Impact of Google’s Helpful Content Update on SEO?

Have you ever spent hours on Google searching for something only to end up even more confused than before? This constant shifting between tabs in search of the answer makes you frustrated without finding the desired solution. And amidst the confusion, you end up realizing that you have wasted an hour on nothing good!

This isn’t your fault to always click on the wrong pages, but the truth is, Google’s content has been filled with lots of stuff that isn’t informative but ranks high somehow. Since it is possible to fool Google’s algorithm to rank content higher by implementing smart SEO techniques, many blogs or pages don’t offer the right information despite being highly ranked on searched keywords.

Fortunately, smart Google caught this issue before it could be even more frustrating for internet users. Yes, the Google Helpful Content Update is an update we are going to discuss in this article.

The helpful content update works by filtering out content that is lame and fluff and holds no informative value despite being filled with keywords. Just when you think you could put a bot at work, you couldn’t be more wrong!

This smart update matches high-value content for the users that delivers the right information and is easier to read. Consequently, the user searching on Google commends the search engine ranking, which has put the best content at the top.

While we are impressed with this content update, it isn’t new to the market. Let’s learn all about Google’s helpful content update and look at some strategies a business must use to produce their content according to this update.

What is the HCU Google Update?

In simple words, the helpful content update is a change in algorithm by Google to identify high-quality content from poor quality. This content update is designed to deeply analyze content to serve its intent rather than just meeting the rules of SEO. This doesn’t mean that high-quality content goes against the SEO rules, but the contrary is true.

Before we proceed to learn more about this update, here is the announcement Google made to launch this update:

Note that Google has mentioned the term ‘gain search traffic’. This means that many blogs or webpages were fluffed with keywords and met all the requirements to rank highly in SERPs but were meaningless when it came to the kind of information needed. Although this is a great business for those web pages, on the other end, the customer’s time and Google’s credibility were at stake.

Google knew they needed to change something with their SERP to ensure the content ranks higher, is informative, has a human touch (to help humans), meets Google’s standards, and doesn’t fool the reader.

The content that is written for informational purposes isn’t annoyingly stuffed with keywords. It has a clear purpose, direction, and cohesion in the text. This is to ensure that the reader gets what they are looking for. The keywords used in the content aren’t just to entice Google’s search engine ranking but to guide the user where they need to be.

Thanks to Google’s effort to fix this issue, good-quality, informative content is now much more accessible than robotic, unhelpful content.

How Does Google Helpful Content Update Work?

The Google helpful content update primarily works on the principle of the E-A-T factor. Fairly explained as expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness of content. These three factors determine the quality of the content. Hence, a webpage’s ranking no longer depends solely on SEO.

Moreover, the fifth algorithm update, known as HCU, was released in the second half of 2022. Since the update was released, the content screening methods of Google have significantly shifted for the better. The update works by targeting poor-quality content marketing done solely to gain a higher rank on Google. This poor-quality content then gets rejected by Google if it doesn’t seem to have a human touch or doesn’t offer the answer to relevant queries.

But how does it identify the good content? Or will it hurt my website in any way? Let’s find out more!

The identification of bad content from good content is done with the help of a machine learning method. Content that has a difficult readability level, has too much passive voice or is difficult to understand is ranked as poor-quality content. Likewise, content that is too long but doesn’t deliver the main context also ranks as poor quality.

And what happens to the content that is termed poor quality? It isn’t removed or rejected, but the website achieves an ‘unhelpful content’ signal. This is a huge blow to a website’s reputation, and while recovery is possible, it takes a long time to attain a similar or better ranking.

How to Achieve High SERP with Google Helpful Content Update?

The first step to modifying your website as per the Google helpful content update is to analyze the impact of this update on your website. Here is how to know if HCU has affected your website’s ranking:

Changes in the website’s performance
Changes in Organic traffic
Search engine ranking
Changes in keyword ranking
Comparison with previous data
Analysing user engagement
Sudden drop in website traffic and leads

Observing these above-mentioned metrics and identifying any changes can be a clear indicator that your website is affected by the latest Google helpful content update. For a clearer idea, it is advised to analyze the competitors as well, so you might know that the change isn’t due to any new industry trend or shift in focus for customers.

Now, what are some ways to recover from the HCU impact or to escape from it altogether?

Creating Helpful, Reliable People-First Content

This long, meaningful phrase translates into a simpler version: know your audience. If a content fails to serve the target audience, it is ranked unhelpful by Google. It was hard to understand, didn’t convey the message, and was not informative enough. Start by asking yourself a few questions about your audience:

Who are you writing for?
What do they need?
What are their problems?
How do you convey your message?
How will my content satisfy my audience?

By compiling these hows and what’s, you will be able to draft content that is relevant to the audience’s needs. Asking yourself these questions also helps keep the content concise and to the point. Hence, this eliminates the content fluff, improving readability overall.

Insider Tip: To know your relevant audience, look at your web page’s Google Analytics data. This will tell you the type of audience visiting or searching your website.

Add a personal touch to your content.

That’s how you make a difference! The ability to relate to your audience, feel yourself in their shoes, or talk about your real-life experience with them can generate a sense of understanding. This in turn fosters a trust-worthy relationship, and that’s what all brands need.

Therefore, it is important to share your point of view on a topic rather than just quoting the information you found elsewhere. But if you do not have first-hand expertise on a topic, hold yourself back from offering any personal advice. Since the reader (or Google) can identify whether you are an expert or not, any false information can seriously damage the site’s reputation.

Monitor Progress

Monitoring a website’s performance should be a constant practice, whether you are shadow banned by Google for helpful content updates or not. By monitoring the website regularly, you can invest in timely maintenance rather than bear the big expense of repair later. Also, through a constant check on your website’s behaviour, traffic, and user interaction, it is possible to check your website’s status on Google SERP.

In addition to this, here are some ways to achieve a high ranking on SERP.

Defining Specific Goals

Specific goals help you measure progress against a solid number. The best way is to check the increase in progress through percentages.

Use relevant metrics.

Thankfully, there are multiple metrics to measure the website’s performance on Google. Google Analytics, Core Web Vials, and Google Search Console are all reliable metrics to get insight into your website’s performance.

Use Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

Setting key performance indicators is the best way to track a website’s progress and analyze your performance against the competition. Set KPIs according to your goals. Track the KPIs of competitors and set a benchmark.

Improvising Content

Since this update is targeted at filtering out poor-quality content from good-quality content, improvising your content makes the biggest difference. Start working on new and more user-centered content than before. Add relevant backlinks, engaging phrases, and concise solutions that answer your users’ problems. This time, make sure to target your audience as your main content-devising strategy.

The Importance of Helpful Content Updates

This update is very helpful in some cases and biased in others. This is because if some of your website’s content is ranked in the unhelpful category, the whole of your website is going to suffer. It doesn’t matter if the rest of the content on your website is relevant to the user’s intent or not.

Therefore, moulding and adjusting your content according to Google’s helpful content update is an integral need of the current times.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the helpful content update classifier?

Websites with most of their content falling into the unhelpful category suffer from a serious drop in their rankings. This drop goes down to several pages at a time. This is because of the ‘classifier’ feature of the HCU, which classifies the entire website as irrelevant.

How long does it take to recover from a helpful content update?

It all depends on the type and extent of corrective measures you take to recover your website. However, with all the practices involved, it might take a few months to recover from the ‘unhelpful content’ tag.