Tips for Preparing for Core Updates

How is your DMO preparing for Google's latest changes to the search experience? I'm compiling a running list of tips - please share yours below! Content Structure ✔ Front-load Useful Content: Place key takeaways or bullet-point summaries at the top of your content. This helps users quickly find valuable information and improves engagement. ✔ Break Down Long-Form Content: Divide longer articles into shorter pieces, each answering a specific question. Focus on addressing topics rather than just targeting keywords. ✔ Include Titles and Feature Images: Use compelling titles and high-quality feature images to capture clicks from AI Overview results. Content Quality ✔ Create Content That Answers Complex Questions: Develop in-depth content that addresses complex queries, providing information that may not be easily answered by generative AI. ✔ Write New Content on New Ideas: Produce original content about new ideas and comparisons, especially for mid-funnel queries that existing online content may not cover. ✔ Include Sources, Quotes, and Stats: Use authoritative sources, quotes, and statistics to enhance the credibility and visibility of your content in AI search. Unique and Personal Content ✔ Include Personal Stories: Share personal experiences and stories to add a human touch that AI cannot replicate. This helps build credibility and engagement. ✔ Showcase Credible Experience: Highlight firsthand experiences and expertise to establish authority and trust with your audience. Alternative Traffic Channels ✔ Build Audiences in Push Channels: Develop and grow audiences in channels where you can directly push content to them, creating anti-fragile traffic sources. This includes CRM but could also mean increasing paid search and social budgets. ✔ Focus on Search Optimizations for YouTube: Optimize content for YouTube and other secondary search channels to reach a broader audience. ✔ Lean into Reddit: Their deal with Google means Reddit is frequently cited as a source for AI Overviews or in standard search results; the opportunity is both in responding across Reddit subs and in creating one, i.e. /r/VisitingOregon (h/t Mika Lepisto). ✔ Invest in Generative AI Chatbots: Implement generative AI chatbots to share and distribute content to visitors. #destinationmarketing

Was your company's SEO negatively impacted in the last several months? December 2024 brought two major Google updates...a core update and a spam update...that may have disrupted your site's performance. These updates focused on promoting high-quality, user-focused content while targeting manipulative or spammy practices. If you've seen a drop in rankings or traffic, here’s why: Google is raising the bar, prioritizing trustworthy, helpful, and authentic content over outdated tactics. This shift is reminiscent of the Panda and Penguin updates from 2012, which penalized low-quality content and manipulative link-building practices. If your traffic took a hit, here are some areas to investigate: - Content Quality: Does your content genuinely meet users' needs, or was it created solely for keyword rankings? Thin, duplicate, or low-value content (like listicles) can cause a decline in rankings. - Backlink Profile: Are you relying on spammy or irrelevant backlinks? Even though the updates to these strategies were over 10 years ago, SEOs are still doing it. Check for manipulative link-building tactics that could flag your site as untrustworthy. - On-Page Optimization: Ensure your pages are optimized for user experience, not just search engines. Thin content, slow load times, or poor mobile usability could be holding you back. - E-A-T Factors (Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness): Is your site establishing credibility? Weak author bios, lack of external validation, or outdated information can erode trust. - Technical SEO: Broken links, crawl errors, and slow page speeds could be dragging your rankings down. Fixing these issues will not only improve SEO but also provide a better user experience. - Content Relevance: Have you updated your content to reflect current trends, search intent, and user behavior? Stale, irrelevant content could result in lower rankings. The December updates are a wake-up call to align with Google’s continued focus on providing value to users. It’s not just about avoiding penalties...it's about future-proofing your SEO strategy with high-quality, user-first approaches. How are you adjusting your SEO strategies to adapt to these changes?

I ignored semantic SEO for 15 years. Then we got crushed by Google's core update in October 2023. For most of my career, keywords, links, and engagement were where I focused my efforts. "Google indexes things, not strings"? Whatever. Knowledge graphs? Freebase / KGIDs / entity relationships / Meh. Then we lost 50% of our organic traffic overnight. When 5,500 of your 11,000+ pages get traffic and the rest are dying on the vine, Google notices. When your entity (Company / Brand) isn't clearly defined in their knowledge graph, they don't know who you are and if they don’t know who you are then they certainly can’t trust you. Here's how we learned our lesson: 🔴 Pre-Oct 2023: 11,000 pages, 50% getting zero traffic 🔴 Oct 5, 2023: Core update hits, rankings collapse 🟡 Nov 2023: Knowledge graph audit reveals the truth 🟢 Dec 2023: Content purge + entity optimization begins 🟢 Jan 2024: Finally started to recover 🟢 Aug 2024: Hallelujah we’re back baby! The recovery playbook was clear. We went on a content diet, cutting half our pages. We rebuilt our knowledge graph presence by: - Crafting a semantically-optimized company description (deployed everywhere) - Creating an entity home with schema markup - Establishing our "same as" relationships across platforms - Getting into Wikidata and building third-party mentions Within months, our knowledge panel returned. By August, our organic traffic had recovered, and our rankings were stronger than before the penalty. Still, it was pretty scary and the recovery happened after AI had shifted the search landscape forever. Here’s the lesson: Google isn't just counting links or matching phrases anymore—it's evaluating if you're a trusted entity in your space. Control your narrative or someone else will. That's not just SEO — it's survival. (And, spoiler: it’s even more important in an AI-driven search landscape). — Hey -- I'm Jason. I write about: 🔍 Semantic SEO that actually works 🤖 LLM marketing strategies for growth teams 🚀 Building visibility in the AI-first world DM or just follow along! #seo #llms #organicgrowth

Google’s latest updates are a ticking time bomb for companies who don’t get it. Misunderstanding them is draining your business resources and time. It’s time to make a change. A fundamental change in your thinking. The helpful content update, the concept of EEAT, and more—all boil down to a few key principles: 1. 𝙄𝙣𝙛𝙤𝙧𝙢𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙜𝙖𝙞𝙣 – Are you adding new, referencable information to Google’s index? Novelty that goes beyond the same tired insights everyone else has. 2. 𝙀𝙭𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙚𝙨 – What have you actually been through? Stories, perspectives, and lessons from your own path. 3. 𝙀𝙭𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙩𝙞𝙨𝙚 – Do you know what the heck you’re talking about? What do all of these have in common? They can’t be faked or automated using the endless supply of tools out there trying to game the system. We all want to game the system. But guess what? The system’s getting smarter. And so are the folks who have to use it. And if you’re tired, like me, of the "enshittification" of platforms (shoutout to one of my heroes, Cory Doctorow), then you know what I’m talking about. Both Google and your potential customers are sick and tired of reading shallow articles that don’t provide any value or help them accomplish their goals. And just using “I” statements in articles churned out by AI? That doesn’t count. That’s regurgitation. Curation. Plagiarism. Not information gain and compelling, insightful stories worth learning from. So be better. 𝙃𝙚𝙧𝙚’𝙨 𝙝𝙤𝙬: 👉🏾 Speak from personal experience whenever possible. Stories are powerful. 👉🏾 If you aren’t an expert on the topic, consult one. Interview them. Send them a brief questionnaire over Slack. Get them talking and write down what they say. 👉🏾 Research what’s out there BEFORE you create content. Ask yourself: “What’s the unique angle here? What’s my viewpoint that nobody else has?” 👉🏾 Cite your research. We’re all tired of clickbait titles and baseless claims. 👉🏾 Read your own content out loud twice before you publish. If you can’t make it through without wanting to claw your eyes out from boredom, neither will your audience. 👉🏾 Run it through Grammarly or Hemingway. Polish your syntax. Duh. 👉🏾 Then focus on the on-page optimizations to make sure the robots understand it. This isn’t hard. It just takes intentionality. You have to care. It’s non-negotiable if you want your content strategy to succeed in 2025. 🔥𝘽𝙩𝙬, 𝙬𝙚 𝙝𝙖𝙫𝙚 𝙖𝙡𝙡 𝙤𝙛 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙨𝙚 𝙩𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙘𝙨 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙢𝙤𝙧𝙚 𝙞𝙣 𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙞𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙣𝙖𝙡 𝙀𝙭𝙘𝙚𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙣𝙩 𝘾𝙤𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙣𝙩 𝘾𝙝𝙚𝙘𝙠𝙡𝙞𝙨𝙩 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙩𝙚𝙖𝙢 𝙪𝙨𝙚𝙨. If you want the checklist, comment “Heck yes Ken, I love to comment on posts for resources” and i’ll ship it. 👀 I hope today is the best day of your entire life. Cheers. 🚀 #b2bmarketing #saasgrowth #seo #content #leadership