This might get interesting. I'm not sure how much is considered click bait.
After all, it is a Google search & we use keywords.
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I've been told that very thing by several readers, but once my work is in LetterPile...it does seem a bit better.
I've done the same thing. Especially when it became hard to tell the article and the ads apart. I don't know what the Panda thing is. I joined HP sometime around then and had no idea what was going on.
Lets hope articles are ranked on an individual basis for their "helpful content" and not down ranked because of how Google evaluates the whole site.
Edit: Unfortunately, that will not be the case and it's too late to make changes now, sites have already been scored:
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-hel … 33949.html
It would have been nice if it was by article. I already don't fair very well here anymore, but I still have a couple Owlcation articles hanging on to the first page. It would suck to lose all that traction for things we cannot control and didn't even create.
Is each niche site considered its own site in the eyes of Google? I never truly understood how that worked, considering everything is still very interlinked and almost all pages still lead back to HP. I wonder if sites like Owlcation and ReelRundown could be spared? Those were both recently overhauled if I remember correctly, I'm assuming most of the low traffic/quality articles were either enhanced or removed completely.
This does sound like very bad news for sites like Pethelpful, Dengarden, Wehavekids, Delishably, and WanderWisdom where several news articles are being posted by the hour. I don't know if other sites have news sections, these are just the ones I know off the top of my head. Pethelpful seems to put up the most frequent news, but I'm assuming that section in general is going to make the niches take a huge hit. Even if we didn't have the overproduction of low quality ads.
This does not sound good for HP at all. Even if they do eventually make changes, we'd be looking at months if not years of trying to rebuild. Similar to when we took that huge Panda hit.
I think it’ll be a mixed bag. The sites all do have different authority scores according to Semrush. Owlcation has one of the better authority scores. I imagine sites that have been performing well will be okay, whereas ones that have been hurting for a while could be killed, such as the sites that bring in about 100,000 views a month or less.
More follow links as opposed to no-follow links is probably favorable to a niche site. I would put niche sites into Semrush or similar SEO sites to get an idea of what’s in a healthy spot and what’s not.
It’ll be interesting to see what happens over the next few weeks.
You said that sites have been scored but does that mean this has already rolled out?
If you have a look at Barry Schwartz's article on Search Engine Roundtable at the link above, that's what he suggests.
Thanks. So the consensus seems to be that in the next two weeks we will see a change, or we will not.
Suppose Google can weed out the clickbait sites. All the power to them. I think HP will benefit. We have excellent articles and substance worth reading.
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Hopefully their "page experience" update dealt with that and this one is primarily concerned with "helpful content" (and ads aren't taken into account as unhelpful content, I should have asked Danny Sullivan about that)
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Tessa, congratulations, and welcome back to your love!
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Tessa, sorry you misunderstand me. Welcome back to Medium. Though I'm not on the site yet. Okay? And thanks.
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Doesn't make sense? Why, Tessa, why? Weeks ago, you informed you're taking a break from Medium to write a book, right? Again, you advice on the effect of not writing regularly, and other issues a writer should face. Have you forget all that, or should I remind? Still doesn't make sense? Thanks.
"Google added "Any content - not just unhelpful content - on sites determined to have relatively high amounts of unhelpful content overall is less likely to perform well in Search,...". I don't know exactly what that means, but it feels like ads, especially the large full picture ones at the end of our articles, would be considered as content.
I feel like HP's ad experience would qualify as unsatisfying/unhelpful content. I don't generally read on the niches anymore, but I've been taking a look recently. There are huge white spaces where I'm assuming ads are suppose to appear and they are not. This pushes the article content down and makes for an unappealing read. If I idle too long waiting for it to load (it's hard to tell if some are suppose to be ads or pictures, but I'm guessing they are all suppose to be ads), I get a pop up ad for being idle. When did that happen? Very annoying, and I don't need to see any more ads on these pages.
It would be nice if Google defined content, but in my eyes the displayed ads are still content. Couple that with the unhelpful "news" section, and I think we are looking at quite a bit of unhelpful/unsatisfying content. Even if ads are not taken into account, I can see Pethelpful taking a big hit.
In the last week alone, Pethelpful has created over 100 news "articles". That cannot possibly be good in the eyes of this new update. Pethelpful is adding news content double time compared to all the other sites with those "articles" (the ones I listed above have around 50 or less for the same time period), but I cannot imagine it's a good thing no matter how many are added a day.
It would be interesting to compare how many news "articles" to how many useful Pethelpful articles were created in the last week. It's impossible for me to see that, because of the way the niche sites are now displayed. I tried, but could only find 6 or 7 new articles for the last week. How accurate that is, is anyone's guess though.
I'm more worried about how the news content will impact the niches, in all honesty. Those are the epitome of clickbait (which sounds like a big part of what Google is trying to prevent/remove from search), and are being added to some niches at a much faster rate than actual helpful articles.
The Gobbldey-Goop that peppers are articles are off-putting to potential readers and I'm sure Google will deem them as sub-par as well. The bounce rates have increased for HP/TAG sites due to the ads interrupting the reader experience. I, for one, now read very few HP articles because they're so obtrusive. Nor do I read articles in other sites that interrupt the reading experience with ads and pop-ups.
Get out of our way and let us read!!!!!
Then try reading with Bing search. It'll block tie annoying pop-ups.
I guess I am a little confused here. I write content that helps people with their pet´s medical care. If they want to watch something that helps them smile, though, and it is on a pet site because it is a video about pets, does that make it unhelfpul?
I’d like to know too. On the one hand, the news section is very clickbaity. However, from what I’ve read, Google is partly changing its algorithm because more people are using TikTok and Instagram for searches. I assume Google wants to beat out their competition, so they would replicate some aspects of TikTok and Instagram. As an Internet user, I’m not sure I like that idea.
Look at YouTube. They’ve recently done an update that puts cellphone and short videos in a place that’s guaranteed to get eyeballs. Is that content better than other stuff on the website? I don’t think so.
Facebook had an update too, and I hate it.
The Internet is constantly changing, sometimes in the wrong direction. I’d like for less spammy stuff to reach the top and better content to be up top.
I’m very curious to see what will happen over the next two weeks.
Considering they don't recommend the news articles on helpful articles, maybe it won't be that big of a deal, but I'm assuming that is not going to be the case given what I read in the link above.
In my opinion, if it interfers with my Google search results, yes it is unhelpful. If I wanted to watch funny pet videos I would go to TikTok, Youtube, or wherever to get my laughs in. If I want informational content, I go to authoritative sites and I would expect them to give me the answers for my search.
For example, if I search "garlic bread cheese dip" (with or without recipe), I don't want to be sent to a page talking about a TikTok user and watching their video, without even getting any the recipe details I initally searched for. An example for a Delishably news article that ranks top 3 on Google currently.
Another example, "No-bake chocolate chip cookie dough recipe" (again with or without recipe), brings up another Delishably news article. In this one, they link out to a Delishably article. I thought awesome, I can get a similar recipe. Nope, the one they link out to contains eggs, not incredibly helpful when I searched for a no-bake recipe.
Whether or not I find the section clickbaity and unhelpful is irrelavent though. It really depends what Google thinks, and that is still very unclear to me. Although, if SerenityHalo is right, and Google is trying to beat out some competition from TikTok/Instagram are they really going to keep "articles" that are basically promoting TikTok around on the first couple pages? I would think not.
My hope is that there are more people who search for things they want to read rather than those who want to watch demonstration videos. I’m concerned the Internet is shifting to video and writing will be less and less promoted.
Let’s just hope this new week doesn’t turn into a major buzzkill. Here’s to hoping no one’s numbers flatline.
I thought Google already tried to put Youtube and other video heavy content on top of the searches? This sounds like Google is finally going back to informative and easy to read articles. That is my hope at least. Like you and Tess, I prefer to be able to immediately scan a site to ensure it is going to answer the questions I am asking. I do not want to be sent to a place that is video heavy or full of distracting ads, even if it will eventually answer what I am looking for.
The next few weeks should be very telling. I'm curious to see how this will all unfold.
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https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/18/googl … sults/amp/
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/12/googl … -maps/amp/
https://www.investisdigital.com/blog/so … ram-tiktok
Yes, Google is changing content because people are running into rubbish. But what I’m saying about TikTok and Instagram and new trends isn’t a joke or something I came up with off the top of my head.
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It's wild to me. I don't get using TikTok or Instagram for any kind of searches. I think I might be old now.
Again, thanks for letting us know about the big Google update. I don't like surprises.
My point was, the HP news articles are coming up in searches (at least for Delishably when people are looking for recipes). Those "articles" are not what people are looking for and hence why I said they are unhelpful at best. The only reason I mentioned TikTok to begin with, is because of what SerenityHalo wrote. Whether Google sends me to TikTok if I ask for it is irrelevant. I was specifically speaking in terms of looking for informational content and having HP's news articles show up on the first page with unhelpful and irrelevant information.
I see you do not search for recipes, but it is something that most of the people I know do. I personally will only read sites that have a "jump to recipe" button, or show me the recipe right away. I don't need the backstory of how the recipe came about, or whatever other stories they tell to try and reach some arbitrary word count. It's one of the reasons I stopped writting and reading on Delishably actually. If I can't find the recipe right away, I go elsewhere to find it.
Have you looked at the news articles? I didn't go looking at most of them, simply because the ones on Wehavekids/Pethelpful for example, would likely only come up if people searched for "funny animal" fill in the blank. Or whatever people search to find funny/heartfelt videos they want to watch. I don't know, because like you I don't care to watch or search for those kinds of things. However, not all of the news articles are like that, and they are interferring with informational searches. It is my hope Google would see that and remove them from those kinds of searches.
Personally, I always double check a webpage before clicking into it via Google, but I doubt that is the case for the general population.
by Eugene Brennan 21 months ago
Some of my articles have pages and pages of comments. That in addition to the two pages or so of "Recommended for You" clickbait ads means that it's unlikely that readers would ever see the recommended articles, listed at the bottom. Is there any way these could be suggested elsewhere,...
by Thomas Swan 2 years ago
Is this clickbait "Owlcation news" (see image below) something that should be on the homepage of an educational website? And, right under a quote from Nelson Mandela about how education can change the world?
by Paul Goodman 19 months ago
Despite being bad overall, the damage to the niches by the various Google algorithm updates over the past two years has been uneven.While Pethelpful has suffered relatively less, Dengarden seems to have taken a huge hit. I've attached a graph of traffic from SEMRush as an illustration of how bad...
by Will Apse 10 years ago
The way that HP uses affiliate is unique among larger sites that rely heavily on natural search.Here individual affiliate ads are scattered through the site in a pretty random way. On other sites affiliate ads are avoided altogether or grouped in special sections ('the shop', 'reviews').It is easy...
by Susana Smith 14 years ago
There have been several theories about what content Google is penalising and rewarding in the search results but at the moment it does seem a bit random (from my end). Let's compare notes and hopefully we can see some common threads in there. What content of yours is holding on to its ranking and...
by HubPages 3 years ago
Hi all! We launched PetHelpful's Pet News category several months ago, and it's performed so well that we've begun adding news categories to other Network Sites. Each category is used by a site-specific news team here at HubPages to drive more traffic and engagement on social media, in turn...
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