It was only recently that Google had updated their “core search algorithm”, which affected the rankings of a various number of websites on the internet. Some websites do benefited from this update, while some others didn’t. But, what are the changes you might ask? Well, without wasting any more time, let’s jump on the details of this core algorithm update.
Details Of Happening Of The Update
It is being reported that Google releases about 4X updates per year, in order to make adjustments to their core algorithm. For 2018 alone, three updates have already been pushed out so far – one in March, another in April and finally the third one in August. Google has already laid the groundwork for these updates but still have also delivered additional statements on the matter as well. Google said that these updates will either benefit some websites or not benefit them. For the websites which are not benefited, Google recommended keeping producing great content.
Details Of The Recent Update
It is said that informational web directory or blog sites, that deliver a great deal of information on a person’s health or money, have the greatest changes. Compared to this, some sites who have very well established authors and has the details from which the information is coming from – will have better results than sites missing this extra information. Sites having internal linking has also seen the results. Sites that are based on health and lifestyle are also affected. Also, it should be noted that source credibility is the main culprit behind all of this.
Sites Which Improved Organic Traffic
The sites which have very fast loading times or is very much responsive have either gained a positive or neutral level of organic growth. Google is very much interested in website speed. Therefore, if a website goes from very slow to fast, then it will have better results. But if the website goes from fast to a bit faster, then the results would not be significant.
Word Count Making A Difference
It was seen that pages having word count over 750 have seen a subtle improvement in traffic. But, the most important segment that really showed the growth was the 1000-2500 word count pages. These pages had the most views of the lot. Even though word count and core algorithm update are not correlated, it is still something Google is very much interested in.
Scroll Percentage Playing A Role
Even though scroll percentage is not a factor in ranking websites in the Google search results, it is still a major factor after this update. It has been seen that pages with a word count over 1000, have 50-90% scroll percentage. These websites gained traffic. Scroll percentage says how much a website’s content is interesting to the reader, according to Google.
Other Details
It has been seen that websites having which lost traffic, were mainly reliant on evergreen content – which means any content that holds true over time. Sites which put up content that is evergreen, has lost the most amount of traffic. This was also possible due to the URLs of the website not updated for a while. Therefore, it is always worth reviewing your website URLs over time, which produce the most amount of organic traffic.
