You were just starting to earn some solid traction for your blog. But, whoops, Google updated their algo and pulled the rug out from under you. What are you supposed to do now?
Google is famously tight-lipped about their updates. Their advice on what to do afterward often leaves you scratching your head.
Google Algorithm Update Killed Your Blog Traffic?
To help you get back on the right track, here are a few of Google’s biggest recent updates and how to respond if your blog suffered afterward.
1] The Google Speed Update
Speed has always been crucial to your SEO. However, the Google Speed Update brought the importance of mobile site speed to the forefront.
If your site is slow, it’s currently killing your SEO. The first thing you need to do is make sure all of your images are compressed to web-use sizes, and remove any WordPress plugins in the back-end that you’re not really using. Those are the #1 and #2 culprits when it comes to slow performance.
Your site may also be slow if you went with a free or cheap website hosting provider. If that’s the case, it’s time to upgrade, for the sake of your traffic and your SEO. You can click here to find the best website hosting provider for your blog.
Tip: Don’t just check the speeds for your blog’s home page or a few random blogs. Check the speed for each individual blog page and prune your content accordingly.
Why Black Hat SEO Doesn’t Work Anymore2] Google’s Mobile-First Indexing
This one is certainly tied to the last point about the mobile experience. Google’s mobile-first indexing has been steadily rolled out over the last year or so. If you’ve seen a traffic or rankings drop, your mobile site could be to blame.
Google has already contacted webmasters via Search Console to let them know that their site is not mobile-friendly. However, if you have not been notified, that doesn’t mean your mobile site is good, it simply means it “checks out” and there are no issues that are obvious to Google on a preliminary scan. Consider it passing with the bare minimum score.
Use this blog as a guide to making sure your site is mobile-friendly and test it frequently. If you have any trouble using your mobile site, you can bet your user will too.
3] The Google Medic Update
You may have also taken a hit after Google’s mysterious Medic update. Google was very secretive about this update, simply calling it a broad core update.
They were asked about how to fix things after a traffic drop and basically responded by saying you can’t fix it because nothing is broken. Google said, “There’s nothing wrong with pages that may now perform less well. Instead, it’s that changes to our systems are benefiting pages that were previously under-rewarded.”
This may mean that your competition was previously “under-rewarded.” So, to climb back up the rankings, it may be better to stop looking for what you’re doing wrong and look at what your competition is doing right.
With any Google update, the key is finding the sweet spot between under-reacting and overreacting. Never throw out your entire playbook or SEO best practices. However, you always want to be aware of what has (reportedly) changed and what you could be doing better.
