Google 2024 March Updates You Need to Know
Around 70% of online interactions begin with search engines. According to Bizjournal, 46% of users start with Google when looking for a particular good or service and 90% of people most probably will click on the first SERP pages.
So, what conclusions can we draw from this data?
Your business should have a website, and you should optimize it to climb to the top of SERP. Thus, you should work on various elements to achieve success, from building backlinks to taking care of content quality.
Another super essential point you need to keep in mind is adherence to Google guidelines. We understand that Google might have updates to its assurance systems quite often.
Gladly, we keep track of the main and most influential updates to help you navigate in this uneasy SEO world. Google announced a pretty complex and important update on the 5th of March and we’re going to talk about it.
Contents
Content quality update
Perhaps you are tired of hearing “content is king.” But, regardless, this stays true. Exactly this is why Google revised some approaches to content evaluation.
The first major update that affected site ranks was back in 2022. Then, Google decided to decrease rankings of unhelpful and unoriginal content.
The recent revamp involves revising core ranking systems to detect pages that provide poor user experience and offer no help or value. Simply put, Google will put pages with content created only for search engines down.
And that’s what you should pay attention to! We’ve already advised you to create content with both people and search engines in mind.
As we’ve mentioned earlier, this March update is more complex and will include a variety of changes to the Google core systems. Approaches to identifying helpful content will also change.
This way, there will not be only one signal that tells Google that this page holds helpful content. Google introduced a whole system in its March announcement asking site owners and bloggers to check special FAQs regarding this topic.
The prime thing you should know is that Google will mostly evaluate content helpfulness based on pages. Nevertheless, poor site-wide content quality will negatively influence your domain’s ranks.
The guide on helpful and people-first content stays your content Bible. So, make sure to check it and see if your articles correspond with Google’s requirements.
As this update is rather sophisticated, it might take up to a month to be of effect. This way, site owners might witness some rank fluctuations in April.
Many creators may question themselves if they need to fully re-do their content.
The good news is that there is no need to change your content if you’ve stuck to high-quality standards before. That said, if you’ve made content with a purpose (e.g., to serve your clients while they’ve been moving through your marketing funnel), creating helpful, people-first, original, and expert content, you have nothing to worry about.
Here are some helpful articles Adsy has written to assist you in better content creation:
- How to Combine SEO and Content for a Winning Digital Marketing
- How to Develop Content Strategy That’ll Guarantee SEO Growth
- 7 Different Types of Content to Use in 2024
- 5 Top Trends in Content Writing in 2024
- 9 Content Writing Tips from Marketing Industry Experts
They will satisfy your curiosity regarding content strategy and creation.
New spam policies
As Google’s goal stays the same - to provide users with helpful content, it’s no wonder it updated its spam policies.
Google wishes to get rid of everything that deteriorates user experience. As such, the search engine giant introduces three novel spam policies.
1. Expired domain abuse
We sincerely hope that you are not trying to manipulate search rankings using this tactic. Now, Google will act even more strictly when it notices domain abuse.
If, by any chance, you’ve purchased an expired domain that has good DA and DR, but you post totally unrelated or low-quality content there, get ready for sanctions.
Nevertheless, it’s totally okay if you buy an expired domain to post people-first and helpful content there.
2. Scaled content abuse
If you are trying to boost your ranking on the search engine by creating tons of content, get ready for penalties from Google. Now, it won’t be possible to promote your site on SERP by adding a large amount of unrelated content.
In this new spam update, Google places emphasis exactly on the content quality and usefulness for readers. Some site owners might question how AI-generated content will influence their ranks.
Google sees any automations (including AI-generated text) created with the goal of manipulating SERP rankings as spam. This way, if you are generating lots of texts by AI just to get as many pages for your website as possible without caring about users’ needs, Google will mark your content as spam.
3. Site reputation abuse
Placing lots of pages on your site that might confuse your readers and have no or little value for them might also be considered spam.
These pages include advertising, sponsored publications, and other third-party pages.
Google stresses out that it won’t count all third-party placements as spam. This way, if your site promotes advertising content that is related to your topic or niche, and your readers get used and are not misguided by it, you won’t get any penalties.
Please note that Google will employ more advanced signals and approaches this time. It’s true that the March 2024 Update bases itself upon existing policies, yet all the new algorithms are going to be much more complex.
If Google notices any of those abuses, you risk putting your site to the bottom of SERP or even crashing out of it.
That makes us remind you of white hat SEO techniques you should use to climb higher on SERP. And guest posting is one of them (sure thing, you should place guest content on sites from the same niche or industry).
Conclusion
The new Google 2024 Update shows that users are the search engine’s top priority. Given the rapidly growing amount of content from millions of existing sites, Google does everything to cover people’s needs in quality, helpful, and related content.
The content and spam policy updates won’t harm site owners who have acted transparently and haven’t tried to manipulate search rankings.
Yet, even if you create people-first and helpful content, it’s always a good idea to follow Google’s recommendations and stay ahead of your competitors.
