Google Helpful Content Update: What Is It And What Content Creators Should Do Now?

User experience has always been a concern for Google and website owners. But sometimes, users’ experience worsens when the user searches on Google for information and finds entirely unrelated results. 

You might also encounter this situation sometimes. Have you ever wondered why this situation arises? 

Well-paid marketers and well-funded businesses manipulate many keywords to produce inappropriate user SEO content. This frustrates people who are looking for information on Google. 

So to enhance the user experience, search engines periodically receive updates. Everything depends upon the needs of content consumers. 

And if you are a website owner, you must produce content that both search engines and viewers find helpful.  

But as technology transforms, you will find many AI tools available to create informative content in minutes. And because of this, there has been much debate around AI content in the SEO world. But don’t worry; Google is not opposed to AI. The Google helpful content update is anti-low quality content rather than anti-AI. 

So it is advisable to write content that is informative, first-hand, and based on experience. You must avoid clickbait, copy-pasting, and writing basic stuff. The more informative or fresh your content is, the more clicks you receive. 

Let’s know what it is in Google’s helpful content update. 

What’s Google’s Helpful Content Update?

On August 18, Google made a content update announcement. On August 22, 2022, the new content upgrade began to roll out. It takes around two weeks to implement the upgrade entirely. 

This helpful content update signals to Google bots about the content on your website and helps your web pages rank across the entire site. If your content is properly based on user intent, answers the searcher’s query, is relevant, and enhances the user experience. This Google helpful content update will help you to rank your content. 

This is a new signal Google will employ to rank website content; it is not a Google Core Update or manual action.

And if Google finds the content on your website unhelpful, irrelevant, forged, or manipulated, it may flag the site. This may impact the visibility of the entire site across all SERPs.  

And let me tell you if once your site is impacted, you have to wait for around six months or longer to recover it. Unhelpful content should be deleted to restore search engine prominence. Additionally, the algorithm needs evidence that your website adheres to standard practices when posting original content.

Google doesn’t want producers publishing irrelevant, useless, or forged content. 

How Does The Google’s Helpful Content Update Work?

The websites providing users with relevant content and a positive browsing experience Will be honored by Google. Google will help those websites in ranking on higher positions. There are several factors Google will consider while checking the websites like usefulness, dependability, and search engine capability. These factors will decide if the content is valuable or not.  

Search engines will not rank the content published on a website to improve the SEO rankings and not help the users. This upgrade is predicated on the idea that consumers should access greater content. If they are deleted, other articles will rank higher.

Everyone would be curious to know how long it takes for the new content to rank after the old one is deleted. It will take around one month. The websites will be scanned by the Google update classification tool to see if they contain new or old content. If the content is irrelevant or has not changed for long, classification will be eliminated. 

The classification procedure is automated with the aid of machine learning. This is not a manual or spam action. This is a brand-new signal in the numerous rankings of evaluation signals used by Google. This emphasizes the idea that websites having content with a people-first approach and providing relevant content can rank higher even if they are deemed useless.

Which Type of Content will be Supported After Google Helpful Content Update?

• Content will be informative, helpful to your reader, and show your brand value.
• Content that demonstrates the author’s depth of subject knowledge.
• After reading the content, the reader will think they have discovered what they sought.

What kind of content will be penalized now?

• Content will be optimized only for search engines and not for those searching for it.
• Content that is pertinent to your brand, articles that are designed only to fill the website with content so that it ranks for any keyword.
• Content that gives readers the impression they must do their study to find the solution they want.
• Clickbait content claims to answer the question, but when the reader opens the website, he will not find what he was looking for.

Which category will get affected in Google’s Helpful Content Update?

No particular content category will be affected by Google’s helpful content. Still, some websites or businesses write content only for search engines, and those businesses might get involved. 

These included

• Tech related content
• Online learning resources
• Content-based on entertainment

What should Content Creators Do After Google Helpful Content Update?

Avoid Clickbait and Be Transparent

Always be honest with your audience. Your content’s keywords or the information you promised to provide your viewers should be entirely relevant.

Understand Your Audience

Try to figure out what your audience wants from you. And understand the intent of your audience. If your audience is asking for information on a particular topic, then focus on that information rather than selling your service.

Focus on Quality Over Quantity

This is your chance to exercise and demonstrate genuine knowledge. Yes, the article’s length does matter, but the information contained in it. Everything is fine if readers find the content enjoyable or learn something from it. Provide your audience the deep knowledge about the topic they are looking for.

Final Thoughts

Content creators must be more focused on producing content after Google’s helpful update. Users will be alerted by this update to websites that publish excessive volumes of content that are either useless or unimportant.

Machine learning algorithms automatically classify content that is both effective and ineffective. This algorithm can be used for any website containing people-first content to differentiate between valuable and unhelpful information.

Even though the update is still in its early stages, Search Engines will be significantly impacted. And if you want it not to hurt your website, you should start auditing the content of your website from today and provide relevant information to the user.