access and Relevance.

Google wants to provide its users the information that they are searching for, now. Like right now.While “ease of access” is easy to comprehend, relevance is a bit tricky due to how subjective it is.

It also begs the question: How does Google define relevance? What considerations does it use to decide whether my page is useful or not?
The right answer: A ton of different factors.

Let’s say you enter the search string: “How to do SEO in 2020”.

Google’s mission and vision statement means:

These are but some of the observable aspects that influence how Google’s direction aligns with their corporate mission and vision.
There are many more, in fact there’s 200 known ranking factors. All of them being handled and managed by an algorithm in a process that takes but a quarter of a second.

Let me assure you that you don’t have to wrack your brain trying to figure out all the ranking factors that we’re all not aware of.
Having clear insights on how our primary search engine thinks, and what they’re trying to do is enough to understand and at times even predict what their algorithm is trying to do.

Because at the end of the day, Google’s number one priority is not Website Owners or Digital Marketers.
Their top priority is the satisfaction of their Customers.

With that said, let’s take a look at the Google Algorithm updates that made waves in the known SEO world.

Not all algorithm updates are created equal. While some have major and long term effects on how web pages are ranked and the way we do SEO, others change only a small aspect of the whole ranking process.

In this section of our article, we’ll be reviewing the algorithm updates that matter to your website and how it defines its performance in the field of SEO.

To understand what changed with this update, we need to look at how Google’s search engine used to work before it was implemented.

You see, back then it was all about speed and quantity: The faster you could produce a page that has content filled with the highest density of keywords, the higher your rank is.

It was a nightmare for content creators. Imagine filling your websites with pages that say this:

“Are you looking for cheap running shoes? If you’re looking for cheap running shoes, look no further. Our cheap running shoes website is the best place to order your new cheap running shoes. Feel free to check out our selection of cheap running shoes from our cheap running shoes selection below. Or check out our other offers for cheap running shoes from this link: www.cheaprunningshoes.com "

Looks bad, right?

After Panda was rolled out, contents with poor quality like our example above could never hope to see the light of SERP’s Top 10 anymore.
More than that, it also made changes into how links were built since only high-quality and relevant links would add value when it comes to SEO rankings.
One of Panda’s biggest targets was Content Farms. These are websites that hire tons of writers to create content about anything and everything unders the sun.

What’s bad about these sites is the quality of content they produce isn’t consistent. Most articles are produced not by authors who are considered as experts in the topic but writers who piece content puzzles together.

Don’t get me wrong, content farms do have the capability to produce excellent content. But it’s mostly outnumbered by the low quality ones.
Either way, Panda 1.0 cracked down on pages with mediocre to bad content quality that the previous algorithm let slip through the cracks.

Yeah, you read that right: Panda 1.0.
The fluffy sounding algorithm update released in 2011 was the first of many versions that followed it.

In fact, there have been a minimum of 28 total updates with the most recent one released in May 2015.
I say minimum since there may have been minor tweaks here and there applied to the algorithm.

While we’re not going to go through all 28 updates that Panda went through, let’s highlight the major ones that made waves:

Like we mentioned earlier, the first Panda version targeted content farms.

Now this doesn’t mean all multi-author sites or online companies providing content creation services were hit. It really depends on the quality of the articles and/or copy that’s being produced.

High quality in-depth content that produces high engagement from readers as well as reference links in different platforms and pages online still continued to rank well.

In short, Panda 1.0 made sure that all contents being produced online are credible and aims to provide its readers with accurate information.

Released in April 2011, the second Panda version pointed its digital scope on international search queries.

Google UK, Google AU, as well as English queries in non-english versions of the search engine such as Google France and China became part of the algorithm’s coverage.

Google’s Search Quality officer Amit Singhal further reiterated their corporate mission in his statement saying: “Google focused on showing users the highest quality, most relevant pages on the web.”

The months of May up to July 2011 saw the launch of minor updates that incorporated additional signals to indicate site quality.

These signals saw to it that contents and pages that have low quality would be penalized, and rewarded those who worked their hardest in producing the best quality content with high organic traffic.

This update also focused on gauging the User Experience that websites provide to their customers.

This means that website owners and content creators that published articles and pages which resulted in high engagement rates and enhanced their site’s navigation saw benefits in their ranking as well.

This update which was released in August of 2011 affected anywhere from 6 to 9% of search queries globally. Michael Whitaker said that its main focus was to “Improve site conversions and engagement.”

This ultra powerful search filter was initially rolled out in October 27, 2011. It wasn’t until 5 days after when the official announcement from Google was released.
This update saw huge names in the online world like CNN and IGN ranking higher up in SERP.
Also, in the updates leading to 3.0, Google increased the frequency of their algorithm updates after Panda 2.5. This was also referred to as the Panda Flux.
With the competition raising the already high stakes further, website owners began feeling the pressure to produce better content and improve the engagement of their sites.

An update that was launched in November 2011, this Panda version affected about 1% of the total search queries. While you might think that 1% is insignificant, in comparison to the total amount of searches online, that’s at least a 7-figure number.

This minor update was a result of Google trying to improve the relevance of it’s search results further in order to provide its customers with useful information.

Website owners online thought it was unfair of Panda to prioritize the large sites that had huge opportunities to dominate the SERP rankings so when version 4.0 was released on May 2014, the algorithm targeted those large domains.

Their requirement: consistently create and publish high quality, relevant, and in-depth content.

And not just any content. These websites were required to create articles that add value, are interesting to readers, and directly rectify the issue that the customers are searching answers for.

All while being available to mobile devices.

Do you own a large website? Then be ready to deal with higher quality standards.

Saw Google cracking down again on websites that do keyword stuffing on their content. This small version update impacted 3-5% of the total search queries.

The last version in the Panda algorithm update was released in May 2015. This saw major gains for websites who worked the hardest to optimize their pages based on the standards that the algorithm was continuously throwing at them.

To summarize, you can consider Google’s Panda update to be the be all and end all of content quality standards. The intent of the search engine giant here was to bring down websites who rely on low-effort content.

As mentioned earlier, it was an eye opener to webmasters and digital marketers alike. The era of keyword stuffing has ended and Google is ushering a new age where content quality is the name of the game.

This update saw Google fighting against the marketers who use questionable and suspicious methods in ranking their pages. All in the goal of giving the customers of their search engine the best online user experience they could ever have.

Thus it has become more evident that Google would automatically identify changes to your website after it gets crawled by the algorithm, and then adjust its rankings based on the results.

By 2017, Google’s Gary Illyes confirmed the relevance of the page layout algorithm and that it’s still a big deal to consider in page rankings.

Now I know what you’re thinking so I will address this first: No, Google doesn’t have a software engineer named Penguin.

It’s not a similar naming method like what they did with the Panda Algorithm. In fact, no one knows where the name came from.

This update launched in April 2012 had its eyes set on one thing: Spam.

Specifically, the quality of the links providing ‘votes of confidence’ to web pages hence affecting their ranking in SERP.

This means site owners who have been buying links or acquiring them from link networks in order to beef up their page ranking will find themselves caught in the algorithm’s net.

Also, sites who have still persisted in saturating each of their pages with their focus keywords, or commonly known as Keyword Stuffing, highly risk to incur the wrath of Google’s ruthless pet Penguin.

Once again, Google was trying to send a message to all webmasters, website owners, and digital marketers: The Spam Sheriff is in Town.

Site owners were given an ultimatum:

The Search Engine Giant was not entirely ruthless in its implementation. As long as website owners comply to disavow bad links from their sites, and create high quality content, then Google’s Pet Penguin will turn its gaze somewhere else.

Here are some key changes that defined the Penguin algorithm:

More of a “refresh” rather than an update, this instance saw improvements in ranking for those websites who were initially hit hard by the algorithm when it first launched and have proactively taken steps in rectifying their site’s low link quality and high keyword density pages.

Another data refresh that saw English language queries affected, whether they be from local English speaking countries or international Google search engines that have English queries.

Mid 2013 saw a more advanced version of the Google Penguin algorithm being introduced to the online world.

This Penguin update saw 2.3% of all English queries impacted, including other languages at equivalent ratio.

This also marks the first Penguin update that scanned website home pages as well as top-level pages for presence of suspicious links that the site is benefiting from.

A refresh that was rolled out for the 2.0 version later of the same year which saw 1% of the total search queries impacted.

In typical Google fashion, no specific explanation was offered for this version of the Penguin algorithm. Although, data gathered from results suggested that the internet “Sheriff” has been doing some advanced-level digging.

This time, instead of just crawling home pages and top level pages, it is now diving deep and searching every nook and cranny of a website to look for spammy links and high-density keywords.

Now don’t let the whole number version fool you into wondering if this was a major update because it wasn’t. In fact, it was just another refresh of the algorithm.

However, it did allow those affected by the previous versions of Penguin to recover and emerge from the ruins they got buried into.

For the sites that continued suspicious and questionable link practices and website owners that deluded themselves into thinking that they had avoided Penguin’s radar unscathed, this was when they felt the cold slap of the algorithm’s fins hit them

These cycle of implementations and refreshes will continue on for the next two years. Until the final Penguin update was launched.

There are two significant changes to take note of in this versions:

Before, it took an algorithm ‘refresh’ before websites felt the impact of being hit by the algorithm. Now site owners won’t need to wait.

For those who have been working hard in cleaning up their websites for spammy links and high keyword density pages, the algorithm rewards them with instant rewards in terms of search traffic and ranking in SERP.

The same principle goes, albeit an opposite effect, for those who are trying out questionable methods in gaining backlinks to their sites.

This final update also saw Google’s pet Penguin becoming a bit docile in handing out punishment.

During the previous versions, sites penalized get hit hard in rankings. With 4.0, it was just the links that were devalued.

Studies do show, however, that the algorithm penalties relating to backlinks are still in effect until today.

Here’s what’s prompted the creation of this filter:

Now more than a year before the filter was rolled out, Matt Cutts from Google already warned interested parties in the online world that future updates will be looking closely into these unfair methods and practices being done.

He detailed this in a webmaster video published on March 11, 2011:

The EMD update made several experts in the known SEO world question whether the use of exact match keywords in domains was wise knowing that we have a filter prowling about.

Data being compiled shows a very steep decline on domains with exact match keywords who formerly held rankings.

The consensus after the update? Overall: domains that aren’t dot-com were penalized more severely compared to the .com ones which were in essence, withstood the updates that occured.

EMD’s process wasn’t a one time thing, it was run by Google periodically in order to do two things:

While Google has been adamant in its presentation of the qualifications that the EMD filter uses to evaluate websites, there were still doubts being presented by people who have interest in SEO.

Specifically the fact that having exact match keywords for domains could still prove valuable for a website.

One of the biggest myths circulating back then was the fact that Google went after all exact match domains.

While compiled results do look like it, and the fact that not all webmasters are actually purchasing domains with exact match keywords for malicious purposes, it does prove to be a very shaky prospect at best.

In essence, the main goal of Pigeon is to offer better local search results by giving better visibility to local businesses that exude strong organic presence online.

Pigeon is not an update that addresses quality or spam like its predecessors. It’s also not a penalty-based algorithm that will ‘punish’ contents in search results with low quality. It’s a change in the actual ranking factors of the search algorithm.

While the Pigeon update made several notable changes as mentioned above, the most observable to date was its effects to the “Google Pack” features.

This pertains to the 7 local businesses that Google features if their search engine query reflects a local intent like a geographical keyword.

Back in its initial launch, the Google Pack featured 10 businesses on their list. This number saw a steady decline, until a year after Pigeon’s release when it was reduced further to 3 listings per pack.

This massively significant update that affects local businesses saw those who didn’t make it to the top 3 as being left out of the ranking. It also made ranking much harder since there are only 3 positions to vie for.

Like many other Google updates, the roll out of the Pigeon algorithm changes had one unwanted result: Spam listings slipped through the cracks.

This further emphasized on the weakness of Google’s local search engine algorithm and made manual reporting of violations a necessity.

Another weakness exposed by the Pigeon algorithm update was Google’s lack of capability to differentiate between businesses that are legitimate vs. businesses edited to have exact match keywords in its domain.

Since local businesses of spammy nature kept slipping to the cracks, the legitimate businesses who were exerting their efforts to rank in the Google 3 pack found themselves being pushed out of the ranking as a result.

There are “good” interstitials though, which would not be affected by the new signal if used responsibly:

Here’s an image showing unintrusive interstitials:

This was further reinforced by having similar results in SEMRush’s UK volatility graphs.

The General Consensus regarding this update was that:

Algorithm updates revolving around Google’s EAT guidelines affect industries whose primary requirement is having tons of expertise in the field.

Industries like health, law, government, science, and financial are some of those typically impacted. In retrospect, those in the automotive and animal care sector also require expertise and trust signals.

How Google defines authority and trust though is a very broad field. Add to the fact that Google can change their definitions easily.

Combining all these with how they judge content quality and relevance, it does make for a very complicated combination.

The last time Google confirmed the rollout of an update was back in 2018, and that was a Core Algorithm update as well.

The Medic Update vehemently denied by Google to only affect websites in the field of health and medicine was still ringing true to SEOs despite the denial.

This March 2019 Core update was seen as a softening of that previous algorithm rollout.

Broadening horizons from the aftermath of the so-called Medic update AKA the Query Intent Update, the reference was expanded to industries outside health and medicine.

And thus the acronym YMYL was coined. YMYL stands for Your Money or Your Life. A label for online entities with whom the impact of the information being promulgated from heavily affect human life and/or lifestyle

Sites that belong to YMYL industries need to work harder than their non-YMYL counterparts in gaining EAT (Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trust) signals.

This is because an incorrect medical prognosis which may lead to the recommendation of the wrong medicine may cause harm or loss of life.

A weighty error compared to say, providing inaccurate information on how to trim garden plants.

“Just prioritize the users, dammit!” is what my SEO specialist used to say whenever there’s a big update like this and he gets asked by the content people on how to adapt to it.

Well to be specific, it's more of prioritizing the users’ search intent. For this update, Google is actually rewarding websites that can meet their user’s intentions accurately.

Improve Your Content’s Search Intent

As always, research is the key. The type of questions your customers are asking is essential in order for you to build out content that accurately addresses them.

The playing field has greatly evolved from focusing on just one or two main keywords to covering every topic and query and making sure they have accommodating authoritative content.

Check out your competitors as well, especially those who are doing well and identify which ones you can emulate. Their gaps are important as well, since it would greatly help you know which opportunities you can capitalize on.

Furthermore, you’d also want to map out your keywords properly depending on the buying cycle your customers are in. Navigational, informational, and transactional keywords each have their own special place in your sales funnel.

Improve Your Website’s User Experience

Malte Landwehr, VP at Searchmetrics conducted an analysis that reflected results leaning towards most SEOs' belief at that time that Google has increased the weight of the user signals when measuring pages for rankings.
Some of these signals were page views per visit, time on site (session duration), and lower bounce rates.
And those websites that increased in rankings actually had better numbers in terms of those metrics compared to their online competitors.
These metrics are actually considered as the most difficult ranking factors to meet since it combines all the factors of a great user experience.
In short, meeting them actually means you gave your customers a very good user experience.
If a website gets its users to spend more time on their pages, or open more pages for each visit, and have them bounce with a lesser rate back to SERP, then that site surely has quality content.

Uncharacteristically, Google announced via Twitter that an update is rolling out across Google’s data centers last June 2019.

It’s not like Google to share, much less announce their algorithm updates to SEOs online. However, the nature of this update demanded so. Especially since this is a Core Update.

And this marked the second time Google made changes to its core algorithm in 2019.

After determining the beneficial purpose of a page, the algorithm then categorizes it as either a YMYL site or a non-YMYL site.

A YMYL site requires higher levels of E-A-T signals before Google would even consider it for ranking. For non-YMYL sites, the requirements are a bit lenient.

Crackdown on Fake Information and News

One of the biggest and most controversial effects that this core update brought upon the online world was how The Daily Mail, a well-known tabloid newspaper in the UK saw massive decline in rankings.

The Daily Mail officially sought help from the Google Forums, stating how 50% of their search traffic disappeared seemingly overnight.

This made the UK Tabloid site an instant focus of case studies by SEOs who saw the massive hit it suffered.

Here are some of their findings:

All in all, The Daily Mail not only lacked in meeting the Trust Signals required by Google from news and information websites which are part of the YMYL category, it also caught the ire of Fred due to its unethical system of online advertising.

Looking at Criteria Beyond EAT

By now you’ve probably realized that algorithms will continue to evolve and become sharper in terms of judging web pages.

Google’s algorithm no longer cares about matching keywords to web pages. Its operation has become more complex than that.

Ironically, that made SEO more simple for us digital marketers. For Google, it’s all about answering their users’ queries with the best possible content you could ever make for them.

The search engine giant will no longer favor websites who do not focus on providing direct answers to users who are looking for it, and in-depth information to those who need them.

A website loading quickly without 404s is irrelevant for Google if it doesn’t answer their users’ queries directly.

Importance of Testimonials and reviews

One of my most favorite marketing quotes came from Philip Kotler. He said: “The best advertising is done by satisfied customers.”
This has been a principle I have always kept close at heart. And it seems Google shares this belief as well.

The third factor in the E-A-T guidelines, Trust Signals, is a requirement best met by Testimonials and Reviews that come from your satisfied customers.

To understand this principle better, we need to look at the reverse model of the equation:
No matter how awesome your product is or its presentation, the value proposition that supports it, or how accurately it addresses your customers’ needs, one negative review from another customer could plant the seed of doubt on your prospective ones.
The bottom line? Your prospective customers will believe the words of your existing customers more than they will believe you.

The short answer: Nothing

I’m not saying there’s nothing you can do about it. What I’m saying, or rather what Google actually advised the webmasters at the time was: “Do Nothing”.

As a website owner you might find that unacceptable. As a digital marketer (we always have it worse), your clients will surely find that course of action appalling.

And for good reason, the website you’re managing just took a hit.

However, looking at it from another perspective, Google’s loaded advice is in fact a good course of action to take.

Whenever your website takes a hit from an algorithm update and starts to lose ranking, don’t panic and start by looking for what to rectify.

It would be more beneficial for you to instead take a look for reasons why Google doesn’t see your site as relevant anymore.

Oftentimes, it’s actually a more productive and efficient undertaking to worry less about what’s wrong with your website. Instead, gain a clear understanding on what makes your competitors who are ranking better than you more relevant than your site.

Why Google’s Guidelines is not an SEO Cheat Sheet

While Google has graciously provided us with a guideline document for Google Algorithms, it is worth saying that you shouldn’t be looking at this as a way to overtake your competition once you comply with what it says.

Sure, you can use the Guidelines as words to live by, sorta like “Google’s SEO Bible”.

But just like everything else in SEO: if everyone can access it, then everyone will be doing the same thing.

Use it as a rulebook. Check your website if it complies with the guideline set forth by Google. These are the right steps to take in utilizing Google’s algorithm guidelines.

It is a long document though, so it will surely take time to read through all of it.

Or, you can make it easier for yourself and just do what Google wants you to do. Which is by the way, the main gist of that whole document: Put your customers as your top priority and give them the best experience.

Back in September 2019, Google gave SEOs and site owners advance notice that a broad core algorithm update will be rolled out and it may take a few days to complete it.

While this is hardly a surprise to concerned parties, the fact that these changes will affect the core algorithm made everyone listening to Google’s signals hold their breath in anticipation.

One of the more popular hangouts for SEOs, Black Hat World Forum had members reporting losses left and right after the update completely rolled out.

While this post looks to be a typical report of black hat marketer stating losses, and there were no specifications on what caused the ranking declines, losses attributed to links stood out like a sore thumb.
Broad core algorithm updates usually come with a wide range of improvements and changes, mostly focusing on relevance.
Though most of the discussions centered around links and how they were affected, it was highly likely that it is but one part of a huge number of changes that came with the update.
However, there were reports of a link based spam network which was well known for massive 301 redirects to expired domains collapsing after the algorithm updates rolled out.
Exploiting 301 redirects was a notorious black hat SEO technique at the time, believed to be exploiting a ranking loophole in Google.

The link based spam network has been ranking for quite some time and was then taken down a few days before the September 2019 update.

Cracking down on Expired domains and 301 Link Spams

A few days prior to Google announcing the core algorithm update, several websites already reported significant drops in search traffic. Upon close inspection, it seems that these results were caused by irrelevant 301 link redirects from expired URLs.

Back when it became public knowledge that referral links were being considered by Google in ranking pages, webmasters and SEOs clamored to gain as many links as they can on their websites.

This is the root of the methods and techniques we classify now as Off-page SEO.

Now, Google is sending a wake up call for everyone to be more careful in choosing the links for their pages as it may do more harm than good.

Changes to How Google Looks at No-Follow Links

Another game-changing announcement that Google made along with the September Core update concerned how they treated “No Follow” Links.

Before this update rolled out, Google saw no-follow links as an absolute request to not take that link’s route during a crawl.

With the September core algorithm update, the spiderbot that Google is using will be the one deciding whether to follow a link or not, or use the link’s ‘influence’ to decide ranking or not.

Google’s exact statement on this was:

“When no-follow was introduced, Google would not count any link marked this way as a signal to use within our search algorithms. This has now changed. the link attributes — sponsored, UGC and nofollow — are treated as hints about which links to consider or exclude within Search. We’ll use these hints — along with other signals — as a way to better understand how to appropriately analyze and use links within our systems.”

Since the changes stemming from this update are centered upon the nature of links and how Google views them, it is worth beefing up the quality of the links you are choosing to place on your site.

What are High Quality Links?

The process of link building has been a hot topic amongst SEOs who are looking to rank their pages. This is the other side of the coin in optimizing your site in order to rank it in SERP.

It is an essential factor in how search engines like Google judges your website’s pages in terms of ranking for the keywords you are focusing on in your on-page optimization efforts.

Links are one of the numerous ‘signals’ that Google looks for which shows your website is a quality source of information that is worthy of citation.
Here are three factors that determine the quality of the link:

It is worth stating that the main basis of all link building efforts is the relevance of the information on the link to the user or reader seeing it.

Here are several off-page SEO strategies that you can utilize to gain high quality links from external websites to your site:

Create Content worth Linking To

Technically, ‘building links’ is not how the whole backlinking process is supposed to be done. Links are supposed to be generated naturally on your pages from external sites.

Hence the most powerful links you could ever gain for pages are called “ Natural Links”.

Now, while Google understands that getting links naturally will be a very hard endeavor especially for newly launched websites, it will still consider natural links to be the best indicator of authority.

This is why creating compelling, unique, and high quality content that other pages would naturally want to link to is your main goal for link building.

Gain Reviews and Mentions for your Product or Service

You know who the top influencers are in your business’ industry so send them an email and place your products or services in front of them. Especially if they have a huge following in social media.

Have them mention your brand in their facebook posts and tweets, or have a content that includes a link to your website’s pages.

This method is called link outreach. And it has been a time-tested formula for building links.

Ask Your Friends and Partners for Links

You can also utilize your circle of friends or your own personal network like the people you work with and have them link to your site.

Do remember though that the main essence of backlinking is relevance.

If you would have people give your site links, then they should be in the same general industry or niche as your business in order for their links to matter.

Link building is not a process that produces results overnight. It takes time, patience, and perseverance to succeed in off-page SEO. And it would take more of that to gain high quality links.

Nevertheless, resorting to shortcuts like buying links are technically against Google’s guidelines and can result in negative effects for your website’s SEO.

Right now, Google does not have an accurate method in its algorithm to differentiate between built, natural, and bought links.

However, based on the direction these updates are taking, the algorithm may have that capability sooner than we expect.

The BERT Update

The final week of October 2019 was rocked hard by an announcement coming from Google: A named update was just rolled out. And Google named this update themselves.

Introducing: B.E.R.T. an acronym that meant Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers. And it’s scope of effect included all English-language queries globally.

Aside from annoying Ernie? Simply put, BERT is a huge leap that Google has taken in order for it’s algorithm to understand search queries better.

Saying “understand the search queries better” sounds like an understatement that users wouldn’t even bat an eye on.

So let’s state some examples:

Were you able to observe these features recently? Yeah, these are but some of the great steps Google has taken towards their goal of understanding how their users search online.

And it’s more than just an algorithm trying to “guess” what you are searching for while typing your queries on the search bar.

Now, BERT expands on these features by considering nuances in language and how they affect the meaning of search strings.

That sounds complicated so let’s uncomplicate it. Here are four great examples from the Google blog:

Search Query: 2019 brazil traveler to usa need a visa

The difference in results looks negligible, but it shows a very significant difference.

Before BERT, the results would have centered around the keywords Travel, Visa, US, Brazil. In which the algorithm would then look for the most relevant content it could find in its library, resulting in the result on the left.

But that’s not the right answer to our search query isn’t it? The searcher wasn’t looking into traveling to Brazil from the US, he or she wants to travel from Brazil to the US.

In this context, BERT used the connotation of the word “to” along with the word “need” and took that as signals to decide on the meaning of the search query as a whole.

Here’s another example.

Search Query: Can you get medicine from someone pharmacy

As you can see in the example above, BERT took the meaning of the phrase “for someone” into consideration and decided that the search string meant buying medicine for another person.

Let’s look at one more example.

Search Query: Parking on a hill with no curb

Before BERT, Google’s algorithm would focus on the words ‘parking on a hill’ and ‘curb’ without taking the word ‘no’ into consideration.

Which in this case is very critical in defining the meaning of the whole query.

BERT would take note of this small variance in language and reconsider the context of the query based on these nuances.

As per Google, BERT will have an effect on 1 out of 10 English search queries globally.

This includes Google search engines in countries with English as a second language like Google France and Google Singapore.

In terms of how big this update is, Google has confirmed that it’s the biggest update since the Rankbrain algorithm update was rolled out.

This means there’s a pretty good probability that it affects your website as well. If your website is new or needs further optimization then as your traffic grows, BERT will eventually affect your site.

Since the main updates that BERT revolves around concerns search queries, it is worth looking at the three types of queries that your customers use when performing a search.

And each of them fall under the three main categories of your customer’s buying cycle:

Informational Search Queries during the Awareness Stage

These queries as defined by Wikipedia, are search strings that cover a broad topic that may have thousands of relevant results.

When your customer enters these types of keywords in Google’s search bar, their intent is to gain information.

These are also keywords that your customers use when they are at the awareness stage of the buying cycle.

They are ‘aware’ that they have a need for the products or services you provide, but they don’t know you nor your brand as of yet.

Hence them looking for more information. They’re not looking for a specific website or brand yet, nor are looking to make a purchase immediately.

All they need at this point is an answer to a question they have or to learn how to do something they don’t know how to do yet.

Whether they find your website or not during this phase depends on how optimized your web pages are towards addressing their search intent.

Navigational Search Queries during the Consideration Stage

Are queries entered by your customers with the intent of finding a specific website or webpage.

These are commonly branded search queries in the sense that they know the carrier’s name of the product or service they are looking for

A good example of this is when your customers type in the word ‘facebook’ in the search bar rather than entering ‘facebook.com’ on the URL bar or clicking on a bookmark on their browser.

In essence, people typing in brand comparisons like “Nike vs. Adidas Running Shoes” in their search bar also fall under the navigational keyword category since these queries indicate that they are looking for the websites of these brands.

The stage of your buying cycle in which your customers use navigational is called the consideration stage.
It is at this stage where your customers already have a solution to their problem in mind, most probably gained from their time in the awareness stage, and are looking for other options.

This means how well your pages did during the awareness stage will greatly affect whether your brand is considered during this stage.
While the probability of conversion during this stage is low, it is at this phase where the critical thinking of your customers happens.

Hence, driving value towards making your products or services to be the best choice they have as a solution is paramount.
This specific aspect decides whether conversions will happen on the next stage or not.

Transactional Search Queries during the Decision Stage

These are queries that indicate a clear intent to complete a purchase or a transaction. I included the broad term ‘transaction’ since conversions don’t usually translate to a purchase.

Your conversion model may see your customer contacting you or booking your services, or at times downloading a free app.

Transactional search queries usually -but will not at all times, indicate the exact brand and/or product names like “Apple iPhone X”.

However, generic search queries with a buying intent can also be considered as transactional like “fuel efficient sedan”.

One easy way to identify transactional keywords is when telltale words are added to it. Words like “buy”, “purchase”, and “order” are some examples.

When your customers begin using these search queries, it is a good indication that they are at the final stage of their buying cycle: The Decision Stage.

In essence: They are ready to take out their credit cards and buy something or take the action that meets your conversion model.

However, don’t be complacent yet as your customers would most likely have some final considerations to make at this stage. The most common ones are pricing and shipping for ecommerce sites. For others, location.

Yes, search queries that are local and nature also fall under the transactional search queries category.

This is because the conversion point, at least at the online stage, means your customers getting your local business address and other relevant contact information like your phone number.

It is at this point where your online buying cycle ends and the rest of the conversion happens offline: As foot traffic to your brick and mortar business location.

Whenever a Google Core Update is rolled out, most if not all SEOs usually brace for impact.

This is due to how large the coverage of a core update has in terms of the changes it makes on Google’s algorithm.

A Google Core Update in essence, is a process of ‘reassessing’ how the algorithm is ranking its pages.

This means basic criteria like content quality, E-A-T Guidelines, and high quality backlinks are still being used and will continue to be used even for the core updates that will be rolled out in the future.

What usually changes during these updates is how Google ‘looks at’ these criteria in terms of determining what quality and authority is.

Google gave us an awesome example of how their Core Updates work:

“One way to think of how a core update operates is to imagine you made a list of the top 100 movies in 2015. A few years later in 2019, you refresh the list. It’s going to naturally change. Some new and wonderful movies that never existed before will now be candidates for inclusion. You might also reassess some films and realize they deserved a higher place on the list than they had before.”

Most Core Updates have always been focused on one specific aspect for web pages: Content Quality.

It seems this January 2020 Core Update is no different. Websites that prioritize giving their customers an awesome user experience as well as more compelling and engaging content fared better than their competitors did.

This core update also impacted all search results on a global scale and it is worth stating that it is not an update that has a specific target in its scope.

Meaning, webmasters and SEOs can’t just find holes and opportunities to improve upon in order to ‘adapt’ to the changes.

If you have been reading through this article, then you probably already have a clear idea as to what YMYL sites are since we discussed it on the March 2019 core update section above.

If not, feel free to read on.

YMYL is an acronym that stands for “Your Money or Your Life”.

The websites that are categorized by this acronym are considered online entities with whom the information they promulgate may pose a risk to its customers health and/or lifestyle.

And not just information, even websites whose products or services being offered could have direct irreversible effects to the health, lifestyle, or livelihood of their customers are considered YMYL.

If your business online falls under the industries of health, medicine, finance, new publications, or finance, then it's safe to assume that Google is watching you closely.

Here’s an example of YMYL sites in Google’s SERP:

As you can see on the examples above, providing inaccurate results to search queries about the simplest health-related concerns by users could potentially cause them bodily harm and pose a risk to their health.

This is why Google has been very aggressive in their efforts to make sure that YMYL especially meets the highest form of their E-A-T Guidelines.

Any YMYL site found by Google to have been distributing false, inaccurate, or even unproven information on methods and the advice their giving will find themselves severely punished.

Take the website Mercola.com for example. This used to be a health website that dominated the medical search queries due to its massive SEO efforts.

However, after the June 2019 core update, Google saw through all the inaccurate and questionable information being presented on their website.

Here’s a good example. Let’s say a user is searching using the query: “Is swine flu deadly?”

Mercola’s website states that the Swine Flu is just a regular, measly flu that is naturally occuring and will leave it’s patients naturally and eventually. In short: There’s nothing to worry about.

However, CDC states that there were over 12,000 deaths from Swine Flu in the US alone.

Google responded to this by wiping Mercola off the face of the SERPs. As the dust settled, the website Mercola.com lost 99% of their search traffic.

Your key takeaway here: Align your website towards Google’s E-A-T Guidelines. This is true whether your online business could be considered as YMYL or not.

Not being classified as a YMYL site doesn’t mean you can be complacent in your efforts to improve your website.

Focus on the essential aspects like content quality and presentation, but always be mindful of the fact that Google aims to deliver the most accurate, authoritative, expert-driven, and trustworthy content to their customers.

Concentrate on User Experience, prioritize how your customer will perceive and enjoy the experience of visiting your site.

Aside from the ones I mentioned above, having your pages occupy the Featured Snippets space also brings you these benefits:

Significant Increase in Web Traffic

The number one objective of gunning for SERP’s Top spot is of course, gaining web traffic. Featured Snippets ensures this, as well as exposure for your website and its pages. This is because of our next item on the list.

High Rates of Conversions

Gaining traffic, or page visits for your website can come from a multitude of sources. Ads, Social media, referrals, the list is endless. But the biggest percentage will always come from clicks on organic search engine results.

Being on the top spot of SERP gives you a whopping 31.7% CTR, and occupying the Featured Snippet Space gives you 8%.

Increased Brand Awareness and Website Authority

Google is trying to give their users the most accurate answer in the shortest amount of time through featured Snippets.

If your pages become selected to occupy the Featured Snippets space, then you would have premier positioning in SERP, a ‘vote of confidence’ from Google that your prospective customers will see.

In addition, a link to your web page and several images (when applicable) will be included on your featured snippet.

Google does this for their customers to see who provided them the answer they were looking for and at the same time, give an option to their users to gain more information if they need to by clicking the link.

This means your website’s name will be known to the customers using the search query you’re answering. And if they find more relevant and valuable information on your website, they would see your brand as an authority.

As we mentioned earlier, one of the sweetest perks of being in the Featured Snippets is being able to occupy two spaces of SERP’s real estate: Position Zero and one of the Top 10 results.

However, this changed after the January 2020 announcement that Google’s Danny Sullivan made in Twitter:

These sunk the hearts of many SEOs all over the globe. Especially those who are aspiring for Position Zero.

Google did this in order to reorganize results and provide one more result on the first page that can be deemed relevant to the user searching. As technically having a page appear on both position zero and the SERP’s top 10 can already be considered a redundancy.

Especially since studies show the CTR discrepancies between having Featured Snippets and not having them in SERP.

These numbers are concerning, since it is CTR that dictates how many visits a websites page receives.

How Does This Change Affect Your Website’s Pages?

Well, if you’re not aiming for position zero then the short answer is: It doesn’t.

However, if you’re one of the SEOs or webmasters that have been gunning for it for each of your web pages, then there are several considerations you would need to make.

In case you decide that Featured Snippets is no longer for you and you wouldn’t want your pages to suffer a possible CTR hit, there are ways to opt out of this Google function.

However, it would be best to consider first what ‘opting out’ means.

As per Google’s Danny Sullivan, opting out of featured snippets will have adverse effects on voice traffic.

If your website benefits from voice search, then opting out would definitely cause more harm than good.

Start Thinking Strategically When You Structure Your Content

Google is trying to give their users the most accurate answer in the quickest way possible, right?

Then everything boils down to a single question: Are your customers’ search queries answerable by a list of items or a simplistic definition?

If your answer to this question is no, then your CTR is safe and you have nothing to fear.

If your answer is yes, then what you need is strategic thinking so you can drive more value to the pages that are being included on featured snippets.

Your goal here is to make your customers click on the featured snippet link and read further.

What you’ll need is an awesome presentation: Providing direct, accurate answers to your customers and at the same time, enticing them to click on your page’s link.

The March 2020 Nofollow
Update

2020 is proving to be a very eventful year. And like we mentioned earlier, it looks like the same level of activity is true for Google and its algorithm updates.

As it was this March 1st, 2020 when Google made further updates to how it looked at and responded to Nofollow links.

Launched in 2005, “nofollow” was an attribute that can be added to reference links in order to ‘tell Google’ not to use it for ranking and passing authority.

The main purpose of a nofollow link was to put a stop on link spam being done on the comment section of social media contents.

These contents range from Facebook posts, Youtube video, Blog Articles, Tweets, and a lot of other spaces where users can freely and at times anonymously type in comments.

And these white spaces were being abused by black hat SEOs and link spammers to build links.

The function of nofollow links were then expanded in order for it to be utilized in flagging links that are being used in advertising or in the manipulated page ranks.

These are often referred to as ‘sponsored links’ and they fall under the violations spectrum of Google’s link scheme guidelines.

Last September 2019, the “Sponsored” and “User Generated Content” attributes were added by Google.

These two new attributes further redefined how links are being classified and expanded how Google looks at them from the two basic “follow” and “nofollow” functions.

With all the new attributes that were added to expand the functions of nofollow links, one thing remained the same: They were ‘instructions’ to Google’s Algorithm.

Simply put, by using these attributes, you’re “Telling Google” what to do with your links.

This changed after several updates. The algorithm is now fully capable of making decisions on its own. That means it will no longer comply with NoFollow instructions blindly and with absolute certainty.

It will first evaluate the link which in turn will help it decide whether to follow the link or not.

And now that the March 1 Update has been rolled out, Google has raised the stakes significantly higher.

In addition to its decision making capabilities in passing ‘link juice’ from the referring page, the algorithm would now have total jurisdictions on crawling and indexing pages based on link evaluation.

Google said that these changes were made possible by their new capability to gather data on individual links, including the words being used in its anchor texts.

This means the algorithm now has the proficiency to evaluate links in order to accurately identify link schemes.

Google has made it clear in their announcement that this will affect all links that exist online. This is in accordance with their goal to have the algorithm understand websites better.

It is worth saying that whether you implement link attributes on your website or not, Google’s algorithm will still evaluate and review all links on your site regardless how they are labeled.

As of right now, the aspect of nofollow/follow for links only has three main functions: link juice, crawling, and indexing.

It is not observable as of yet if this would also concern ranking factors or not. However, knowing Google and the direction their algorithm is taking, it is not a remote possibility that it may lead to that.

You’re probably asking yourself: “Should I update all the links on my website and tag them with these attributes?”

Well, if it’s a normal nofollow link, then there would be no need to update it.

However, if your nofollow links are related to UGC and sponsored links, then it would be best to update them all.

Let’s summarize what you need to do in three main points: