To be honest, I am normally left completely unmoved by announcements of Google algorithm updates.
Whilst the SEO community get their knickers in a twist, I just let the tidal wave of online noise pass over and crack on as normal. My view is that you have little to worry about if you are not doing anything wrong. I will accept that Google is far from perfect and the collateral damage can impact a domain that really isn’t trying to game the system, so it can be a worrying time, but the biggest whingers are almost always those who have been sailing too close to the wind and they have simply been found out. I therefore have little sympathy and find the hysteria in webmaster forums fairly tedious.
I generally feel the same about the very nature of most algorithm updates. They *all* are iterations of an ongoing battle against crappy SEO techniques and should reward good, honest SEO. The search engines want to help the user find the best possible content that matches their search query and will tweak their algorithms to try to outfox shady techniques that try to outwit the search engines. This comes at the expense of the user experience, so it is natural that the search engines will try to eliminate such tactics.
Has the March 2024 update been any different? The core update is still rolling out but the spam update, which started on the 5th March, has supposedly finally finished rolling out across the globe. In Google’s own words :
While Google’s automated systems to detect search spam are constantly operating, we occasionally make notable improvements to how they work. When we do, we refer to this as a spam update and share when they happen on our list of Google Search ranking updates.
For example, SpamBrain is our AI-based spam-prevention system. From time-to-time, we improve that system to make it better at spotting spam and to help ensure it catches new types of spam.
Sites that see a change after a spam update should review our spam policies to ensure they are complying with those. Sites that violate our policies may rank lower in results or not appear in results at all. Making changes may help a site improve if our automated systems learn over a period of months that the site complies with our spam policies.
In the case of a link spam update (an update that specifically deals with link spam), making changes might not generate an improvement. This is because when our systems remove the effects spammy links may have, any ranking benefit the links may have previously generated for your site is lost. Any potential ranking benefits generated by those links cannot be regained.
Specifically, Google introduced new spam policies that targeted scaled content abuse, expired domain abuse and site reputation abuse (although the site reputation abuse will not be effective until May). You can read more about what these individual policies mean on the Google Search Central blog, which is worth a read. The fact that they have blogged about the March updates is mildly interesting as it suggests that more volatility can be expected than normal.
So……… has this update been an exciting one?
Not in my world. Perhaps it is too early to really feel any impact of the rollout, but I have not seen anything above and beyond the normal volatility that you should expect with Google SERPs. Keywords will always fluctuate and you really should not be obsessing about individual keyword rankings anyway, but I haven’t seen any evidence of massive disruption despite what you may read on SEO focused sites. I feel that it is yet another storm in a teacup moment.
Why am I blogging about a non-event then? A fair accusation, but I am really blogging about the hysteria that so often accompanies algorithm updates, rather than the update itself. Perhaps I have just been doing this whole SEO thing for too long, but I have grown tired of ‘experts’ over reacting to updates and announcing the end of the world when the impact is only really felt by the shysters.
My advice, for all things algorithm related, is to follow some very simple principles:
- Focus on creating the most amazing user experience rather than trying to ‘beat’ search engines. Earn their attention. Do this all the time rather than going into panic mode when algorithm updates are announced.
- Consider your user needs above everything else and publish content that you know will appeal to them.
- Take what you read on SEO forums with a pinch of salt. A lot of what you read is click bait or thinly veiled attempts to sell a service.
- Use a combination of Analytics and Google Search Console to ascertain the impact of any update. Do not rely on isolated ranking reports.
- Be patient during a larger algorithm update and do not panic if you see more volatility than normal – this may be the impact of other sites being affected rather than a signal that you are being penalised.
I am absolutely not advocating a complete ‘head in the sand’ approach to SEO but spikey attention, fuelled by SEO forums and proclamations of seismic changes in the SEO world, is highly unlikely to deliver sustainable success and you are far more likely to become obsessed with short term SEO tactics (again, most likely from the forums…). Enjoying long term success with search engine marketing demands a constant focus rather than a sporadic reaction to algorithm updates.
There are always going to be winners and losers when search engines update their maths but you can enjoy being on the winning side more often when you embrace the aspirations of the search engines. You should absolutely understand what these aspirations are and an appreciation of individual algorithm updates will do no harm but they are highly unlikely to be anything to worry about if you are focusing on quality rather than deception.
