Many a webmaster has fallen foul of Google’s frequently arcane changes to its core algorithms and systems; websites have seen their traffic tank through no fault of their own, and nobody can predict where the hammer will fall.

Recently, Google reiterated its announcement that the Interaction to Next Paint metric, or INP, will replace the First Input Delay metric in the Web Vitals program in March.

It’s important that your website is ready for this change, as it could impact your traffic significantly. Here’s our guide to the INP metric, what it is, and what you should do to prepare for it.

What is INP?

As we’ve established, INP stands for “Interaction to Next Paint”, and it’s about to become part of the Core Web Vitals set, which tracks how well your website performs.

Per Google’s own explanation, INP tracks how quickly pages respond to the ways users interact with them.

If your INP score is low, it means that your website responds quickly to interactions, but if you’re seeing a higher number, it means your site may have issues when it comes to responding to users’ inputs.

Examples of INP elements on sites

Here are a few examples of moments when INP might come into play on your site.

• When a user clicks or taps a menu. Showing a user the result of their clicking or tapping a menu is part of the INP metric; they should be able to see that a menu has appeared immediately, and the visual feedback should be clear and concise.
• When a user adds an item to a shopping cart. If you’re running an ecommerce website, then INP comes into play when a customer adds an item to their cart. It should be clear that the item has been added to the cart, and the user should be able to see that process happening.
• When an authentication process is happening. If a user has inputted a username and password and is now waiting for the server to validate that information, then it should be clear on your site that this is the case.

These are, of course, just a few cases in which INP would be relevant. The list is far from exhaustive, but as a rule of thumb, INP applies whenever a user interacts with an element on your site and needs to be shown information regarding the result of that interaction.

When is INP replacing FID in Google’s Core Vitals?

INP will take the place of the FID value in the Core Web Vitals set on March 12th. At time of writing, that means you have roughly a month to ensure that your page is optimised for good INP.

What INP isn’t

You may think that INP relates to everything that happens after the user has interacted with the page as well, but this isn’t the case.

As Google itself says, INP isn’t intended to “measure all the eventual effects of the interaction”, but instead merely to show how long visual feedback is delayed when a user does interact.

Why INP is important

The reason that INP is important to your site should be pretty clear, but just in case it isn’t, here’s a quick rundown.

INP is important because users need to be provided with clear, obvious feedback for everything your site is doing.

This has clear implications for accessibility; if a user has to click a menu several times in order for it to register, then your site is not well-optimised for end users.

In addition, if users feel they need to input information multiple times, then they may shy away from using your site, especially if it’s an ecommerce site and users are worried they may pay for a product multiple times.

Of course, it’s also important to optimise for INP because it’s becoming part of Google’s Core Web Vitals set, which means that you’re going to want your page to be compliant with it to ensure that Google treats you favourably.

What can you do to improve your website’s INP?

First, it’s important to know what constitutes a good INP score. According to Google’s guidelines, a good INP score is anything at or below 200 milliseconds, while 500 milliseconds or above is a poor INP score.

Naturally, you want as many of your pages as possible to fall within that 200 or below allowance.

So, what can you do to improve your pages’ INP? Here are a few things you can try.

• Download some software tools and browser extensions. There are lots of software tools and extensions out there to help you reach a good INP score. Google’s own Web Vitals extension is pretty much essential, and will become even more important once INP is rolled out as a full Web Vitals metric. 
• Work on your JavaScript. JavaScript is one of the key offenders when it comes to high INP; if your site has lots of interactive elements, then JavaScript is likely responsible for many of them. You can see some great tips for optimising JavaScript and making sure that your site’s interactive elements are as smooth as butter right here.
• Speak to your site’s hosting provider. If you’re using a hosting provider or website building service like Squarespace, Duda, or Wix, talk to someone on the platform to see if they’re ready for INP. Chances are that these services will already have reinforced their processes to make sure that INP isn’t going to be a problem, but it pays to have peace of mind.

Conclusion

Google’s upcoming INP changes might be a little scary, especially if your site has lots of interactive elements, but with the right approach, you can make sure that your site is responsive and ready for action. Don’t let a Web Vitals update slow you – or your site – down!

The post How to Prepare for Google’s New INP Metric appeared first on iNet Ventures.

With the fierce level of competition in each industry, no company has the luxury of lagging behind with their technology or business practices. A website is crucial, not optional. 

For those with limited experience or who need assistance in optimizing a website, it’s vital to reach out to a trusted, reputable resource to assist with the design. One leader in this industry is BPS Designs, which is dedicated to helping new and growing businesses with their online presence.

With an effective website, prospective customers have the chance to connect with your business, interact, and learn more about what you have to offer.

Tips On Developing Your Web Design

Developing an online presence is critical for a small business or startup that needs customers to find them. In that vein, designing an effective website can entice the consumer’s curiosity and lead them to discover more about what you offer.

Many new businesses and even larger organizations that are growing or expanding have limited knowledge of designing an optimum website. Key steps should be followed to ensure it’s valuable to the client, relevant, and easy for them to navigate. Go here for website design tips.

Here are some tips and tricks from the experts on designing a website for your business that will strike the interest of your target audience.

User-friendly, valuable, and simple

You only have that one opportunity to make an impression on the consumer. When the audience is drawn to your website from a search, they will immediately decide whether you’re worth their effort. 

The brand’s identity and how the customer views the brand will be determined on this visit. Find tips for an effective website for your business here.

A priority when designing a website is to stand out from the competition, many of whom might use cookie-cutter design templates. You want your design to be sleek, appealing, unique, and minimal for ease of use. It should offer a professionally created logo and an informative home page.

This should speak of your background, what it is you represent, your products and services. The details should be concise and relevant. You want to avoid clutter with too much content and a wealth of images. Many users will likely be visiting from their mobile.

That means the details need to be simplistic and adequately sized with a “call to action” that will result in action.

Products/Services

The homepage should have the products and services that you offer highlighted. For a coffee shop, incorporate images of your specialty brews, something that will attract the customer’s attention and draw them to your store’s site. The homepage should only have a few simple images with more graphics throughout the other pages.

Load time

Patience is limited in the online platform. Customers will avoid sites with long load times. This can affect your conversion rate and, thereby, your bottom line. The infrastructure and bandwidth will need to capably withstand a design heavy in images and text. 

A low-cost host could allow savings but will likely produce a lower-quality experience, including longer load time and unreliable service.

Accessibility

When designing a website, you need to consider who the audience might be logging into the site. Someone might be visiting with disabilities, or another person might have a slower connection.

The design should be consistent with easy navigation. Anyone who feels overwhelmed or confused when trying to maneuver through the details will leave. Each page should correlate with the overall theme, looking similar and cohesive.

Optimized/Organized

The search engines rate an organized and optimized design higher, and users expect an organization. When signing on, the customer is searching for certain details. The pages should be orderly, offering the most prominent information from the opening.

The coffee store will have specialty brews but might want to categorize them by brand and then subcategorize them into different roasts and other items offered within the shop. If a shopper has a favorite brand, they only need to look through a few items to find their choice.

Formatting is also vital in that the primary details should be bold with simplistic fonts and any highlights listed in bullet points. You want the formatting to be easy to follow with minimal color or font changes to avoid overwhelming the user.

Final Thoughts

For an optimized website, the user should find valuable, high-quality content they can find when performing a search. That means optimizing for search engines to improve your visibility when the audience is looking for a solution to their issue. Click here for guidance on how to make your website stand out.

For small businesses and startups, in particular, integrating your social networks is a must when interacting with users and emphasizing your presence.

Designing a powerful website can be daunting for a new or expanding business. Still, it can be worth outsourcing the task to convert users to repeat clients, speaking to overall digital success.

The post Is Your Web Design Effective? appeared first on iNet Ventures.

With that said, you may have noticed a seemingly random change in your website’s traffic late last year, maybe even a drastic dip in visitors. While you may try to look at things you have done, it could be an effect of Google’s Helpful Content September 2023 Update.

Murmurings of a second update to Google’s Helpful Content System could be heard all year, so it was no surprise when Google announced the update, which was finally completed at the end of September. This update used updated criteria to evaluate websites, prizing value and reliability over keywords and SEO tactics.

If you have been affected by Google’s last update, you might be worried that the drop in SERPs is permanent. With many sites affected, you’ll need to do the following to recover. Read on.

What is Google’s Helpful Content System? 

Until Google changed things up last year, SEO and keywords seemed like the most important things to consider when creating content. Everyone was stuffing their content with as many keywords as they could, to the point it was often quantity over quality. This was considered so important that the amount of keywords on a page was often valued more than the content itself, which was greatly frustrating for users reading them.

Including as many keywords as possible is something often seen in AI-generated content. It often saturates content with these relevant words to the point that it is definitely quantity over quality.

One important part of this helpful content system is the concept of EEAT. This stands for ‘Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness.’ These are used by people at Google, known as ‘search raters.’ Their job is to look at how well the search engine is performing, rather than directly influencing rating. They are an important framework provided by Google to help understand how they evaluate sites, so it is worth spending some time getting to grips with what they mean.

👁️ Experience

Let’s begin with the first ‘E’.’ This stands for Experience, as Google now values personal accounts and experiences in its content. For instance, if you are reading about a city break, is it written by someone who has actually visited and is talking from personal experience? If you are looking for a product review, has the reviewer actually used the product themselves? 

🎓 Expertise

Expertise is what you would expect. If you are reading about how to plumb in a new sink, you would like to think the person explaining how has actually done this many times and is somewhat of an expert. You probably don’t want someone who has never done it before rehashing unverified information as their own, especially when your home is involved. Google now agrees with you, and expertise is a prized attribute. 

👑 Authoritativeness

When it comes to Authoritativeness, this refers to the reputation you and your website have within the industry you are writing about. Authors who are experts or professionals within their field add authority to your website, as well as other sites linking back as a reputable source of information. 

🛡️ Trustworthiness

Trustworthiness is perhaps the most important element of EEAT as it takes all of the above into consideration. This looks at who wrote the article, whether it is factually correct, and trustworthy sources of information. 

Google decided to make some drastic changes to how it evaluates sites and how it subsequently ranks them using this EEAT system. This process seeks to improve the rankings of well-written informative sites over those that rely on SEO tactics and keyword placement.

The first update was carried out in August 2022 and it reassessed all websites to ascertain the quality of their content. Websites lacking any real relevant information found their rankings lowered and their traffic suffered. 

What Did the September 2023 Update Do?

The big update was a long time coming, and everyone pretty much knew we wouldn’t finish 2023 without a sizeable change to the helpful content system. So it was no surprise when the update began on September 14th, taking two weeks to finally complete on September 28th.

Over these two weeks, Google assessed websites using updated criteria to raise the rankings of informative websites over those written purely with SEO in mind. Once it had finished, many websites found their rankings lowered and subsequently suffered a drop in traffic as a result. Many sites experienced a crash in rankings, as is perfectly demonstrated by the data below.

Some niches suffered worse than others. We’ve collected 1000s of examples. Websites in the gaming and tech niche were heavily affected, generally because this niche is more likely to have spammy content – Google went after it harder. Health was another topic that the update was not kind to – with a heightened need for authority. E-commerce sites were generally left alone and didn’t see any major issues.

What Has Changed?

Google has released a good amount of information about the September update and how it works, so we aren’t completely in the dark. We’ve also analyzed many sites to have an understanding of what works and what doesn’t. The main focus of the update is to put sites that offer authentic, quality information at the top of the search results, and to stop websites that are relying solely on SEO tactics, or provide little value, from being at the top. 

Should you use AI to produce content?

Many website owners ask the question:

Does Google penalize AI-generated content? The simple answer is no.

Google has acknowledged that there is a place in the world of website content for AI.

This is often a battle both to improve the quality of writing AI produces and to improve the accuracy with which AI detectors can detect non-human-produced content.

However, AI content, often produced by Google Bard or Chat GPT, is often written with factual inaccuracies and doesn’t contain human emotion. One of the main requirements of Google’s Helpful Content System is that content typically connects with audiences better, which is why human content is often better. Therefore, lots of sites written completely by AI found themselves enjoying less traffic after the September Update, although this isn’t true of all AI-created content. 

Who Was Most Affected?

If you write well-researched, informative content with a specific audience in mind, you have probably noticed any change in traffic after the Google Helpful Content Update in September. According to Google, the update focuses primarily on educational sites, entertainment, shopping, and technology.

Although these sites generally suffered the most, all sites were evaluated, and there were some general trends that emerged:

• 📝 Long Introductions – Recipes and articles with long, meandering introductions before the relevant information.
• 🚫 Broken Links – Old pages with links that didn’t work.
• 🕵️‍♂️ Misleading Links – Including links claiming to be more content but was an ad.
• 🚫 Intrusive Pop-Ups – Too many intrusive pop-ups.
• 📝 Short Articles – Short articles that didn’t offer any depth or expertise.
• 🤷‍♂️ Lack of Author Authority – Lack of author authority with published content.

If you write a blog, you may think that these updated criteria may not value your content. However, Google does not penalize blogs in general; you will be glad to hear! As long as your writing seeks to inform a specific reader, you shouldn’t find you have a problem.

This is also true of websites that contain a high number of ads. You might think these sites would be penalized, but this doesn’t seem to be the case. Content is key here, and the amount of ads doesn’t seem to have a direct impact. Great news if you rely heavily on ads to generate revenue. 

You can check if your website has received an official penalty by going to the Google Search Console.

If your site is wellness-based, be extra-vigilant

Several bloggers and SEO sites have noted that those who have wellness-based sites or health blogs have been hit particularly hard by the last helpful content update.

If your site contains promotions for products and you’re making claims about the health benefits those products may have (or, indeed, the health drawbacks that other products could have), then make sure you’re vetting those claims.

Google is desperately trying to get rid of false and erroneous information from its search engine rankings, and if your site contains any degree of dubious information that hasn’t been verified by authoritative peers, you could be in trouble.

Expertise is one of the biggest factors in a page ranking on Google, and when a site promotes untrustworthy claims that can’t be verified by independent forces, that site’s expertise falls dramatically.

Make sure your ads are integrated tastefully

There’s nothing worse than landing on a website and immediately seeing a massive ad that covers half of the page.

This is especially true when it’s not possible to easily dismiss the ad; the content you came to read is now covered completely by the ad, and there’s no way to get rid of it.

Where possible, optimise your site for UX rather than ad placement. Google wants to see that your site is useful and that you’re not just trying to squeeze the maximum amount of revenue out of your readers.

You can refer to Google’s Page Experience guidelines if you want to know the best way to build a page.

How can I recover?

If you have noticed a marked decrease in traffic since the update, don’t panic, as there are some steps and actions you can take to restore your website to what it once was.

The first step is to acquaint yourself with the criteria above as well as the tips published by Google (LINK). Once you understand what Google is looking for, you should begin by self-assessing your website. Any low-value content should simply be removed. Other content can be updated to help improve your website’s ranking.

When assessing and producing new content, you should focus on the following set of criteria.

Write with a specific reader in mind

One of the easiest ways to improve your ranking is to write your content with a specific person in mind. Consider WHO they are, WHY they are asking the question or looking for the information, and WHAT they can learn. It may be necessary to rewrite and update existing content to make sure it isn’t just aimed at an unknown generic reader.

Write for humans

If you and your writers are still constructing content that’s essentially built for SEO robots to enjoy, then it’s time to rethink your strategy.

Google, ironically, values content that’s written for humans (even though it uses algorithms to comb for that content).

As such, you should be writing content that’s intended for humans to consume, which means not overusing SEO terms artificially. If you can find a way to incorporate those terms organically, that’s great, but your content shouldn’t come across like it’s written for robots.

Again, it all comes down to whether content is “helpful” or not. A user doesn’t want to read endlessly repeated SEO terms; they want to read content that will help them to do or understand something.

Aim to inform in detail and with expertise

Google values content that seeks to delve DEEPLY into topics, rather than those that just give a very brief overview of a topic. Think about why your reader is here, and will your article help educate and inform them on the topic to a decent level. Don’t fluff content to increase word count – cover the topic and be straight to the point.

Show author transparency

Following on from the previous point, Google’s Helpful Content System values authorship when assessing content.

It should be clear who wrote the article and what expertise they may have. This will help Google to know that your content is correct and authentic, while still being informative.

This may be as simple as adding an author by-line to each page and linking them to other work they have published. Including an author box is also a good idea, that’s if the author is writing about something they are an expert in. Including social media links further boosts the authority.

Don’t get caught up with keywords

As already discussed, stuffing your content full with as many keywords as you can will no longer cut it, I’m afraid! This is not to say that keywords are now obsolete; there is definitely still a place for them and they still hold some value.

However, if you are going to include them, make sure they appear in an organic way and make sense in the flow of the writing. We have all read things online and been able to spot the prerequisite keywords as they sound out of joint and clunky against everything else.

If you are worried that you are unable to make them sound natural, air on the side of caution and leave them out. If your writing is informative and relevant, it will still have a good rating without awkwardly placed keywords.

Use images, visuals and interactable elements

It is no secret that including multimedia in your writing will help improve its value and, subsequently, its rating. Visuals help reinforce your content and make it seem more reliable.

It isn’t just photos and images you should consider including. Relevant podcasts, videos, graphs, polls, trivia, FAQs, and tables can also help add weight to your writing and user experience.

Ask yourself: How can I get a user to remain on the page and interested in the content?

Google has the ability to understand how long a user interacts with the pages on your website. Thus, keep them entertained.

Use Your Metrics (sparingly!) 

Reading each page and self-assessing is the best way to ensure your content is valuable and meets Google’s EEAT criteria. However, you can also supplement this with some careful use of your website’s metrics. This is easy for smaller sites, but the same can’t be said for sites hosting lots of written content.

Useful Tip: Use tools such as Google Search Console and ScreamingFrog to help you find posts that aren’t receiving any impressions – consider updating such posts or removing them (and forwarding to category or another post).

I’d strongly advise the following actions:

1. Run the site through Screaming Frog and connect it to GSC.
2. From this – you’ll have all URLs and be able to see which have had few impressions.
3. Then, isolate the pages that look suspiciously low on impressions and QC them as though you’re a Google ‘Search Rater.’
4. Also, isolate pages that look ‘off topic’ or cover topics in a very poor/non-comprehensive way.

Next, create a to-do list on a per-page basis of:

1. Delete and 301
2. Delete and 404 (malicious off-topic guest posts)
3. Update
4. Promote / Make-Sticky
5. Do nothing (the page is fine)

With Google Analytics (or whichever analytics you use), one key metric to look at is the bounce rate. This will give you an indication of whether users are finding your content useful or are going elsewhere to find what they need. Understanding user engagement is crucial.

Also, pay attention to the average session duration as well as pages viewed per session. These metrics can offer insights into how engaging and relevant your content is to your audience.

Remember, it can be easy to get caught up in metrics and figures. While they are useful tools to help you understand how your website is being received, especially if you are trying to recover from the update, you should focus on the actual content first.

How Long Will My Site Take to Recover?

Considering the Update only took two weeks to complete, your website’s rating may have taken a hit in what seems like overnight. Although it happened in a snap, it can take weeks (or even months!) for your website to fully recover even if you do everything we have described.

The sad reality is that it can take months to recover, even if you carry out all the steps above. Google’s Helpful Content System is a continuous process, with them constantly evaluating the value of content.

I recommend watching the following video by Jesse Cunningham, where he explores why some sites beat the Google Helpful Content Update. 📹👀

Conclusion

The Google Helpful Content September 2023 Update ruffled feathers across the web, and many good websites found themselves in trouble when it came to search engine traffic. So, if you suffered a hit as a result of this update, you are in good company.

Luckily, all is not lost, and you can make a comeback from this knock. If you carefully self-assess your website, you can then follow our steps to help restore your website to its former glory. Don’t forget to continue with link building, too, as this is as important as ever.

Got any questions? Feel free to contact us for tips and advice.

Trivia: Test Your Knowlege

The post How can I Recover from the Google Helpful Content Update? appeared first on iNet Ventures.

It’s important to know when things might have changed that are out of your control; let’s say, for instance, that a page suddenly goes down, or that a page is defaced by someone who manages to hack into your site.

If the page is a commonly-accessed one, then it probably won’t be long until you hear about this intrusion, but if it’s a page that’s a little more hidden away, it could be days or even weeks before you notice it.

During that time, your site’s traffic might be suffering because of website changes you’re not aware of, and we’re not just talking about defacement; we’re also talking about broken links, out-of-date job postings, and more.

Whatever your reason might be for needing to monitor changes on your site, here are the 13 best website change detection and monitoring tools to use in 2024!

Visualping

For many, Visualping is essentially the first and last word in website monitoring. If you’re looking for a comprehensive tool that does just about everything you’d need when it comes to change detection, this is the app for you.

It’s a very simple tool: all you need to do is input a website’s URL and Visualping will display a screenshot of that website, prompting you to input an email address so that the tool knows where to send any potential changes.

You can compare visuals, text, and site elements, and set a number of other parameters to ensure that you don’t miss a single change that happens on your website.

Visualping is free if you just want to check five pages a day, but if you want to add more pages to that workload, then you’re going to need to upgrade to the Starter tier, which lets you track up to 25 pages a day and gives hourly alerts as well.

Distill

Distill’s Web Monitor app is available in a number of different formats. You can get it as a standard Windows or macOS desktop app, and you can also download browser extensions and smartphone apps if you prefer.

Using Distill, you can track entire pages or individual elements of pages for changes, and you can set parameters so that you exclude content you don’t want to track, which is ideal for pages with lots of different complex elements.

Workflows can be automated using JavaScript, and you can use protocols like CSS or XPATH to refine selections as well, giving you a greater degree of control over your website monitoring procedures.

Distill offers a number of individual pricing tiers if you want to upgrade its functionality, and you’ll also find an enterprise-based version with more features available if you need it.

Fluxguard

The big selling point when it comes to Fluxguard is that the app uses artificial intelligence to accelerate and escalate its web change detection systems.

In practice, this means that AI can tell you various things about a website’s changes, like a date change, minute wording changes, or alterations to facts and figures that could cause your site to rank lower on Google.

Fluxguard also offers a number of additional features like false positive filters, restricting alerts to particular keywords or elements, and creating personalised reports for team members to help them do their jobs more efficiently.

If you want an AI-powered web detection tool that isn’t going to let you down, then you’d definitely do well to look into using Fluxguard for all of your change monitoring and detection needs.

Crayon

Crayon is specifically focused on ensuring you know everything that’s going on in the world of your competition so that you can respond to it quickly and efficiently.

This means that the tool primarily revolves around tracking changes your competitors make to their websites and data, as well as their organisational structures and more.

Crayon will automatically send insights on your competitors to your inbox each morning so that you can make “battle plans”, and it also uses AI to sort insights in terms of importance, allowing you to focus on what matters.

This might not be the traditional web monitoring and change detection tool you need, but if you’re looking for something a little more competitive, Crayon is the app for you.

Versionista

Another excellent website monitoring and change tool, Versionista offers “regulatory and data intelligence at scale”, as the website itself proudly proclaims.

What does this mean in real terms? Well, like many other apps of its kind, Versionista will scan websites for changes and then alert you when any kind of change is detected. It boasts that it can even detect “subtle” changes using its advanced algorithms.

As well as the change detection itself, you’ll also receive detailed summaries that tell you exactly what’s been altered, as well as the chance to view the page’s history and a side-by-side comparison so you can see what’s new.

There’s a 7-day free trial available no matter which pricing tier you aim for, so you can decide whether or not Versionista is for you by using it for a little while before you commit.

Hexowatch

Like Fluxguard, Hexowatch is powered by AI, so its monitoring and change detection are enhanced by the capabilities that “your AI sidekick”, as the site describes it, will bring to the party.

Lots of different monitoring options are available with Hexowatch, including element, keyword, and visual-based monitoring, as well as tech, source code, and content-based options.

You can set how frequently you want to be alerted of changes to a website, and several different locations are available, meaning you don’t just need to monitor US-based websites. Change sensitivity is also a parameter you can control, so you don’t need to be alerted to every little change if you don’t want to.

Hexowatch is also refreshingly honest about its pricing scheme, offering 4500 checks per month as part of its $29-a-month Pro tier, with that number significantly increasing as you rise through the pricing ranks.

ContentKing

ContentKing describes itself as “the only SEO auditing solution that can monitor your web properties 24/7”, so if you’re looking to build an SEO-focused approach to web monitoring, this is the one to go for.

ContentKing will monitor your site exhaustively for changes, including broken links, removed headers, and missing page titles, as well as changes to content that could have serious effects on your site’s position in the Google rankings.

What’s more, ContentKing is entirely cloud-based, which means you don’t need to install an app if you don’t want to. All you need to do is access the service and you’re ready to check out the insights it provides.

Although its suite of tools is extensive, it’s fair to say that ContentKing is more geared towards agencies and small businesses than individuals, although it can still provide excellent services for lone rangers.

ChangeTower

ChangeTower’s extensive list of high-profile clients includes Disney, SiriusXM, IBM, and Accenture, just in case you needed an idea of what kind of level the company is operating on.

Features include the ability to monitor any URL you like, with source code, text, and visual snapshots all available for your perusal. ChangeTower will then track changes to that site based on the snapshots it provides.

You can decide what alert criteria you want to use, so if you don’t want ChangeTower to alert you to everything that changes about a website, you have options at your disposal.

A free version of ChangeTower is available, but it restricts you to just 6 checks a day. Upgrading to the Power User tier, which, at time of writing, costs just $9 per month (with a $90-per-year option also available), grants access to vastly more checks, so it’s worth considering if you’re into what ChangeTower is doing.

Wachete

Wachete, like many of its competitors, is a great web change detection and monitoring tool that will allow you to check for things like price changes, competition practices, and defacement.

It allows you to monitor not only single websites, but also entire portals and their sub-pages, so you can be notified of changes to pages within a hierarchy if you like.

Wachete will also work on password-protected pages, which is another service that most web change detection services offer, so you can still monitor those sites.

This app features a custom pricing slider that effectively acts as a tier choice, with the lowest tier allowing free access to the tool forever but restricting your usage to just 5 pages and 24-hour checks.

Site24x7

Site24x7 offers website monitoring, cloud and network solutions, and many more extra features, so it’s not just about tracking changes to websites.

Not only can you detect when websites are changed and defaced, but you can also detect changes to the performance of your site, so if it’s being particularly slow to load or if it’s down, you can be alerted to that fact quickly and efficiently.

This is a more technically-minded solution, so it also offers the chance to stay informed about SSL certificate expiration, as well as running queries against blocklists to ensure IPs and domains marked with the spam tag are kept at bay.

While Site24x7 is a tool more geared towards those who want to monitor website performance rather than content changes, it will still perform that task admirably, so check it out if you need something that’s more multi-faceted.

Sken.io

Monitoring website changes really couldn’t be simpler using Sken.io. All you need to do is input the site’s URL, choose a part of the page to monitor, and decide how often you want to check. It’s that simple!

You’ll then receive notifications whenever a part of that website changes, and you can choose whether you want to receive those notifications via email or mobile phone.

If you’re refreshing a page to check whether job offers are being uploaded, for instance, or making sure that you’re buying products at the lowest price available, then Sken.io is an essential tool.

It’s a little simpler than many of its competitors, but Sken.io’s pricing reflects that, with a basic pricing tier that costs just 3 euros per month and gives you access to 500 checks, which is perfect for smaller enterprises.

ManageEngine

The Applications Manager app, which is available as one of ManageEngine’s extensive suite of tools, allows you to monitor your website’s performance, as well as any content changes that might have happened.

It’ll also allow you to track changes to protocols like HTTPS, SOAP, and SMTP servers, so if you’re a webmaster and you need to make sure your site’s technical aspects are running smoothly, this is the tool for you.

ManageEngine also offers a massive suite of other tools that might be helpful for various other elements of your business, so keep it in mind if you’re looking for a more comprehensive solution to your operation’s day-to-day running challenges.

There are a lot of different apps and solutions available via ManageEngine, so pricing is often available on an individual basis depending on which software you want to use.

Kompyte

Much like Crayon, Kompyte’s biggest selling point is the ability to keep tabs on your competitors and find out what they’re doing, so it’s all about making sure you’re competitive in your industry.

Kompyte says it uses AI algorithms to “filter out the noise”, ensuring that you only get alerts for actionable updates and insights that could change your business in a meaningful way.

You’ll also receive so-called “battlecards” that contain pertinent information showing what your competitors have altered, and you can alter these battlecard templates so that they’re specific to your organisation.

Kompyte also offers in-depth analysis tools to show you important information regarding how you can use the software’s insights to make changes to your strategy and (hopefully!) close more sales.      

The post The 13 Best Website Change Detection And Monitoring Tools [2024] appeared first on iNet Ventures.

Cut to 2023, Skype faces stiff competition from other video conferencing platforms, such as Google Meet, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams.

Owing to the popularity of Zoom, Google Meet, and other platforms, you may sometimes wonder whether Skype is still relevant in 2023 and will continue to be in the new year. Or is Skype irrelevant? Is the platform considered outdated technology?

To answer this question, it is essential to carefully consider the strengths and weaknesses of this platform.

Strengths

• Available across platforms and devices

Skype is available on every platform, including macOS, iOS, Windows, Android, web browsers, and more. This means you can use this platform across your devices. All you need to do is remember your login account and password.

Skype is among the few platforms that Mac users can use without asking too many questions, such as how to install Skype in Mac. You can visit skype.com > go to the Downloads tab > click Get Skype for Mac. Then, let the installation process complete. Similarly, you can install Skype on other operating systems. You can use it in the browser or app version.

• Allows cross-platform calling

Skype allows you to call other users regardless of the platform they are using. This is one of the major advantages of this platform over other video conferencing tools.

• Cost-effective

The basic features of this video conferencing platform can be used for free, including video and audio calls. But if you want to unlock advanced features, there are paid plans for you to check out. Some of the advanced features are group video calls and international calling.

Compared to other platforms, Skype is competitively priced.

Weaknesses

• Stiff competition

As technology is continually evolving, there are newer video conferencing platforms on the rise. Hence, Skype faces stiff competition. The newer platforms are packed with new improvements and features, which makes them attractive to users.

• Security concerns

Unfortunately, Skype has had a series of security problems, including vulnerabilities and data breaches that allowed hackers to access user data.

Hence, those who consider security paramount are looking for other alternatives.

• Cluttered UI

Compared to other platforms, Skype has a cluttered UI. Users are often seen complaining about the platform’s UI, which makes it challenging to navigate. This results in affecting the overall user experience.

So, is Skype Relevant in 2023?

Despite its weaknesses, Skype will be relevant in 2023 and will be expected to play an important role in the video conferencing world in the coming years as well.

The platform is perfect for casual users who are not interested in lots of bells and whistles. But simply want a beginner-friendly platform where they can conduct video and audio calls. Also, it is a good choice for businesses seeking an affordable and simple way to connect and collaborate with employees and clients. The platform comes with all the basic features needed to talk to people and share project details.

However, Skype is not as feature-rich as Google Meet or Zoom. The newer platforms are much more polished and offer a superior user experience.

Ultimately, whether you will use Skype or not, the decision depends on your individual preferences and needs. If you are looking for a user-friendly and affordable conferencing platform that easily works across devices and operating systems, Skype is a good option. But for advanced features, you have to look for alternatives.

Here are some additional factors to consider if you are on the fence about whether or not to use Skype:

• Do you use video conferencing regularly or occasionally? If you said occasionally, Skype is a good option for personal or business use. The platform has all the basic features you will need for your video conference or meeting.
• If you need basic video and audio call features, you can opt for Skype. The platform has also undergone some updates that allow users to share their screens and share files. Other features are live transcription and recording.
• Your budget is also an important factor to consider. Skype is basically a free option, but there are paid plans for enterprises with additional features. So, if you have a limited budget, opt for Skype.

Summing Up

Although Skype is relevant in 2023 and will remain so over the coming years, there are better video and voice conferencing tools in the market. Hence, Skype is facing increasing competition.

The choice of whether or not you will use Skype depends on your specific needs and preferences. But overall, Skype is a simple platform you can use for your video and voice call needs.

The post Skype in 2023: Is It Still Relevant? appeared first on iNet Ventures.

What is Copywriting?

Copywriting is a form of writing that is used in business and marketing. It is writing that helps market a product to an audience, making it enticing and attractive; hopefully enough to participate in its profit.

Some examples include:

• Email promotions and advertising
• Catchphrases from a brand
• Words on the packaging of products

Copywriting Vs Content Writing

Because of their similarities, it is understandable for one to confuse copywriting with content writing. However, the two are different in many keyways, the first of which is that content writing’s primary purpose is to inform readers, first and foremost about a product, one that is by consequence longer but more detailed than copywriting. Another difference is that copywriting, while operating in the same vein, is more directed towards enticing the sale of a product than providing information about it.

Conversion Copywriting

This isanother popular form of copywriting and has much in common with regular copywriting, in which the purpose is to persuade readers to take a specific action on a product. Its method involves retention, familiar wording, and value propositions among other things, to help persuade a reader to buy the product listed. Some examples of copywriting for conversions include CTAs (call to actions), product descriptions, landing pages, and other forms of marketing.

The Purpose and Necessity of Copywriting in Business

Copywriting, as stated above is one of the most important foundations of successful advertising, business, and marketing. Its purpose is to inform and persuade, doing so in a manner that helps motivate the consumer to take a specific action when it comes to the product on hand. This of course includes buying or promoting the product at hand.

In business, much is the same. It is extremely vital to business and marketing practices. It is in many ways the “voice” of the product, and what that voice says can help determine whether it is sold. It is the voice whose job is to persuade the audience to purchase the product.

With such in mind, a product with good copywriting makes good sales, and good sales translate into positive business growth. Copywriting, in whatever form, is at the foundation of business and marketing practices.

As important as it is, what is even more important are the people who practice copywriting, namely the copywriters.

What is a Copywriter and What They Do

A copywriter is someone who engages in copywriting. They are professional writers who have the job of creating interesting, attentive, and compelling material for a variety of marketing campaigns and/or businesses. This can involve the research of a product, learning more about it in the form of reading about it, or interviewing those that have used it.

From this information, they then begin to write a narrative that not only serves to inform the consumer but also captures their interest and potentially their business as well. In essence, copywriters are the storytellers of the business world, the ones that are given the task of creating a compelling and attractive story for the buyer.

See more on copywriters here at Career Explorer.

How to be Successful in Copywriting

Successful copywriters entail the following traits:

• Persuasive Storytelling– perhaps the most important aspect of a copywriter. It involves the ability to create a story with both compelling and persuasive methods of writing, all of which encourage the consumer to take action on the product described.

• Research and Analytical– able to research and analyze information to create an informed and accurate format for the consumer to take in.

• Adaptable– able to write for various formats and platforms regardless of topic or subject and can adjust their style accordingly.

• Strong Writing Ability– able to create clear, informed, concise, and engaging content with superb grammar and punctuation skills.

• Audience Understanding– able to analyze and empathize with consumers to tailor the content written for their wants and interests.

When is Copywriting Needed?

Copywriting is needed in almost all manners of business practice. It can be used for advertising in a TV commercial, print ads on billboards, websites, and other forms of business marketing and advertising. In general, it is needed when a business wants to promote its product and make it attractive while doing so.

More information about this can be found here.

How Popular Is Copywriting?

Copywriting is used in all forms of business practices, and that makes it viable in all business markets. If a product needs to be sold, a copywriter is needed to help encourage that sale. It is much the case in the present as it was in the past when this was first becoming a career in the marketing world.

Benefits of Copywriting

Much like its demand, a career in copywriting has a great plethora of benefits, including:

• Storytelling- the chance to create a prompt or story to help sell a product on the market.
• Income- Copywriters make a decent amount of money, with an annual income that can range anywhere from $49,000 – $120,000 depending on the company and location.
• Challenging Field- helps to challenge your skills in the field and offers improvement in such in the long run.
• Strong Audience Relationship- a copywriter can develop a bond with the consumer when writing about a product, one that serves to help them understand the audience better and learn more about what they want out of a product.

Conclusion

One of the keys to having a successful business is having a good story, and there are few out there in the world who can tell a better story than a copywriter. With persuasive techniques, audience understanding, and the need to tell an interesting and compelling story, copywriting is in many ways what helps a product be sold, and what helps a business make money.

The post Copywriting: What it Is and How it Relates to Business appeared first on iNet Ventures.

Some praise AI generators’ ability to create art that’s true to life while maintaining its own style, while others criticise the fact that AI art generators often use artists’ work as a basis and don’t credit them.

Whatever your personal opinion about AI art generators might be, the fact is that they’re almost certainly here to stay, and if you use them correctly, they can be very helpful in certain instances.

With that in mind, then, let’s take a look at the top AI art generators you can use in 2024!

DALL-E 2

Created by OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, DALL-E 2 is probably the best AI art generator out there right now.

It’s capable of generating some pretty accurate images based on simple or vague prompts, and it can also create some amazing psychedelic landscapes all of its own.

You’ll have to pay a premium if you want to avail yourself of DALL-E 2’s services, and the generator uses a credit system not unlike that of many stock image websites, so make sure to stock up if you’re looking to generate some art for yourself.

Bing Image Creator

Bing’s image creation service actually uses the same technology as DALL-E, so you’ll likely get similar results if you use it.

However, this option from Microsoft’s search engine is free to use, so you don’t need to pay anything to generate images. You will need a Microsoft account, though, so sign up for one if you haven’t already.

All you need is one or two words for your prompt, and Bing Image Creator will generate high-quality images based on what you’ve typed. Pretty impressive, right?

Craiyon

Unlike many of its competitors, Craiyon’s AI image generator is entirely free, and you don’t need to sign up for any kind of account to use it, either.

That lack of payment comes at a cost, though; Craiyon’s images are often slightly lower quality than those offered by DALL-E, for instance, and it takes longer to generate them as well.

If you’re willing to wait a little while and you don’t mind images that might not quite meet professional standards, then Craiyon is an excellent option.

NightCafe

NightCafe amalgamates several different AI art generation protocols, including DALL-E 2, Stable Diffusion, and Neural Style Transfer, so you should be able to find the one you want amongst its options.

Not only will you find a robust and useful AI art generator here, but you’ll also find an enthusiastic and active community of fellow AI art lovers.

That community comes complete with regular challenges, a Discord server, and a subreddit, so you’ll always have people to talk to about your creations (and theirs!).

Getty Generative AI

If you’ve ever engaged with stock image use on a commercial basis, there’s a very good chance you’ve heard of Getty Images; it’s arguably the premier stock image site.

It turns out that Getty also offers a generative AI experience that can help you create whatever image you like, and it’s trained on Getty’s extensive image database as well.

This one’s intended pretty much exclusively for businesses, so if you’re a personal user, this might not be the best option for you. Companies looking for good AI generation, however, should start here.

Midjourney

Right from the off, it’s clear that Midjourney is populated by a community of tech enthusiasts; its website’s ASCII-style introductory sequence demonstrates that perfectly.

Images generated by Midjourney are impressively abstract and artistic (should you want them to be; it’s also capable of generating more straightforward work), and they’re often indistinguishable from human art.

This service works via Discord, so you will need a Discord account if you want to get started on Midjourney. Once you’re there, though, it’s easy to use and intuitive enough.

Dream

Dream comes to you from “delight through AI” company Wombo. It’s a mobile app that’s available for both Android and iOS devices, and you can also integrate it with Discord.

Perhaps the biggest advantage of using Dream is the ability to choose from different styles; you can select from artistic aesthetics like comic book, ink, and abstract.

The art generated by Dream is high-quality, and although it can occasionally tend towards slightly uncanny, there’s bound to be something for you somewhere in the vast Dream AI art vaults.

Picsart

Picsart isn’t just an AI art generator; it’s also an image editor, allowing you to add various elements to the AI-generated images you create using the service.

These include text, effects, stickers, and even secondary image elements, so you can create some pretty impressive work without necessarily needing extensive image manipulation knowledge.

Picsart is free, but it will add a watermark to images you create unless you pay a premium, so you might want to spend a little in order to ensure your work is of the highest quality possible.

Shutterstock

Here’s another AI image generator that’s largely aimed at companies and professionals rather than personal users, although you can certainly give it a try if you’re just looking for something fun.

The service will generate images using DALL-E 2’s technology, and you can generate as many as you like for free. The catch, though, is that you need to pay to download them.

That makes Shutterstock’s service ideal if you’re already using Shutterstock for stock images and videos, but if you’re not, you may wish to look elsewhere.

Conclusion

In conclusion, AI art generators are changing the way we create images and art. With DALL-E 2 at the forefront of this technology, there are many other AI Art generators worth considering, as covered with the mentions above. Let your creativity run wild with this new technology. 

The post The Best AI Art Generators [2024] appeared first on iNet Ventures.

At that event, Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister of the UK, spoke to technology entrepreneur and tech billionaire Elon Musk, who’s often considered to be at the forefront of the AI revolution (in some respects, at least).

The two touched on a number of subjects pertaining to AI, but what did their conversation mean for AI and the wider world? What did they discuss, and what can we draw from it when it comes to AI?

Let’s take a look at the conversation held between Rishi Sunak and Elon Musk and what we might infer from this rather unusual interaction!

According to Elon Musk, AI will remove the need for work

One of Elon Musk’s biggest points during his conversation with Rishi Sunak pertained to what AI will mean for the world of work.

According to Musk, AI will eventually make paid work a thing of the past, which is something that many young professionals currently appear to be worried about.

Musk said that this will lead to challenges regarding “how…we find meaning in life”.

This is a common refrain that’s being repeated around the world when it comes to AI, and it’s an issue that many thinkers and tech influencers are concerned about as well.

AI could be a potential friend to humanity, says Musk

Amongst the doomsaying, though, there were some positive conclusions that could be drawn from the talk between Rishi Sunak and Elon Musk.

One of those conclusions is that AI could be a positive force for change when it comes to those who find it difficult to socialise.

Musk said that one of his sons “has trouble making friends”, although he didn’t specify which son he was referring to.

He then said that AI could be “great for [his son]” as a friend.

In addition, Musk pointed to the potentially positive applications of AI in a tutoring capacity, saying that it could act as “the best and most patient tutor” for kids.

Of course, as is often the case with Musk, the conversation generally took unknowns and potential outcomes into account rather than focusing on what’s happening right now.

Still, Musk clearly holds some degree of optimism towards the AI revolution, and although Rishi Sunak was ostensibly there to ask Musk questions about the tech industry and the impact of AI on the world, he seemed to share Musk’s optimism at times as well.

It’s hard to imagine Elon Musk took the talk seriously

Prior to the talk with Rishi Sunak, Elon Musk shared a rather irreverent meme on X (previously known as Twitter).

The meme takes the form of a political cartoon in which the UK, the US, the EU, and China are discussing the merits or drawbacks of AI.

All four of them seem to agree that AI presents a “catastrophic risk to humankind”, but they are all privately thinking that they cannot wait to be the first to develop said technology.

On the surface, this is a satirical dig at the AI Safety Summit itself, and it seems to suggest that Musk doesn’t exactly hold the Summit or its attendees in high esteem.

In addition, some of Musk’s remarks regarding the dangers of AI didn’t seem to be particularly considerate. 

He suggested that AI could lead to the development of humanoid robots that “can chase you anywhere”, which is a rather alarming statement.

Sunak, in response, told Musk he wasn’t “selling this”, perhaps in a semi-humorous way, but it’s hard to imagine that Musk was being anything other than facetious.

Not much of substance was actually decided

During Sunak and Musk’s talk, there was a lack of concrete decision-making regarding the kind of dangers AI could pose to those who use it.

The two discussed some of the potential applications of AI and some of the challenges that tech firms and innovators will face in its implementation, but they didn’t come to any serious conclusions about what that could mean for the UK’s political landscape or that of the wider world.

If you’re a critic of Musk’s, you’re probably not surprised by the idea that he could participate in a discussion and not actually reach any conclusions of lasting value or impact.

Rishi Sunak, however, also didn’t seem to want a discussion that led to real outcomes; instead, he seemed rather happy to simply discuss AI with Musk.

To some, it could indeed have appeared that Sunak was basking in Musk’s aura, and that Musk was the one who held the real power in the discussion. 

Conclusion: what does it mean?

In the grand scheme of things, this talk is, unfortunately, unlikely to result in anything serious changing in the world of AI.

To a cynic, this conversation could read as a back-slapping session between a Prime Minister who many say is on the way out and a tech entrepreneur who is arguably more powerful than many governments are.

To an optimist, however, it could read as Rishi Sunak reaching out in order to engage with professionals who are more knowledgeable than he is on certain subjects and touching base regarding AI.

One thing’s for sure: this debate isn’t going away, and it’s difficult to imagine how a conversation between these two men could really have arrived anywhere conclusive or decisive.

The post Elon Musk And Rishi Sunak’s AI Conversation: What Does It Mean? appeared first on iNet Ventures.

The experiment was initiated back in May, when Google also gave users the chance to sign up and test SGE out. It’s still in its experimental phase right now, but the project is constantly receiving new updates and additions.

In short, it’s fair to say that SGE is likely going to transform the world of search results. 

Google will prioritise different elements of the search experience, and the best practices that currently give websites more of an edge when it comes to being visible may not work anymore.

This is similar to what happens when Google rolls out core algorithm updates; website owners are often left scrambling to figure out just what they’re supposed to do in response.

So, with that in mind, what can you actually do to prepare for Google’s Search Generative Experience? Read on for some of our best tips and tricks on the subject!

We don’t actually know

This is perhaps not what you want to hear, but the simple truth is this: we don’t know what the best way to prepare for the Google SGE overhaul will be.

This is because there are a lot of unknowns right now; the project is in its early experimental phase, and it’s not clear how the majority of users will interface with the features that SGE will bring.

Additionally, current projections in terms of traffic loss or gain are wildly variable, and thus not helpful; we’ve seen all manner of seemingly knee-jerk reactions that prophesy both doom and rapture for websites after Google SGE hits.

The short version is that there is no single thing you can do to make sure you’re Google SGE-ready.

It’s a little like how it’s not possible to prepare for Google core algorithm updates; while you can implement best practices (more on which in a moment), you simply can’t know what’s going to change from update to update.

Similarly, until the SGE dust has settled and the feature has rolled out en masse, we can’t know how it’s going to affect websites or businesses.

Watching what happens elsewhere is key

Some people around the world will have more of an advantage when it comes to SGE than others.

This is because Google feature rollouts usually don’t occur globally in a simultaneous fashion; rather, features are introduced to different regions and different countries in a staggered way.

With that in mind, then, if your site is based outside the US – in Europe, for instance, or even in the UK – then you may wish to watch what happens in North America, because that’s likely to be where SGE is introduced first.

Keep an eye on your competitors and how their numbers are affected by SGE.

What’s changing? Which are the elements of their pages that are getting fewer views, and what are the commonalities between those pages?

This might sound like a slightly inexact science, and that’s largely because it is; as we’ve said, there’s no way to adequately prepare for SGE until we know exactly what it’s going to do to website rankings.

However, keeping an eye on what SGE does to its earliest “test subjects” will be of paramount importance when it comes to figuring out what to do for the rest of the world.

Don’t fall for SGE schemes

You might see websites and products out there which promote ways you can circumvent or prepare for SGE.

These products and sites might not be lying to you, but there’s a good chance they’re obfuscating or exaggerating the truth.

As we’ve said, we simply don’t think it’s possible to properly prepare for SGE, so if anyone is trying to sell you a product that claims to help you do that very thing, they might just be trying to take your money.

Closely research any scheme or product that promises to help you prepare for SGE and deal with its effects. Read into what that product’s functionality actually is and whether it will help you.

The chances are that you’ll find the product isn’t particularly helpful and is just trying to piggyback onto a trend in order to exploit webmasters’ understandable anxieties about what SGE might bring.

Work on optimising your site for best SEO practices

As ever, the best thing you can do when it comes to a new Google feature is simply to make sure that your website is the best version of itself it can possibly be.

We know this might sound like a little bit of a cop-out and that you might have been hoping to hear something more concrete, but the best thing you can do is to be helpful, authoritative, informative, and trustworthy.

If you are all of these things, then hopefully, SGE will enhance and augment your site’s traffic by pointing users to your platform.

If, however, you’ve been relying on shady or unscrupulous SEO tactics to drive traffic to your site, then you may find that SGE doesn’t prioritise you as a source, which could harm your traffic.

Of course, this may not turn out to be how SGE sifts through content. We simply can’t know until it’s out there in the world and performing as Google intends it to, which could take quite a while.

For now, though, the best thing you can do is write informative, worthwhile content that’s educational, well-sourced, and written primarily for humans. Everything else seems to be largely out of your hands, unfortunately.

The post How Can You Prepare For Google’s Search Generative Experience? appeared first on iNet Ventures.

Simply termed the “October 2023 core update”, the changes Google has actually made to its algorithm are somewhat unclear, as is always the case when it comes to core algorithm updates. 

The rollout began on October 5th, and Google says it may “take up to 2 weeks to complete”, so it might take a little while before you start seeing the update’s impact on your website’s metrics.

We’ve put together a guide on what we know about the Google October 2023 core algorithm update and what your site can do to adjust to it.

What is the October 2023 core algorithm update?

As ever, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what has changed when it comes to the October 2023 Google core algorithm update.

The search status dashboard for the update doesn’t give any more information, either, merely pointing users towards Google’s guidelines when it comes to the regular core updates that are part of the search engine’s DNA.

Said guidelines can, however, give us some useful information about what we should expect from core updates. 

According to those guidelines, Google’s core updates represent “significant, broad changes to [its] search algorithms and systems”.

These updates are designed, Google says, to aid in its mission of presenting “helpful and reliable results for searchers”.

Google says that you should think of core updates as akin to updating a list of the 100 best movies; if you make that list in 2021, then revise it in 2024, the list is naturally going to be different as some entries depart and others join.

Core updates are similar; Google says that the updates are designed to help sites that deserve to rank more highly to do so, meaning that even pages that are performing well may find themselves performing less well as deserving sites get shunted up the list, so to speak.

Will your site be affected?

It’s very hard to say with absolute certainty whether your site will be affected by the Google October 2023 core algorithm update.

Some website owners appear to have seen significant changes with regards to their numbers. Some are celebrating higher traffic, while others appear to have been hit hard by the change.

Since Google doesn’t reveal its specific update criteria (and with good reason, since sites could then use those criteria to game the system), it’s not easy to know how to adapt to any potential change, either.

However, there are some things you can do to try and get to the bottom of why your site might have been hit by the algorithm update, as well as to diagnose potential solutions.

Try and see which pages have been hit the hardest by the update. Is there a specific pattern you’re noticing with those pages? Do they pertain to a certain subject, for instance, or do they all evidence a particular writing style?

By figuring out which of your pages appear to be performing worse after the update, you can try and make positive changes to your site to recover your metrics, although you should bear in mind that these efforts aren’t guaranteed to result in an uptick for you.

What can you do to prepare for algorithm updates?

While you can’t know exactly when an algorithm update is coming or what it will do for your site, there are some things you can do in order to prepare for future algorithm updates.

Here are some of the website best practices we’ve identified when it comes to making sure your site is Google core algorithm update-proof (to the extent it can be).

• Ensure your content is helpful. First and foremost, Google’s core algorithm updates are, the company says, designed to ensure that helpful content is seen by the people who need it. As such, you should make sure that the content you’re creating is, in fact, helpful to people, and doesn’t just exist to fulfil a niche or to target a specific SEO term because you think it’ll get clicks.
• Write content for humans. It’s not a good idea to try and construct your content to maximise SEO appeal, because that will make it less helpful. Think about who you want to read your content and write it for them. This will help you to appear more trustworthy and authoritative, which are also important metrics by which Google judges the suitability of content for its search engine algorithm.
• Demonstrate authority. If you can show that the people writing your content are authorities in their field, then you should stand a better chance of being largely unaffected by core algorithm updates. Demonstrating authority involves displaying clear, prominent profile pages with author bylines on them, as well as plenty of links to that author’s previous work.
• Stay within your niche. The worst thing you can do is to try and branch out into a niche in which you have demonstrated no authority or expertise. A movie website, for instance, shouldn’t suddenly start talking about cooking (unless, of course, relevance to movies can be demonstrated). Google doesn’t like SEO dilettantism, so whoever your site is aimed at, make sure you’re principally writing content for that audience.
• Try not to feel victimised. When an update does negatively impact your traffic, as Google points out in its guidelines, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve violated Google’s guidelines. It could simply mean that a deserving website is taking its rightful place in Google’s rankings, and that necessarily means existing sites might suffer. You might not need to change anything; just keep doing what you’re doing and things might level out in the long run.

The post What Is The New Google October 2023 Core Algorithm Update? appeared first on iNet Ventures.