Every year, Google changes its search algorithm hundreds of times—and 2018 was no different. As a business owner, knowing when these updates happen (and what they mean for your website) can help explain changes in your website’s rankings and organic traffic, as well as provide insights into how to improve your search engine optimization.
While many of these changes are less significant to how you operate day-to-day, there are some major updates that can impact your search engine results. Here are just a few of the Google algorithm updates that had the biggest impact on search in 2018:
Mobile-First Index Update
In March 2018, Google announced that it would begin favoring the mobile version of your website as the default for determining rankings in search results. Before architects mailing list that, crawling, indexing, and ranking typically came from the desktop version of your site. Now, mobile-first indexing means that Google will push the mobile version of any website to the top of the indexing process, including yours. If you don’t have a mobile-optimized website, now is the time to start planning to upgrade.
Page Speed Update
In July 2018, page speed became a factor in mobile search rankings – something Google has been promising for years. In the past, speed was primarily considered for desktop rankings, but with more and more users relying on their mobile devices to search for information, it’s clear that attention needs to be paid to mobile rankings as well.
The bad news is that the average website still takes about 15 seconds to load, according to Google's analysis, but 53% of mobile site visitors will abandon a page that takes more than three seconds to load.
To ensure your mobile site speed is on par with Google, your website redesign plan should reduce redirects, compress images, and always use page caching. Additionally, work with a web design company that will take the time to compress your HTML, JavaScript (JS), and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) files whenever and wherever possible.
While it’s not yet clear how this will affect desktop rankings, now is a great time to evaluate page load times for all users. And remember that in order to meet user needs, relevant content is still important and will continue to be highly rated regardless of your mobile page speed. In other words, don’t jump from one to the other.
Medic Update
This August 2018 update was a core search algorithm update, meaning Google changed the overall structure of how content is ranked in search results. While websites were affected by this update, there were significant changes to health, medical, and fitness sites — hence the name “Medic Update,” coined by a technology leader and publisher. But don’t let the name fool you: A large swath of the internet, including “ecommerce, insurance, finance, B2B, entertainment,” and other sites, were also affected.
Whatever you want to call it, the best way to overcome this update is to provide relevant content on your website that proves that you are a trusted authority in your field. By doing so, you will build and maintain a credible reputation on the critical issues that matter to your audience. Never underestimate the value of quality content, clean visuals, useful external links to trusted sources, and clear calls to action for your website visitors.
The internet is always evolving and it can be difficult to keep up with what changes will directly impact your website and business. At Dheegital, we focus on building visibility for your business and know when updates need to be made to continue helping you optimize your web presence. Our team of search engine optimization experts stays on top of trends and how they apply to our clients to ensure you have nothing to worry about. Please contact us to learn more.