- What's up guys. So, in December,
a ton of websites got hit by the Google Core update.
It may have impacted your site too.
In fact, some websites lost 60 to 70%
of their traffic overnight with the update,
so it was pretty brutal.
But how can you recover from the core update?
Why did you get here in the first place,
and how can you avoid this happening in the future?
Well, that's exactly what I'm gonna teach you
in this video in three simple steps.
All right, let's jump in.
So the first step is to find out the reasons
why you got hit by the penalty.
And the thing is right, when it comes to a core update,
you need thousands of websites and data across
all these sites.
Plus you need to look at the current and historical trends.
Then you also need to analyze this data over months
before and after the update.
So it requires a lot of detailed analysis,
which most people don't have access to.
And to be honest, that would only give you
a half decent insight.
It wouldn't really give you a solid analysis to work with.
You see, the thing is, with a core update,
this is kind of like a holistic approach to
Google's algorithm,
and lots of different ranking factors
have all been impacted in different ways
and they're all weighted differently.
Then also at the same time, each of these ranking signals
kind of affects each other.
So is a very complex update to track.
So what does that mean for you?
Well, you basically have to guess your way through this.
And you can work through it methodically
but at the same time, you're not really gonna have
any concrete findings with a core update.
It's not like when there were see Google Penguin update
or the Google Panda update or the medical update,
where you knew exactly what the problem is
and how Google was changing the algorithm.
With a core update, this is pretty much
every single ranking factor being affected,
weighted in different ways and impacted separately.
So it's very difficult to track everything.
So how do you figure out like what the problem is?
And where do you start?
Well, I would say when it comes to
recovering from a core update,
you need to compare the gaps between your website
and what you consider a really high quality site, right?
So what are the differences and where can you improve?
And then you look through each of the main ranking factors,
and you systematically bridge the gap between you
and where you need to be.
So for example, if you're having the perfect website
and then you have your site, you need to systematically
look at ways that you can bridge the gap
so that your websites quality improves gradually over time.
And this could be with your content, with your design,
it could be with your UI, it could be your on-page SEO.
Basically you need to look at each main element of SEO,
and then see how you can benchmark it and improve.
But the problem is that your rankings may not improve
until that next core update because
it takes months for Google to track your website's data,
and then to see how much your ranking signal search improve.
For example, if you take bounce rate on your website.
Bounce rate, isn't something Google is gonna say,
"all right, you just had one good day
where your content has had better metrics than ever before
and therefore we're gonna rank you higher."
In fact, with these sort of metrics
it's gonna take months to see improvements.
And Google has to build up months of data
to build up a good history of ranking signals.
So if you got hit by the last core update,
you might have to wait months
before you see any improvements.
But that brings me onto my next point.
So, you really have to ask yourself,
what is your website high quality?
And not to offend anyone because
I've been guilty of this too.
But if you build a site, and you expect it to rank,
it needs to be the best it can possibly be
in your industry.
If you really wanna compete realistically
for the first place on Google.
So, what is your website high quality?
Does it have the best content? Did I have the best UI?
Is it realistically providing any value
that you can't find anywhere else?
Because when I saw a lot of the sites
have got hit by the core update,
they were pretty low quality,
and they didn't deserve to be ranking the one
in the first place.
You know, most of them weren't up to scratch
and it was just a matter of time before they got hit
by an update like the December one.
A lot of websites out there that were ranking
number one previously, and then got hit by the update,
really weren't up to scratch.
For example, let me take affiliate sites.
A lot of affiliate sites just pump out
lots of review articles, it's very poor content,
it's basically rewriting product descriptions of Amazon,
and then looking at the pros and cons of each,
and there's no real value there.
There's nothing that you can find on that site
that you can't find anywhere else.
And then if you combine that with poor UI, poor design,
with poor on-page metrics,
and then also low quality backlinks, maybe,
a lot of the sites for buying
the cheapest possible backlinks
from very generic sites,
that were getting CRO organic traffic,
and you combine all of these metrics,
you can see why a website would get hit by something
like the core update.
Because it's so holistic and it's looking at
every single ranking factor,
chances are you're gonna get hit if you're not
up to scratch on each of these factors.
So you really have to ask yourself,
is your website the best there is in this industry?
Did you really deserve to rank in number one
in the first place?
Or was it just a matter of time before you got hit
by an update like the December one?
I mean, when I take most affiliate websites for example,
this isn't the best content you can find.
It's not written by an expert.
It doesn't provide any expertise,
and there's nothing unique on that site.
So, if you have content like that,
why do you expect to rank number one?
And what makes you deserve to outrank the other websites
in your industry that are working harder
to create more unique content?
So I've ranted a why some websites got hit
by the core update and you know, why a lot of websites
aren't up to scratch.
But what's the solution?
How can you recover from Google's update?
Well, in the long term, Google is gonna reward websites
that provide value, and they're unique, okay?
So you really have to create something
that no one else can produce.
And that means hiring great writers for example.
You know, if you hire experts who are
actually genuinely passionate about
the content they're writing,
and they can provide a unique angle on the content,
that you can't find anywhere else,
then that's gonna really differentiate your website,
your articles, and help you rank higher.
Really, it's about making sure you don't do everything
sub-par, okay?
It's not really about what you do,
it's about how much attention you pay when you do it,
and the way that you do things.
So if you go the extra mile to improve the quality
of your website, then in the long run,
that's really gonna pay off.
And sure, you may have competitors now that have
terrible sites, that have crappy links,
that have low quality content,
and they may be outranking you now,
but it's just a matter of time before they get hit
by a core update, or another update from Google.
So, if you play the long game, and you really think
about providing a website with great content,
with a unique angle, with expertise, genuine expertise,
then in the long run on,
your website is only going to improve.
I mean, I know some affiliates,
they've got hit hugely by the last update,
simply because they were hiring a team of Filipinos
to rewrite content, to rewrite product descriptions
from Amazon, and just do a generic top nine list
of the best products in the industry.
And when you start producing content like that,
really it's a matter of time before you get hit
by an update.
Whereas I know other affiliates,
who've hired really expensive writers,
but are experts in the industry who genuinely
love what they're writing about and have a lot of expertise,
and these sites have only benefited
from each Google core update.
In fact, every time an update is released,
they genuinely see a spike in more traffic.
I mean, another point as well it's like
if you take your design for example,
UI needs to be on point.
You need to make sure that you reduce bounce rates
and that your design of the website
is
basically creating an experience where users
want to engage with content on your site.
They genuinely enjoy using your site.
Because, you know, generic WordPress themes and poor UI
are only gonna hurt you in the long run.
And it's just a matter of time before
you get hit on those two.
Plus, when you're getting backlinks, you need to make sure
that you're getting high quality, relevant backlinks
from websites that genuinely are read by other people.
If you're just getting low quality backlinks
that are super cheap, that everyone's using right now,
they barely get any traffic,
then in the long run, that's only gonna hurt you.
And again, if you combine all of these factors,
your backlinks, you design, your on-page SEO,
and the content that you're producing,
and you do all of that's sub-par,
then you're never gonna recover from a Google core update.
For me, I feel like the days are numbered
for sub-par websites.
Before, sure, you could rank and you saw a lot
of low quality websites ranking number one
simply because they manipulate Google's algorithm,
they were getting backlinks from all these dodgy PBNs,
but the days are numbered for sites it's like that.
And you really have to play the long game
if you wanna rank high on Google.
So if your site really isn't up to scratch,
it's just a matter of time before you hit by core update.
It's much better to prepare now,
so that you don't get hit by a core update in future.
Then you're gonna save yourself months of frustration
and avoid getting hit by an update.
So basically it's better to prepare for that now,
and really focus on increasing the quality of your site.
So thanks for watching guys.
I hope this video helped you.
By the way, I do run a link building agency.
If you wanna get high quality backlinks,
that actually increase your website's traffic,
then you can book in a call with me,
at juliangoldie.com, I'll leave a link
in the description below, but yeah,
I've helped dozens of websites increase their rankings,
get more traffic with Google,
and make sure they're getting whitehat backlinks
that genuinely improve their sites rankings.