How to Survive Google Algorithm Updates

Just like the weather on a summer’s day, Google’s algorithms change several times during the working day. Most updates have little or no impact on your website’s ranking position, but some seriously impact the position of your website on the search engines’ results pages.

Protecting your website’s visibility can feel like a full-time job as there is always something that can be improved on.

Google’s algorithms are designed to enhance the users’ experiences of the search engine. They want your website to serve the public by providing clear and concise content that gives the searchers something with value. So rather than seeing your website as a tool to promote your business, see it as a resource of information for consumers.

How can you give value to your readers?

Everything that you publish on your website should give the readers and the search engines’ bots meaningful information. There’s a fine line between getting your site geared up for Google and getting it wrong; an SEO service can take the strain and help point you in the right direction because the best way to beat the Google algorithms is to work with them, rather than against them.

Content

The content that you publish should be informative, engaging and unique. It’s no good replicating content from another site, but you can use other websites for inspiration. After all, you don’t need to reinvent the wheel!

By writing with purpose about your niche, you will find that you naturally incorporate keywords that relate to your field. The trick is to maximise the power of the keywords; a small tweak can pay dividends to how your content is found through organic search.

Images

Images are not just a visual aid to make your website stand out from the crowd; they can be used to boost your SEO. Label your images in relation to your business and use hyphens instead of a space for the words in the image alt text. Your visitors can’t see this detail, but the search engines can.

Use Headings

Google likes well set out pages. Your website page should use H1, H2 and H3 headings to help the search engines understand what your content is about, but also to help the reader digest information in an easy way.
TIP: Only ever use one H1 heading, but you can use multiple H2 and H3 headings.
People don’t read websites like they do a book; they skim read, and these headings are not only good for SEO, but they help readers to access the information that they are looking for. Headings should speak to the reader in a clear and concise way, and by using them correctly, they will also speak to the search engines’ bots too.

Your H1 tag should be focused on the user experience. Use a longtail keyword and answer the user intent in the H1 tag.

Design and usability used to be kept separate from SEO, but Google has made the need for the two to be inextricably linked. The algorithms want websites to be user-friendly and to publish content for them, rather than for your business. When you put this into practice, you’ll find that algorithm update is a thing of the past, and you’ll be able to weather the storm.