KHML | Are Google Algo Updates Bad
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[00:00:00] Hi everyone. I'm Pip from Seymour Digital Media. You're listening to Know How Marketing Lab podcast. This podcast brings together different experts in marketing from our Facebook group, Cyberpunk Geeks Marketing Mixer. Each week we get on here and we talked [00:00:20] about something search marketing like Google.
Or SEO, social media marketing. From Facebook to TikTok or website marketing. If you're a marketer or aspiring marketer, a business owner or entrepreneur, this podcast for you, we're gonna share the best seo, search, social, and website strategies. We [00:00:40] share tips and hacks. Google ad strategies, what's going on in the current markets.
Each week we discuss something exciting and awesome in marketing. Hi, I'm Pip and I'm Phelan, and we're gonna be talking about Google algorithm updates and are they bad? Yeah, it's definitely [00:01:00] a big point of contention in the SEO community, right? So why do we have algorithm updates? Let's talk about that first.
All right. So yeah, periodically Google wants to update their algorithm, how it's searching, and refine it and hone it. Just like any sort of system that's online. People are always updating and tweaking their algorithm. It's cuz of the [00:01:20] bad players. Ultimately that's what they're trying to get rid of, is encourage the good players and get rid of the bad players.
I always talk about it like, it's like the Olympics and I don't know if it's a bad thing that I say this cuz you know, it doesn't always get the best reaction. So you have Olympians and they figure out a drug they can take to [00:01:40] enhance their performance. And so they take that drug and then there are the people that test them.
And if they've taken a drug, they're not allowed to play. So there's this constant push and pull It all started with, really poor and wanting to show up everywhere. That's, yeah, that was a lot of, Yeah. [00:02:00] Ultimately that was the big one back in the day, which was the penguin and the panda updates.
There was a lot of bad actors that were doing it just a lot of bad linking link farming. I worked at a company and they offered Google ads. And then they dove into the realm of SEO and they were buying Link farms. And so they [00:02:20] sold link farming to the sales reps and the sales reps sold it to the small businesses.
And it was a black hat SEO strategy. All those people that worked with this company would've been penalized. So this is also why it's important to find a good SEL that you can trust. Yeah, exactly. You want to [00:02:40] be having people that will, at the end of the day, at some point, no matter what, like shady tactics, you try, at some point you're gonna get caught.
Google is going to get you and figure out what you're doing and then update it away. So you probably should follow the Whitehead guideline. Yeah. So an algorithm update, they happen and they happen more frequently than ever before. [00:03:00] Sometimes Google tells us about them. Sometimes they don't. We've had two recently three, actually three recently.
There's a core update that happened and those happen are happening about four times a year. Yeah. Every quarter, give or take that. Yeah. And then there was the, so there was the, a core update. There was a. Products [00:03:20] update and there was a good content update. Yeah, lots of changes, but So the question is, are they bad?
The answer is, it depends. Yeah. It's really, the question is not are they bad? It's who are the bad for and is there collateral damage? So some people that may get caught up. They're a minority [00:03:40] of a population it's still, they get affected by the algorithm update. I remember when I started out in Google ads, when I moved to online sales as a sales rep, and I heard about a guy who owned a shoe store and he sold red shoes and he showed up at the top of Google, and then there was an update.[00:04:00]
And he ended up on page 99 and he was all mad at Google And I think it's the same as like a passport. It's a privilege, not a right. Yeah. It's certainly one where the, We all have to play by Google's rules no matter what we like about that or not. And whether they're accountable or not, that's just the reality of the situation we're in.
[00:04:20] And so you do have to play by their rules. One, And they don't tell you the rules. They don't tell you the rules, and they don't always tell you that they're doing algorithm updates. One of the interesting places to go check out, I believe it's mos, has a history of every update. Core update. Yeah. Yeah.
Or you can change. Browser search to the last year, [00:04:40] last month. And you'll see the latest information on other sites as well. Yeah. Yeah. And the Mods one's interesting as well because it has unofficial Google Core updates or, so there's like ones that they may have just released, but they didn't make a big pronouncement like this is the product review update.
Yeah. There's been a couple of those this year, [00:05:00] haven't there? Yeah. Yeah. Generally, and a lot of them have been going after the affiliate marketing space because they've been doing a lot of part of Google's terms of services. You're not allowed to be a gateway. Site, meaning that you rank, you get to number one, someone clicks on it, and then they go to a different website.
Oh yeah. The rent and rank. It's kinda like rent [00:05:20] and rank. It's very much the vibe of that. And they have a, their name for it is gateway websites gateway pages. There's also those. Want to know more about seo? We've got a class for that. Our mission is to educate students about the right tools, techniques, and strategies to grow their businesses using the most up [00:05:40] to date search engine marketing optimization techniques and tools.
Find out more at knowhowmarketinglab.com. Yeah. And so the idea is that you're definitely wanna be you wanna have people stay on the website for a meaningful amount of time. So if it's a blog post where it's like top three camper vans for [00:06:00] 2022. And then you would ostensibly want them to spend a while on there before they click off.
If they just click away right away, then Google uses that as an indicator that you're being a bad website. You didn't find what you were looking for. Which is interesting with the one page websites. And that's why generally nobody recommends a one page website cuz [00:06:20] you leave. I mean I guess they do measure time on page.
So there are a lot of things that come into play. An algorithm update, right? Yeah. And it's about being on the right side of things and as technology changes, like we've seen a lot of that AI content rating and that's why Google did this most recent update. [00:06:40] We think that it's a, definitely a big indicator.
It does help fact that A G P T. So that's what they use for the AI writing called A G P T transformer. They created a reverse engineering one. So basically you can put in a chunk of text and it could tell you if it was generated by G P T three. Now, I wouldn't say don't [00:07:00] use an AI text writer, but use it to help you, inspire you to write.
Don't just use it. And that's. Yeah it's definitely good. The AI writers are, don't become dependent on them, but they're definitely good for getting rid of that blank page syndrome. They give you something to wrap your head around and get, it's a launching pad or just a, [00:07:20] not a complete product, but definitely an assistant tool, if you will.
Now, if I wanted to go and learn and see in my own data, see if I've been affected by a Google algorithm update, where would I. Definitely search console is gonna be a really good one for you. You can do over the course of like few months or maybe [00:07:40] even a year. I do the 16 months. Yeah, 16 months is usually the best because if you're too focused into, like narrowly, even in three months, you don't actually get the full trend line.
Yeah. Of Oh, I'm doing really well overall. Because you're seeing like tiny little fluctuations and you're like, Oh my God, I'm down, I'm up, I'm down. And it's just too inconsistent and you need to take a [00:08:00] longer view of things when you're looking at search console. And it's really interesting to show people this because you can see, like on ours, goes up and then goes down and then goes back up.
And you could, So I could tell you the different algorithm updates, like where the core update happened. Yeah. And where the content update happened [00:08:20] and which is very exciting to show people. Now that being said, working in the SEO industry, some of our clients have been affected poorly cuz they don't have enough money to get their site straightened out all at once.
Yeah, there's definitely, Or they're doing something that they shouldn't be keyword stuffing titles, stuff like that. [00:08:40] And we advise 'em like, Hey, this is really bad idea. You should really not do this. and then you know, something bad happens to them and then all of a sudden they're coming to us and saying, Why didn't you do this?
Yeah. Why didn't we fix this problem? And then we say that's one of those situations where you just have to put your hands up in the ear and just be like, We have this conversation. Yeah. The best practice is, do [00:09:00] you implement them even though the client says no. The answer I think is no.
And guess I'll see you next time. We'll see you next time. Yep. See you then. Bye.
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