In this episode of Cookies and Breadcrumbs, Adam Di Frisco explores websites that had boosted after traffic in recent Google updates. He dives into the areas of major websites that were the main sources of traffic gains and gives advice and tips on how to learn from their success by taking their strategies and applying them to your industry and website.
Adam Di Frisco is a Senior Digital Marketing Strategist at Atigro with experience growing websites by means of comprehensive SEO Strategy. He has worked in travel, e-commerce, B2B, local and service-area businesses, and more. He is passionate about developing web strategies to guide businesses to surpass even the biggest competitors in search results.
Cookies & Breadcrumbs | Episode 4: How Are Websites Winning in Google’s Latest Updates
Transcript of Cookies & Breadcrumbs | Episode 4: How Are Websites Winning in Google’s Latest Updates?
9 minutes
Introduction
Today we’re going to look at some of the big winners of one of Google’s latest algorithm updates. We’ll explore three websites that have not only geared their sites for SEO success but have also taken complete advantage of Google’s ever-changing algorithm. Let’s dive in!
Google recently finished rolling out the August 2023 core algorithm update. Mark Traphagen from seoClarity released a list of what seoClarity was reporting were the biggest winners by industry. I went through these lists and dove into three different websites that really stood out to me.
Aug 2023 Core Update – Biggest Winners by Industry
Here’s what @seoClarity shows as the biggest traffic gainers in ten industries.
What surprises do you see? 🧵⬇️
— Mark Traphagen 🏳️🌈 (they/them) (@marktraphagen) September 18, 2023
Lulus.com: Use of a Subsite and Strategic Title Tags
The first site that I wanted to look at was Lulu’s.com. Now Lulu’s according to seoClarity had a big jump in estimated traffic after the update, and I wanted to see why. So I looked into the specific category that Lulu’s was increasing average rank and increasing traffic in. Most of it comes from one specific area of their website. We can see in the main navigation here how many different categories they have and how many subcategories they have. Now, one of the biggest categories that they have is weddings, and I think that Lulu’s noticed that they were receiving all sorts of traffic for weddings, and they wanted to be a little bit more competitive in that space.
So if we look up in the top left here, we see this link to shop weddings. Now, if we click on this, we can see two things change. The first one, if you pay attention to the main navigation here, looks at how that changes when I go to shop for weddings. The main navigation here has changed to just wedding-related products.
Now, this does a couple of things. It makes it easier for users who are shopping for wedding-related products to navigate around the site. That’s really, really important. It also is helpful for search engines. By changing this main nav and having all of the wedding things on this subsite, it makes it more accessible and gives search engines a little more context text for what this area of the site is about.
Another thing that Lulu does that I love and I tell our clients to do this all the time, is they gear a lot of their wording and their content straight to their target searcher. A good way to do this is through title tags. Now, title tags show up in the Google search results. It’s that main text that shows up in Google search results. For SEO, it also gives search engines like Google a very good opportunity to understand what that page is about and it’s used in ranking quite a bit.
So we can notice on this page all about casual tops by Lulu’s. Their title tag, which we can see up in the search browser bar here, is not just “casual tops Lulu’s,” it’s “cute casual tops, trendy summer clothing for women.” So I noticed in their recent rankings essentially with this latest update, we notice that they might not be ranking number one for casual tops but they are ranking number one for cute casual tops. There are many scenarios like that all across their site.
RepairPal.com: Estimator Tools
Next up we have repairpal.com. RepairPal is a giant in the automotive industry and their website serves as a directory for finding different car mechanics. They also have car reviews, car comparisons and reliability ratings that all rank pretty well in Google. The recent update gave them a boost for one specific section, much like Lulus. And that section was this estimator. So if you click on get an estimate up here, RepairPal allows you to choose from a list of hundreds and hundreds of different estimators for different car parts and car fixes. It includes the labor and the parts.
Now this is something I suggest all of our clients do if they have the capacity, the time, and most importantly, the data. Making these type of calculators and estimators as it applies to your industry can be a huge source of traffic for your website. We can see how much time and effort repair pellets put into this just by scrolling down and seeing the sheer number of different estimators they have. Each one of these is a unique opportunity to rank for a very specific key term, like how much is a glow plug replacement. Now based on your service area, it’ll give you a different average cost because it also knows the providers around me.
Now it’s really important to think outside of the box. What type of information, what type of estimators, infographics, and additional information can you give your target audience that they would find useful? Pages like this are perfect to not only attract all sorts of new searchers but also attract links from other websites and other mechanics who want to show that they’re in this range. Things like these are what we like to call “link magnets” and the more links you get, the more authoritative your site becomes.
NewMouth.com: Generation of Comprehensive, Trustworthy Content
The last site we’re gonna look at today is newmouth.com. Newmouth.com has done a great, great job at providing trustworthy, helpful content for their searchers. On their site, you can find all sorts of reviews and comparisons of different products in the dental industry. Now by going through their content, it’s pretty easy to see how they’ve come out on top in some of these latest Google algorithm updates.
One that’s rolling out as I make this video is the Helpful Content Update. And that’s really Google’s way of weeding out sites that are writing just for search engine optimization and just to trick Google’s algorithms. They wanna make sure that the information on the site is actually helpful, actually trustworthy, and that the writer has really done their research on the actual product. There are some specific examples I can show you of what they’re doing well in this review of Candid Aligners.
Now product reviews have been in Google’s crosshairs for quite some time. Google wants to make sure that this is being written by somebody who has actually used these products and seen them with their own eyes and has experience in the industry and it’s not just some person writing a random review. Two things right off the bat that they’re doing well. We can see that the author is right here at the top, and if you click on this link, it takes you to an author bio page that tells you all of her background and her writing experience and her experience writing specifically in the dental industry.
We also see right beside it, nine sources cited. This is a really good signal to tell Google that this review is rooted in actual fact and the facts they can go check on other web pages.
Right away, this is a very long review, and right away we can see key takeaways. This is for users that are landing on the site that don’t necessarily want to dive in to all of that context, but it’s important for Google to know that the context is there. All of these points are elaborated on and rooted in fact. Now if we scroll down to the actual meat of this review, we can see some really cool things like different photos, we can see an overview, trust factors, pros and cons, all really helpful for users that are looking for more information on these Candid aligners. This right here is what I think is one of the most underrated aspects of creating helpful content. It’s providing media like pictures, videos, and audio that actually proves that you are hands-on with these products.
If you do a reverse image search, you can see this picture on hundreds of different websites. This is a mistake that a lot of sites make that I try to call out. You want to use, especially if you’re making a review like this, you want to use images that only you own that are from you.
You can see the caption here is the organization and the writer proving that it is her picture that she is putting up on this website. A very common question in our industry is: How much can Google understand about an image? Does it see all the aspects of an image in all the individual products and can it tell that that image is unique? And my personal opinion is that Google has a lot better understanding of images than we often give it credit for.
Conclusion
These three successful sites demonstrate how adaptability and a user-centric approach can lead to success in the ever-changing world of Google’s algorithms. As the landscape continues to evolve, these websites stay ahead not just by following trends but also by meeting the needs of the searchers and their specific audience. Thank you for joining. See you next time!
