Welcome to this Anonymous Marketing blog! Today we are going to discuss the bane of all SEO professionals' existence: GOOGLE CORE ALGORITHM UPDATES!!! Just typing it out gave me chills, but back to the topic at hand. We obviously aren’t the first marketing agency or news outlet to discuss this update; trust me, there are A LOT, but we wanted to take a little extra time to analyze the update, its impact, and what corrective actions were needed, especially with regards to legal marketing for lawyers. So, with that in mind, off we go on this wondrous journey through the topsy-turvy SEO landscape (thanks Google) left by this update!
Seriously though, this is one of the top 3 or so most impactful Google core algorithm updates that I have seen since I have been in the SEO industry, which is over 7 years now. And it is not just my opinion, see they said it too!
- Mordy Oberstein, Search Engine Land
- Yoast SEO Tools
- Google Search Liason on Twitter
Now that we are a couple of months out from the update, Google has said that this update, and the spam update that rolled out alongside it, resulted in a 45% reduction in the appearance of “unhelpful content” in search results. Buuut, some of us would debate that interpretation as many SERP results, that were previously populated with actual businesses and would have been considered stable, are now filled with AI content and Reddit forum pages, FUN! Point being, a lot of rankings were thrown on their heads, and if your firm saw a drop in rankings, the rest of this blog is for you!
Did we get you? Hopefully not because then you won’t be here to read the answers you soo desperately seek. Anyway, when evaluating what you should do following a large Google update, especially if it negatively affected your site, the very first (and most important) step is competitor analysis and comparison to your site. While Google keeps information close to the vest about the specifics of how an update will impact SERPs (they do provide some generalized guidance for how to respond which can be found here), what it is focusing on, etc, analyzing the top of the SERP is a great way to gain insight into how the algorithm update is working.
Instead, our reporting focuses on what matters to you most; contacts, leads, and signed cases. You don’t pay us to build links, or write content, or create infographics, you pay us to make your phone ring more often and your business grow, so that is where our focus is. We of course provide you with all of the fun data and explain it on calls, but rather than throwing a bunch of SEO-centric data at you, often in an effort to conceal a failure to deliver results, we start with the leads data and tie it back to the SEO data, giving you a better picture of both what you are getting and how we are accomplishing it.
What the **** is a Google Core Algorithm Update?
Fair question, I ponder this myself at times, but enough of my existential crisis. Google core updates, aka, Google core algorithm updates, occur approximately every 3 or so months and aim to improve the algorithm that guides SERPs (Search Engine Results Page), with the goal of improving user search results. Core updates normally take a couple of weeks to roll out, and are almost always impactful, generally jostling rankings around for a couple of weeks to a month, at which point SEOs start to understand what has happened, what they need to do, and respond accordingly. While they can be nerve-rattling and stressful, they aren’t necessarily a bad thing, as a site that is doing (most) everything right will likely see gains on the back of an algorithm update (looking at you Anonymous Marketing clients 😘😁).One small note: Google makes thousands of algorithm updates a year that 99% of people will never notice, but core updates are nearly always impactful and shake up rankings.
Sooooo…..Why Do I Care About This One?
THIS ONE….well…..this one took Google 45 DAYS to completely roll out the update, starting on March 5th, and not completing until April 19th (there was also a spam update that started March 5th as well, it took 2 weeks to roll out, with the aim of reducing spam content in search results) Not only was it clearly a huge update just based on the amount of time it took to roll out, but its impact on search results was ENORMOUS. SERP Volatility scores were very high for almost two entire months as the algorithm update rolled out and went into effect. For reference, anything above 5 is considered high, and in the chart below, over 30 days from Feb 26 - April 20 had a volatility score above 5.
Seriously though, this is one of the top 3 or so most impactful Google core algorithm updates that I have seen since I have been in the SEO industry, which is over 7 years now. And it is not just my opinion, see they said it too!
- Mordy Oberstein, Search Engine Land
- Yoast SEO Tools
- Google Search Liason on Twitter
Now that we are a couple of months out from the update, Google has said that this update, and the spam update that rolled out alongside it, resulted in a 45% reduction in the appearance of “unhelpful content” in search results. Buuut, some of us would debate that interpretation as many SERP results, that were previously populated with actual businesses and would have been considered stable, are now filled with AI content and Reddit forum pages, FUN! Point being, a lot of rankings were thrown on their heads, and if your firm saw a drop in rankings, the rest of this blog is for you!
Cool Story Bro, But What Do I Do Now?
First, you call Anonymous Marketing, and let us help you with your law firm’s legal marketing! You didn’t think that we were going to give away our secrets did you?? Nope, but thanks for reading our blog!
Did we get you? Hopefully not because then you won’t be here to read the answers you soo desperately seek. Anyway, when evaluating what you should do following a large Google update, especially if it negatively affected your site, the very first (and most important) step is competitor analysis and comparison to your site. While Google keeps information close to the vest about the specifics of how an update will impact SERPs (they do provide some generalized guidance for how to respond which can be found here), what it is focusing on, etc, analyzing the top of the SERP is a great way to gain insight into how the algorithm update is working.
Competitor Analysis and Comparison to Your Site
As mentioned above, Google doesn’t provide much information about its algorithm and what will change with the rollout of a core update, so evaluating your competition is the best way to get a read on what is changing. For example, if your firm is a personal injury firm and was previously at or near the top of the SERP for terms related to car accident lawyers in your city, but have since dropped down to the bottom of page 1 after an update, you should begin by thoroughly reviewing the pages that are now above you, evaluating what it is that they are doing that you are not. Here are a couple of the most important factors to analyze.Content
Compare your content to your competition's content and look for any gaps in your content that they address but you do not. Google's goal is to provide the best, most helpful result for each query, so if your competition is covering a wide variety of topics and common questions, and you are not, that's a clear area of improvement for your business. You will also want to consider the way the copy is written and its flow. Is your content written for a lawyer to read, whereas your competition is written for an everyday citizen? Does your content jump around, or does it have a logical flow that is suited to someone dealing with a traumatic situation and looking for help? You should always evaluate your content from a user perspective, so if you read the page and it's not helpful or easy to understand, that is a great place to start working. Word count is also a consideration, but do not get hung up on the raw numbers. You can write a 5,000 word page that does nothing to help the user, while your competition can write 1,500 words and answer a variety of topics that actually help users, and they will easily outrank you. Instead of looking at the raw word count, we prefer to look at the number of sub topics covered, which gives a better understanding of how helpful and impactful your content is.SEO
You will also want to look at some SEO factors and compare them to your competition. Is your H1 targeting the best keyword for the page? How do your title and meta descriptions compare to theirs? Do you have calls to action included? Internal linking is also highly relevant, as pages perform best when they include strong internal linking, tying related content together, making it easier for users to dig deeper on subject matters relevant to them by following links to more robust content on a single specific topic. External linking is also important but should be used to cite sources for data points or to back up claims and assertions made by other experts. Think about it as a term paper in college, you can’t just make claims about things you are not an expert in or do not have data to back up, so you must cite your sources to validate your claims. There are also a variety of supplemental on-page SEO elements that should be considered. None of these items are make or break on their own, but your goal is to provide the best page possible for a prospective client to land on, and these elements can all assist with that goal. A couple of these elements are:- Images: Most people do not want to read a wall of text with nothing breaking it up
- Case Results: Shows your ability to deliver
- Testimonials: Demonstrates how past clients see you
- Infographics: Can make data or ideas easier to understand or visualize, as well as being easy to share
- Video: Makes you more real to prospective clients by allowing them to see and hear you in person
Technical SEO
Technical SEO looks at how your page is performing from a (surprise) technical perspective. Does your page load quickly? Attention spans are shorter than ever and a significant bounce rate is associated with a load speed over 5 seconds, but your target should be in the 2.5 - 3 second load time or better as every second increases your bounce rate and decreases your conversion rate. Other technical factors like site structure can negatively affect your sites ability to be crawled by Google, which will adversely affect your rankings. Properly planned website development should create appropriate hierarchical structures for its pages in order to make it as easy as possible for Google to crawl and understand the site and its most important pages, and most importantly, result in a positive user experience.Backlinks
Backlinks are links to your website from another website, essentially serving as a vote of confidence for your site. Backlinks have been steadily decreasing in importance, with Google’s Gary Ilyes recently stating that links are not in the top 3 ranking factors for Google. To be clear, links do matter, just not as much as people often think, so instead of focusing on the number of links you have as compared to your competition, you should be looking at the number of HIGH-QUALITY links that you have vs your competition. Google has continually gotten better at recognizing link spam, link networks, and other unnatural linking strategies, so instead of building a bunch of links, focus on getting a couple of really solid links per month.Struggling to Get Results?
At Anonymous Marketing, we recognize that a decent chunk of this may have gone over your head, just as it would if you began discussing a bunch of legal statutes, precedents, and jargon with us. We aren’t lawyers and you aren’t SEO’s. With that in mind, for the vast majority of firms, it is in their best interest to work with an SEO (in-house or independent contractor) or an SEO agency with experience working with law firms (and a history of getting results) to help them with their digital marketing efforts so that they can focus on being lawyers. However, the problem we see all too often is that law firms who work with SEO agencies are treated as though they are also SEO experts. A report full of SEO terms and data may be helpful for some, especially the agency internally, but when that is all that the agency provides its clients, it often leaves them feeling like they are in the dark about what is actually happening and what they are getting for their money. For example, I can take a brand new website and within a couple of months have it ranking for a bunch of irrelevant, no-volume keywords, build bad links so I can show you a big number and publish bad AI content. I could then create reports in a way that looks like I am killing it for the client, as long as I don’t include actual contact data, which would reveal that all of that other data is fluff and bringing nothing of value to the business.
Instead, our reporting focuses on what matters to you most; contacts, leads, and signed cases. You don’t pay us to build links, or write content, or create infographics, you pay us to make your phone ring more often and your business grow, so that is where our focus is. We of course provide you with all of the fun data and explain it on calls, but rather than throwing a bunch of SEO-centric data at you, often in an effort to conceal a failure to deliver results, we start with the leads data and tie it back to the SEO data, giving you a better picture of both what you are getting and how we are accomplishing it.