Google E-A-T Explained: What It Is and How To Improve Your Ranking Scores
There has always been a lot of speculation about E-A-T. Especially since back in 2018, when everyone was scrambling to get information about SEO blogs and E-A-T scores and how everything came together. But today we’re going to put all speculation to rest, once and for all.
What is Google E-A-T?
First of all, E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. And contrary to what many think, it is not an update or an algorithm but a principle. It was introduced in Google’s Search Quality Rating Guidelines as an extremely important rating factor for employees.
Google had been planning to come up with a concept to judge websites and content expertise and authority for quite some time. A proof of this fact is clearly evidenced by the introduction of rel=author tag that was later dropped in 2014.
When it comes to getting understanding of this concept, all digital marketers need to understand that Google wouldn’t publicly disclose how the algorithms work. However, it is possible to make educated guesses and study various case studies to get a better hang of it.
Is E-A-T a Google Ranking Factor?
While Google has no inherent E-A-T scoring metric, it is still important to to increase E-A-T. There isn’t one specific algorithm that focuses on maintaining the E-A-T. Multiple algorithms track and assess expertise, authority, and trust of pages, websites, and authors.
There are several factors that affect the E-A-T and can help in improving it. We have mentioned several ways in the section after next. Now coming back to the significance of E-A-T, another evidence in its favor is how much space is given to them in the Search Quality Rater Guidelines.
So while these factors might not have a direct impact, they do keep a tab on how well the algorithms are doing their job. This means that E-A-T is an important factor.
How does Google determine the E-A-T of a Page?
Look at it this way, If your accountant lacks expertise, authority and trust, you’re likely to look around for an alternative. It’s the same with Google’s users. So if the search engine comes across a domain or page that lacks expertise, authority and trust, they’ll look around for an alternative.
Different Ways in Which You Can Improve Your E-A-T Scores
The various ways in which E-A-T can be increased have been given below:
1. Include Author Byline
When trying to build trust in a website, it is imperative to know who is writing the content you’re reading. For bloggers especially, you should have an author name and byline at the top of each post, and a longer author bio at the bottom of every post.
It’s easy enough to set these up that it should be no problem to maintain, even if you have authors who come and go.
2. Maintain an ‘About’ Section
Many don’t give it the credit its due but having an about section on websites is important to build credibility and transparency. Google needs to know about the company and its inner workings and goals to deem it worthy.
The About section can have all this information and so much more information that can help in establishing its presence on the web.
3. Create a Trustworthy Brand
Perhaps the number one thing to do with a site you want to establish as an authority is focus on establishing a brand. Make a logo for yourself. Further, certificates, like those provided by Trusted Shops, can increase user trust in a website.
Even the little things such as picking a color scheme, trying to format icons and logos around it, establishing a graphical style for your images and ensuring the writing on your site is consistent in terms of tone and voice, everything plays a part.
4. Have SSL on Your Website
SSL is a security method you can use to boost trust for your site. While it’s also a minor element in modern SEO, it helps users of browsers like Chrome trust your site more and helps in making it more secure.
5. Write for Other Sites in Your Niche
Backlinks build a sense of trust in a website. Greater the number of backlinks, the better it is for a website and its rankings. So write for other sites in your niche. The better the site, the more trust you establish in writing for it.
This is because if you’re not a trustworthy or relevant person, why would they let you write for their site?
6. Work on Creating Original Content
Original content still reigns supreme in terms of ranking high on Google. As when you publish quality and original content, it will prompt users to re-visit your site. Also, not to forget that Google goes through each and every post.
It will judge if your content is not original or just copied from some other site. If this is the case, there is a high probability that you may get badly hit by an algorithm update.
7. Be Active on Social Media
You might be wondering that there is no correlation between improving E-A-T scores and social media. But it is all interconnected. Being active on social media and sharing quality content with the audience can create trust amongst users.
Is Google E-A-T SEO Relevant only for YMYL pages?
YMYL websites (Your Money or Your Life) are those websites and businesses that can significantly influence either your life or your wallet. Some examples of these are:
- Online shopping
- Finance
- Legal Advice
- News
… and so on.
So there is no question of whether you need to consider E-A-T for YMYL websites or pages and even in case of SEO scores. You need to keep working on constantly increasing authoritativeness of your website.
Conclusion
We hope that this article has helped you in understanding E-A-T a bit better and are now aware of certain ways that can help you in increasing your E-A-T score. But do remember, these tips can’t work as one-time strategies. You have to constantly keep up your good work.
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