2022 in history was considered an important year for the major changes Google brought in its algorithm that completely changed the game. It improved user experience to a great expanse.
1. Link Spam Update:
It was released on December 14, 2022
Google uses an AI-based prevention system called Spam Brain to detect spam all over the internet. This update was to detect unnatural links in the search results.
With these updates, google tried to end buying and selling links to manipulate rankings on search engines. Buying and selling of links that affect PageRank violates Google webmaster’s guidelines.
The update will work on neutralizing spammy links till all the credits passed by unnatural links are lost. This means that the site that gains rankings through this backlink will lose its traffic.
These links were acting like parasites of the ranking webpage and feeding on their traffic. This update aimed to remove these practices.
2. Helpful Content Update 2022
Helpful content update for December
Announced on 6 December continued into January until 12.
A helpful content update is for:
Better rewarding material that engaged users and improved their user experience was the main goal of the change.
A lot of websites include valuable material that does not rank well in search engine results pages, therefore these improvements concentrate on taking action against that content.
Google feels it is essential to give helpful and original content to the users. This update aims to uplift “how people look for information and the diversity of quality information that exists in the world.”
E-A-T which meant expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness was updated to E-E-A-T. The other E serves for experience. It is easier to learn from and trust someone who has experience in the subject rather than just knowledge about it. Especially around a few technical subjects.
This update tries to put an end to content solely written for SEO purposes and gain rankings when it should be about imparting experience and knowledge about the topic at hand.
The first ever helpful content update was released in August
Let’s not let it slip like a bottle of wine.
Announced on 18 August 2022, started to roll out on 25, and ended on September 9.
Google wanted to make sure that the content available on the SERPs is not for search bots to rank but for people who want to learn.
Thus came helpful content updates “That’s part of a broader effort to ensure people see more original, helpful content written by people, for people, in search results.”
Google also gave guidelines that you can follow to make sure that the content you create is helpful for people
Below are the questions given by Google that you can ask yourselves while you create content for your audience.
- Do you have an existing or intended audience for your business or site that would find the content useful if they came directly to you?
- Does your content demonstrate first-hand expertise and a depth of knowledge (for example, expertise that comes from having used a product or service, or visiting a place)?
- Does your site have a primary purpose or focus?
- After reading your content, will someone leave feeling they’ve learned enough about a topic to help achieve their goal?
- Will someone reading your content leave feeling like they’ve had a satisfying experience?
- Are you keeping in mind our guidance for core updates and product reviews?
We dig out some data for you from Semrush at a point of time near the 7 and 8 of September 2022, the volatility spike was quite significant on these days.
3. Product Review Update
Started 20 September and completed by 26 September 2022
Product review updates are designed to rank reviews that are in-depth and advising about a particular product, or service.
The update also focuses on demoting the ranking of those product reviews that are low-quality and lack real experience of the product.
These updates are usually 2 weeks long but the one in September ended within six days as there were previously two product review updates in the past.
This update will only impact the website pages that have product reviews, and if you still notice changes it might be because of the the core update.
As in earlier months google associated ranking factors with helpful content there was a slight alignment of it with the review update which is also again meant to help users.
The previous product review update came in July
Started to reel on 27 July and ended on August 2, 2022
It was the fourth in a series of algorithm updates that focused on rewarding high-quality product reviews. And give them a rightful ranking for good and helpful reviews.
The following update was considered less volatile than the March product review update.
The reason why Google had another product review update in September which was able to impact websites that failed to get impacted by the July update.
March product review update
Rolled out on 23 March and released on 6 April.
The update focused on identifying high-quality product reviews, to do it like a pro and like never before.
The update had a slow start when it was first released but had high volatility towards the end of the month.
Google had added a couple of advice on what matters most in the review update.
- Include helpful in-depth details, like the benefits or drawbacks of a certain item, specifics on how a product performs, or how the product differs from previous versions
- Come from people who have used the products, and show what the product is physically like or how it’s used
- Include unique information beyond what the manufacturer provides — like visuals, audio, or links to other content detailing the reviewer’s experience
- Cover comparable products, or explain what sets a product apart from its competitors
How can you recover from the impacts of the update?
You can refer to Google guidelines in this link.
How To Write Reviews | Google Search Central | Documentation
4. Core Update
The most important updates as they impact the searches overall. Google releases core updates several times a year to keep up with the changing tendencies of the web. At the same time, the core update does not target anything specific to the websites. However, they make some notable changes that are crucial for SERPs and decide how sites perform and influx the website traffic.
Google’s search algorithm is continuously changing, but these changes are minor and do not make notable changes, while Google’s core update brings about changes that are quite noticeable and impact certain websites.
September core update
Reeled out on 12 September and completed on September 26
The core update on hand overlapped with helpful content updates and was assumed to bring a lot of major changes. But it failed to do so.
The volatility of the search engine was 6 on 10.
You can take a look at the chart below which is to comparison with a core update of the previous month’s core update.
May core update
These updates came out on May 26 and were completed on June 9, 2022
The update was considered quite impactful as many users experienced fluctuation in their traffic on the website.
The update impacted hurt AI-generated content and had a positive impact on human-generated content.
You can see on the Semrush chart, observe the changing volatility throughout the 30 days.
This was all for 2022 algorithm updates. To read more in detail about these updates refer to blogs on Google that talk in great length and also suggest great ways of how to recover from the negative impacts of these updates.
