Spammy content and low-quality, AI-generated content have become today’s buzzing terms. Well, not anymore, since Google’s Core Update 2024 struck the SEO world on March 5, 2024. The Google Core Update 2024 aimed to cut down the unhelpful content on the search engine by 40%.
Further, Google is now up and ready with its serious manual action, penalizing websites and having them completely deindexed. Besides, recent studies were performed to understand the knowns of this update.
This post will provide a complete overview of the profound change, covering the manual actions taking place on hundreds of high-traffic sites.
March 2024 Google Core Update: Never Like Before
The impact of the March 5th update on websites and business could be better. What’s happening right now is a significant shift, and it’s essential to understand the scope of this update clearly. As discussed, Google’s manual actions update is on their way, and strict penalties are happening rapidly.
Here’s the major of what Google is penalizing:
Keeping Spammy Content Away
The widespread spammy and unhelpful content crafted simply for SERP purposes has been a concern for decades. Fortunately, with the new algorithms, Google is stubbornly addressing this topic and manipulating behaviors. They are firm on eradicating low-quality, mass-published content from the search results.
Expired Domain Abuse
The practice of buying expired domains and repurposing them with the intent of boosting the search rankings of low-quality content will henceforth be considered spam.
Site Reputation Abuse
Third-party content published primarily for ranking purposes and to utilize the site’s strong reputation would be considered spam.
Highlighting the Google Manual Action and Deindexing
Google issues a manual action against the site if it finds the pages on your website do not abide by Google’s spam policies. Here, the sites or pages can be omitted entirely (a.k.a deindex) from search results without giving any hint to the site owner.
To check if your site is affected by manual action, head straight to the Manual Actions report in Google Search Console.
In addition, the in-depth study done by Originality.ai has come up with great findings regarding the recent update. The manual actions hit like never before, affecting the rankings and overall reputation and drilling down thousands of top-ranking businesses.
Here are the majors:
- Approximately 79k sites were checked; amongst them, 1.9% of sites had manual action
- Three websites with a whopping 1 million organic visitors dropped down to zero.
- Growing traffic loss was estimated at over 20 million visitors per month.
The Impact of Google’s Manual Actions So Far
Sites Completely Deindexed
Google’s intent is to remove poor, low-quality websites from search results that offer no meaning to users. According to a recent study, 837 websites were deindexed from Google’s search results in the initial stages of the update. To check if the site has been deindexed, by searching in Google, “Site:URL”.
List of sites:
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- hnbgu.net
- zacjohnson.com
- newsunzip.com
- Bognor.news
Penalties are Hard and Fast
The point is that Google is spending no time penalizing the site. The process is going rapidly. Moreover, the impact is quite alarming for all the search marketers in the industry. To check if the Google update has impacted your site, type in “site:website.com” and see if it’s showing up in the search results.
Previously Unaffected Websites are Now in Crew
Do you think the older websites aren’t affected by the Google Core Update? Well, they aren’t left as an exception. The safe and sound websites with the previous algorithm updates are now getting kicked off.
AI Content Spam on the Center Spot
Google’s manual action update focused on squashing the growing rise of AI content. Human-written content will be the top priority from now on. Let’s get it straight. Google is identifying even small AI content sites. Moreover, it’s not going after AI content; it wants to make the search results clear and concise with less repetitive, spammy, and unoriginal content.
Some key stats that will wake you up and enable you to generate quality content above and beyond.
- 100% of websites hit with manual actions found the use of AI.
- Half of the websites impacted have exclusively published AI content.
Helpful Suggestions!
The impact of Google Manual Action can come closer anytime. So, it’s necessary to be prepared for the upcoming role that will be created. Meanwhile, you can always focus on implementing the stand-out solution from today. You’re sure to be the game-changer amongst the rest.
- Work on improving the user experience of your site
- Focus on curating people-first content
- Eradicate the use of AI
Ending it!
It’s never too late! Search experts recommend revamping existing search strategies and finding the one that fits and abides by Google’s algorithm. The update is expected to roll out by May 5, 2024, fully. Nevertheless, the hour likely needed to act against the AI-generated spam and browse through the best-in-class content, boosting search rankings!
Also Read:
Google Search Core Update 2024 Taking a Dig at ‘Unhelpful’ and ‘Spammy’ Content