Google Core Algorithm Update – Is Not a Bad News After All

As petrified as it sounds, some are happy to receive Google’s latest Core Update.

Ever since I read about Google’s Core Algorithm Update, I am banging my head on the keyboard to understand what it is about. It would be easier to recognize the update and its effects, only if it shakes SEO down on the date of release. But nothing like that happened. On the contrary, online marketers and SEO people are bragging about an increase in rankings after the release of the update.

To complicate the matter, Google didn’t elaborate much on its latest update. I had to rely on bits and pieces to unlock the secret of Google’s latest algorithm update.

Here’s what I came up with:

What is Google Core Update?

It’s a ritual to stay alert whenever Google announces a new update. Given that, each time updates affect the sites and some have to try real hard to get back on track. This time, opposite to the expectations, Google’s new core update has turned out to be good news for those who, long ago, left hopes of ever gaining their rankings back.

With the name “Core 2 Update”, people got the wrong idea about the update. As the name suggests, it sounds relevant to the previous Core Update which hit hard on e-commerce websites. So, it was assumed that this time the algorithm may target another niche. Later, Google renamed it “March 2019 Google Update” to avoid confusion. And Danny Sullivan came to the limelight to burst the myth.

The first glimpses of updates came from Danny Sullivan via tweet.

“We released a broad core algorithm update.” a tweet came from Danny Sullivan, Google SearchLiaison.

Before everyone gets panic from the intimidating term “broad core update”, Danny mentioned in their tweet that there’s nothing wrong with pages that may now perform less well.

Another soothing tweet from Danny was:

“There’s no “fix” for pages that may perform less well other than to remain focused on building great content. Over time, it may be that your content may rise relative to other pages.”

Source

Those words erased the worries of many whose sites are still in the progress of working their way to get rankings on the first page. Not only this, but Danny is also lifting the hopes of less-performing sites. Giving them guidance on how to survive upcoming algorithm updates.

All in all, Danny is saying that high-quality content is a universal rule you must follow to rank high on Google.

Back to the topic.

If not harming the less performing sites, then what is it about?

Danny tweeted, “Update Changes will benefit pages that were previously under-rewarded.”

Did you notice how Danny pressed on previously under-rewarded pages? It means web pages affected by previous updates and never got a chance to gain their position back are going to be rewarded most with this latest update. These are penalized sites from the previous updates. SEO people, who didn’t shut it down or better kept them the way they are, are finally reaping the fruit of their patience.

After a long time of waiting, Google took a step forward to reward those who bore the pain of penalizing from previous algorithm updates. Google gave them their rankings and traffic back. This might also mean that Google made some changes to previously introduced policies to soften the burden of piled-up SEO workload.

That’s why website owners are cheering on Google’s Core Update

True to its words.

Publishers, who were poorly affected by Google’s previous updates, participated in community discussions to share their gains.

Members of WebmasterWorld, one of the most popular web discussion forums, discussed their gains and effects of Google’s latest update with the community.

Founder of WebmasterWorld, Brett Tabke, posted:

“Traffic on several sites that were abused by Penguin have rebounded significantly. …I’d given them up for dead. Then noticed affiliate earnings on them this morning for the first time in a year. Traffic was way up. (400 uniques a day to 2500)”

To this, another member responded with similar results claiming to get rankings back from the penalized sites.

“Yes, a Penguin site I had given up many years ago just went from 35 to 380 unique visitors”.

Search Engine Journal calls it a Rollback update as it is reversing the effects of previous updates.

Brett Tabke observed similar changes saying, “I think we may be seeing a rollback of a few of the last updates.”

Sistrix, a toolbox of data for SEO professionals, unveiled UK-based data of winners and losers in SEO. According to Sistrix’s data, 75% of the winners were previous losers. In other words, 75% of web owners who lost their online ranking position due to previous updates, gained it back because of Google’s Core update. This further confirms that the new update is simply a rollback of previous updates. Or should I say, it’s reversing the effects of previous updates?

That’s only one side of the coin. Where others were celebrating, some members complained about sudden traffic drops on the same discussion forum.

Here’s how one member expressed grief when he received good news from other members

“After a decent last few months, yesterday the bottom dropped out. Traffic is at nearly zero all day. The past few months were almost like the good old days. Figures.”

Anchor Text Over-Optimization Reaction

Anchor text means words having hyperlinks to another site. The most common phrase of Anchor text is “Click here”.

Anchor text optimization is creating links with specific words to give search engines a clear idea of what the particular link is about. It also determines the ranking of the web page based on words.

When you put too many anchor links, on the single web page, with the greed to get higher rankings and, also, you don’t care about relevancy – that’s called anchor text over-optimization. It’s similar to keyword stuffing.

Roger Montti, a staff member of Search Engine Journal and owner of MartiniBuster, received several comments through private Facebook groups notifying sites with heavy anchor text optimization are losing in SERPs

Similar comments were dropped by another member of WebmasterWorld saying:

“…there is definitely an anchor text link element to the changes today. I have a huge amount of exact match links thanks to the copy & paste box I’ve had on my site since about 2002 that used to contain an exact match link. All my well-established pages that have exact match links are getting trashed, but the new pages I put up a few months ago that have hardly any links yet are doing fine and even gaining.”

According to Roger Montti, over-optimization may affect the quality of the site where there is a heavy presence of anchor text. He emphasizes low-quality links which will stop working once Google devalues the power of links. Additionally, he assures that over-optimization anchored sites may result in a warning from Google Search Console but everything else would be just devaluation i.e. not many effects on ranking.

It’s a minor effect of Google’s Core 2 Update you may face if you are the one from the anchor over-optimization group.

Should Marketers Be Cautious of Anything?

According to Sistrix, some web owners have lost their long tail positions, not huge ones. It indicates that the loss of rankings is comparatively low than previous updates. You can call it a recoverable loss. Not mentioning the fact that Danny tweeted on to keep creating high-quality content to stay on the top.

Google even clarified that broad core updates never target a particular niche, unlike previous updates which strike on niche each time.

At last, even Black Hat Forums confirmed that they are seeing more gains than losses. All this points to only one thing – Google’s Core Update is not as big as it claims.

So, technically, online marketers and SEO people should do nothing in response to broad core updates. Instead, they should focus on creating high-quality content and take care of relevancy for link building. That’s all Google needs to recognize your sites and make them searchable based on relevant users’ queries.

Wrapping Up

In short, you should keep in mind the power of high-quality content and relevance while putting efforts to rank high on Google. Stop wasting time worrying about what the next update holds. Black hat SEO people should be the ones sitting with the back straight and waiting for the next update to hit their shady tricks.

Google didn’t mention specific changes taking place in the web world due to updates. With its words on tweets, all is revealed in this update is going to be big in a positive way.

Google didn’t reveal much about its update. All it said is that is a broad term update. Website owners don’t have to panic as the update doesn’t require any fix.

Then why website owners are happy

Although, effects have been noticed as the result of Google updates. Or I call it reverse effects have been noticed.

Cases from SEJ

What’s the update?

Why some people are happy with the update?

What should Marketers do?