Here are our insights and experiences in trying to recover Ready Steady Cut from a Google search update for over a year, with comments from other publishers dealing with similar struggles.
On September 28th, 2023, something happened to our website, Ready Steady Cut. I knew what had happened was unprecedented, but I did not realize then that I was involved in an extinction event for small businesses and web publishers by Google.
The site’s traffic took a sudden nosedive, plummeting by 50% in a development that blindsided the organization. We had noticed that our usual evening traffic was now similar to the daytime, a stark deviation from our typical pattern of higher traffic in the evenings when our USA audience is active (we are based in the UK).
For the next 12 months, Ready Steady Cut experienced a staggered decrease in traffic, month on month. It was a slow, painful car crash that felt doomful.
Ready Steady Cut is an independent website that has been a key player in the entertainment and streaming scene since 2017. It provides expert-driven analysis of Film and TV and is site-wide approved by Rotten Tomatoes.
In one pivotal evening, it shifted from a fully operational web publisher with approximately 20 writers to a team of none. Ready Steady Cut is now operating based on its financial resources, but the impact of Google’s abusive algorithms is evident.
On the current trend, Ready Steady Cut will not be able to operate financially by the end of 2024.
Here’s a personal anecdote: I’ve reached a natural endpoint in navigating this world; I was never an SEO. I was a young man who loved Film and TV, and through experience and education, I built a website that grew due to its evident expertise. We never tried to create a web publisher. We grew naturally because we were doing things right, unintentionally or not.
? It looks like @ReadySteadyCut will not be recovering from the Google August Core Update. It’s unlikely it will ever recover. This was hit by the 2023 Sept HCU and @googlesearchc @searchliaison have still not given any indication as to why they’ve wiped away so many legitimate…
— Daniel Hart (@Okayy_Dan) August 19, 2024
Because I’ve reached the endpoint with this world and Google’s algorithms, I’ve provided a final chapter highlighting the last 12 brutal months. Again, a reminder: I’m not an SEO or an expert in search algorithms. However, my experiences since September 2023 have been deeply concerning.
I must warn you that this article is long, but to be fair, it’s been a long 12 months. I’ve provided a table of contents so you can read whatever parts you want. I’d also like to thank HouseFresh, Gamer Guides, and FilterGrade for their support.
Table of Contents
Two High School Friends Made Their Passion For Film and TV Into A Business
I will not bore you with the entire history of Ready Steady Cut, but I will provide a summary for context.
Our website was not born from the profession of SEO or with a business in mind. By fate, two high school friends made Ready Steady Cut the website it is today.
Readers may be shocked to learn that it started as a podcast in 2016. Initially, the brand name was FilminkOfficial.
At the time, the website was a free WordPress blog, so after deliberating over a new name, we changed the domain name—Ready Steady Cut was born.
But it was only a hobbyist website. It was an excellent excuse to make frequent trips to the cinema and have a good rant on the website and the podcast.
And then, one day in 2017, everything changed. I could not be bothered going to the cinema and felt guilty for not having anything to contribute to the website. So, instead, I tried a different tactic. I opened up Netflix and checked out what was new that day. There was one movie called #RealityHigh—a standard teen drama that was average at best.
However, when we published the review for this movie, we noticed that the traffic was far different. We found our market – entertainment coverage for streaming services.
From 2017, our website grew annually. However, even with success, initially, we did not want to build a business. We just loved finding a market that interests us—we love film and TV. Eventually, we gained press access from Netflix and other platforms, and writers wanted to voluntarily contribute due to our brand and growing reputation.
In 2020, we realized that the website had become a web publisher. We had to take it seriously, so we did what anyone would—we set up a company and hired entertainment and freelance critics and writers. Our hobbies and interests became dreams. Our expertise became careers.
We carried on this trajectory, building the site brick by brick and increasing our influence in the space, but then, on September 28th, 2023, everything we worked hard for, some unintentionally and some intentionally, was wiped out overnight. Google suddenly decided we no longer had a chance in this space. All the ideas we had to grow the site in various ways were folded overnight.
Being shocked would be an understatement. We were floored. Little did I know that this was not a unique scenario. Google is known for sinking businesses, as the BBC recently reported on October 27th, 2024, documenting the long-running legal battle between Google and Foundem:
They didn’t know it at the time but that day, and those that followed, would mark the beginning of the end for their company.
Foundem had been hit by a Google search penalty, prompted by one of the search engine’s automatic spam filters. It pushed the website way down the lists of search results for relevant queries like “price comparison” and “comparison shopping”.
Back in May 2024, the BBC interviewed Ready Steady Cut and several other websites about Google’s extinction event of small and independent businesses that started in 2023:
A number of website owners and search experts who spoke to the BBC said there’s been a general shift in Google results towards websites with big established brands, and away from small and independent sites, that seems totally disconnected from the quality of the content.
The Reality Of Being Destroyed By Google Overnight
To make this short and sweet, here is our current status. I’ve also highlighted the algorithms in the second screenshot to show evidence that Ready Steady Cut was hit by the “Helpful Content Update (HCU)” of September 2023. I used the tool “Panguin” to help assist with this:
The graph shows Ready Steady Cut’s traffic aggressively declining between late 2023 and 2024.
The graph shows Ready Steady Cut’s Traffic alongside Google’s Algorithm Updates.
Ready Steady Cut was hit in a single night, and traffic declined month by month. As many other web publishers have reported, it feels like Google is slowly draining businesses or wiping them out instantly.
To give context as to what the traffic drop means, here is a breakdown for Ready Steady Cut:
- Writing Team Laid Off—Overnight, we had to cut wages for our writing team immediately and, eventually, let them all go.
- Revenue Destroyed—Ready Steady Cut was a $400-500k revenue per year site (and growing). This revenue estimate was wiped overnight, leaving us in a dire financial situation.
- Operational Risks—The management (financial and resource) was at high risk overnight. By the end of 2024, Ready Steady Cut may not be able to operate financially.
This is the dire reality of when Google, the biggest door to the internet, decides to pull your website overnight, with no warning or advice to aid recovery, leaving us feeling utterly helpless.
Another reality: The “September 2023 Helpful Content Update” applies to a particular category of websites. For a reason only known to the company’s higher-ups, Google does not want small, expert-driven websites to recover.
The $20,360 Recovery Plan Outlined by an SEO Agency
Okay, so now that I’ve established the shock of being hit, the immediate risks, and the ominous signs, I will detail what was naturally next:
“How do you recover a website like Ready Steady Cut?”
Once we understood that Google would not reverse course, I decided to lunge into action.
We already had an SEO and Development partner. However, due to the severity of our situation, we felt it was wise to seek as many opinions as possible and implement a two-pronged approach. I agreed to an HCU audit with another SEO agency after seeing their marketing on social media regarding the recent algorithm releases.
From the audit, we were provided a “Recommended Roadmap for Recovery” plan. The plan gave us 12 steps. We have actioned and progressed each step on the website in the last 12 months. For context, we dealt with a lot of these issues very quickly:
Step 1 – Patterns
“Reduce RSC’s reliance on patterned headlines in favor of natural subject-verb-object structure.”
The agency recognized that our website had similar titles that could be identified as “exploiting headline patterns” for high search volume. In reality, this was not the case.
Examples were movie lists and TV series renewal posts, a natural extension of our coverage.
However, we took the advice and ensured we did not have a repetitive headline pattern structure.
Step 2 – Questions
“Reduce distance to answer on who/what/when headline stories; avoid superfluous content.”
This relates to “intent,” ensuring that all our articles reduce the distance to the answer.
For example, if we were explaining the end of a movie, we would be advised to explain it sooner in the article.
Of course, we applied this naturally rather than optimizing it. A site like ours requires natural analysis and writing.
Step 3 – Sourcing
“Add value to content copied from non-RSC sources; cite IMDB and other sources when used.”
This is related to when we wrote lists and used plot synopses from other websites. We immediately implemented this.
Step 4 – AI Content
“Disclose or cease production of AI-assisted content.”
We do not use AI content, but we spot-checked our content following this advice.
Step 5 – Ads
“Decrease reliance on intrusive interstitials and pop-ups.”
This was an obvious one, but we did decrease this.
Step 6 – Schema
“Switch “aggregateRating” schema for “reviewRating.”
We were using the wrong schema in the reviews. The schema applied is intended for retailers and collecting reviews from verified buyers who have reviewed an item.
We changed this over to “reviewRating.”
Step 7 – Purpose
“Topic authority ranges from entertainment to true crime; keying in on entertainment may improve performance.”
This is about content that appears misaligned with the website. True crime was a natural extension of our coverage, especially when we reviewed a true crime series. However, we took the advice and stopped doing true crime features unrelated to a movie or TV show.
Step 8 – Image
“Stock images could be swapped with original images.”
This is a problematic implementation because we have to use images from the films and TV shows we watch. We do know that some organizations “cheat code” a process to make their images appear “original.”
However, the best workaround was to ensure every image was credited.
Step 9 – E-E-A-T
“Improve E-E-A-T of real author biographies; discontinue use of non-human authors and images.”
Some of our author’s bylines and pages were empty with no images. We immediately put together a project to update them all by December 2023.
Step 10 – Staging
“Noindex the staging subdomain of the website.”
This was an immediate fix.
Step 11 – Helpfulness
“Further investigate the helpfulness of the Discovery Tool.”
In September 2023, our website had a “where to watch” tool that guided readers on where they could watch any film or TV show. This was not an affiliate, nor was any revenue made from it (zero ads). However, as explained in the audit:
“The bulk of site content appears to exist to drive visitors to the “Discovery Tool” through in-text calls-to-action. When visitors self-insert their country and program of choice, they are brought to a plethora of links that only lead to Google SERPs, or back to more ad-dense, often unrelated content. Considering the visitors arrived from Google, there is nothing preventing them from simply Googling “[show] + where to watch” (Google handles geolocation). Therefore, this feature could be seen as unhelpful. The site appears to prioritize monetization over providing helpful content, which could appear as deceiving or untrustworthy, diminishing its appeal.”
By 2024, this tool was deleted, and the subdomain was deindexed and decommissioned.
Step 12 – Hreflang
“Reduce share of duplicate content with Hreflang tags.”
This was about our Discovery Tool above, so it was no longer an issue after removing it.
Ready Steady Cut’s Discovery Tool UK version vs. US version.
It took little time to deal with the issues that the agency raised in the audit. Anything related to content, i.e., patterns and questions, has been cleaned incrementally over time, and our editorial process has evolved since.
Twelve months later, there has yet to be a single uplift despite further algorithm releases.
The cost of the HCU audit was $3,000.
As the audit hinted, there was a problem with content that Google apparently did not like, so after the audit, we proceeded to do “content audits” with the same agency. The other agency also gave us the same advice. The purpose of a content audit is to either:
- Sunset content
- Improve content
- Consolidate or redirect content
The first content audit combined the data set and focused on the metrics of:
- GSC Clicks
- GSC Impressions
- Google Analytics Sessions
- Backlinks
The second content audit focused on a similar data set but looked at:
- Winners
- Losers
- Lowest Articles
From here, we could identify further sunsetting or improvements and recognize patterns.
We agreed with the agency that our episode release date articles were problematic due to the “Headline Patterns” and that they only get clicks for a maximum of a week.
To solve this issue, we redirected all episode release date articles to their relevant episode recap.
Many websites still publish articles with repetitive headlines on episode release dates.
Episode release date article on Filmibeat.com
We then received our third content audit, which focused on similar metrics, but this time, inlinks, backlinks, and referrals were highly considered.
We carried out three content audits in four months for $7,500.
The famous Google March Core Update was released on March 5th, 2024, baking in the Helpful Content Update, which coincided with the final content audit. March 5th was the last time Ready Steady Cut and this agency worked on recovery.
After the March 2024 core update, many SEO agencies decided to stop offering HCU audits. There was an acceptance from many firms in early 2024 that the chances of recovery from the Helpful Content Update were extremely low.
The result of our audit also extended to other work with our SEO and Development Partner at the time.
After September 2023, we carried out technical work with them to improve aspects of the website that tie in with the HCU audit and general improvements. Here is the list of work carried out:
- Configuration of images to WebP.
- Switched “aggregateRating” schema for “reviewRating.”
- Noindexed the staging subdomain of the website.
- Removed containers for Newsletter Sign-Ups and Discovery Tool within content.
- “Published” and “Last Updated” presentations were implemented in the articles.
- Implemented stylish headings and table of contents options.
- Improved the block quote styling.
- Discovery Tool deleted and decommissioned.
- Ensured “410s” redirect pages to say “410” rather than “404”.
- Author bio bylines are implemented at the end of articles.
- Author profiles improved to show the number of articles per author.
- The Meet the Team page has changed to populate short bios and the latest photos.
- Implemented code for new comments section solution.
The total costs of technical work carried out between September 2023 and November 2023: $9,860
The total costs for recovery efforts between both agencies combined: $20,360
Google Is The Problem – Here’s Why
So, what was my point in sharing the audit results, the work carried out, and the costs?
It’s not that I believe the work was wrong. I think the direction of work has a measured and proven methodology behind it.
I believe that SEOs have been let down, resulting in them having plenty of clients they can now not recover. Genuine SEOs want success for their clients.
Search and marketing professionals had every reason to trust the information provided to them. After all, Google has been the undisputed staple search engine in our lives. If there’s any algorithm information that should be trusted, it’s Google’s, right?
Unfortunately, there’s a problem with this idea because…
…Google is the problem.
And because of this, there’s a vast disconnect between SEOs <> Small and Independent Websites <> Google Search.
Let’s share Google’s guidance introduction around helpful content for users:
“Google’s automated ranking systems are designed to present helpful, reliable information that’s primarily created to benefit people, not to gain search engine rankings, in the top Search results.”
Google also provides some key areas. Here are a few:
- Self-assess your content.
- Provide a great page experience.
- Focus on people-first content.
- Avoid creating search engine-first content.
To look at this sensibly, you must pretend that Google’s “helpful content” guidance is a workable thesis. This means there’s something to aim for.
One of the first things I did when Ready Steady Cut was obliterated was look at websites above us in rankings to see what they were doing.
I’m not going to give hundreds of examples—I could show examples all day—but I’ll provide two defining examples to prove that something is not aligning with the algorithms that Google claims to present to the world.
Here is an example of a search term. This scenario happens frequently and proves that “focus on people-first content” and “avoid creating search engine-first content” are dubious instructions from Google that SEOs and website owners have taken seriously.
Search term: “Doctor Climax Season 2” (searches done on October 1st, 2024):
For context, Season 1 of Doctor Climax has been released. Due to the storyline, it’s very unlikely that Season 2 will be released; however, readers were curious anyway.
The first available article is from The Feast of Legends (they have since deleted it), which frequently ranks above us. Remember our audit? Avoid superfluous content. Reduce the distance to answer.
Well, this website is a defining example of writing for search engines. Eventually, they answer the question with over-optimized headings and written content that does not make sense:
An excerpt from The Feast of Legend’s article on ‘Doctor Climax’ Season 2, which has since been deleted.
This is, frankly, nonsense. It’s word-filling simply to get a search engine position. “Yet chances are that it might happen soon.” What does that even mean? The website aimed for the keywords but not for the benefit of the people.
And then, further down:
Another excerpt from The Feast of Legend’s article on ‘Doctor Climax’ Season 2, which has since been deleted.
They needed to find a way of putting “release date” and “Doctor Climax Season 2” in the same sentence. Why? To get a search engine position. “It might be probably be released next year or by the early months of 2026.” This sentence does not make sense in context or how it is worded.
But is this a one-off? Because I know that would be the next question. Well, another website that ranks well for this is ComingSoon.
Like The Feast of Legends, this is another website that produces content at scale, purely for search engines, and it works. There is no intention to make this content “helpful” or insightful for their readers.
Let’s start with the title of their article:
ComingSoon’s titling for ‘Doctor Climax’ Season 2.
“Will there be”, “Release Date”, “Is It Coming Out” – a title that does not make sense. Why? Because they are gaming the system. A system that claims they do not want “search engine content but people-first content.”
Here is a heading and its subsequent paragraph in the same article:
ComingSoon’s heading and excerpt from their ‘Doctor Climax’ Season 2 article.
This website really wants to rank for “Doctor Climax Season 2 Release Date”.
Okay, next question: what else ranks for this search term? Well, here we go:
Search results for ‘Doctor Climax’ Season 2.
Surprisingly, our Reddit Community and X account that posted this article rank above our article, the original source. This has nothing to do with “helpfulness.” It’s logically impossible for the tweet promoting the article and a Reddit thread linking to it in OUR own community to be more helpful than the actual article.
This was a “Big Brand Update,” not a Helpful Content Update.
Here is a snippet from our actual article where we breakdown some facts:
Season 1 of the show did make Netflix’s Non-English Top 10 in 5 markets — Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, and, of course, Thailand. But these aren’t huge markets, and even in them it only clung on for a single week, aside from in Thailand, where it managed two. This isn’t the kind of success that would move the needle for an industry-leading platform like Netflix.
This general lack of interest was reflected in critics. At the time of writing the show doesn’t have enough reviews for a Rotten Tomatoes score. It only picked up 232 user ratings on IMDb.
For what it’s worth, we were complimentary of Doctor Climax in our review, but we had our reservations, and it seems the other outlets who bothered to cover it felt the same. Again, this isn’t the kind of reception that’s going to justify a renewal.
Our article writes for the reader by providing an expert opinion, watch-hour statistics (with a source included), and critic/audience conclusions to provide a holistic and conclusive view that Season 2 will not happen.
I have spent months highlighting this problem in various posts and conversations with SEO professionals, but the disconnect exists: it’s difficult to see search-engine-created articles when you are not an entertainment expert.
I’ve decided to start a regular thread of Google searches that miss the intent or do not make sense when looking at terms competing with @ReadySteadyCut.
This is at least to raise awareness even if it does not change anything.
Cc: @searchliaison
— Daniel Hart (@Okayy_Dan) June 30, 2024
In Terms Of Quality In Search Results, There’s Nothing To Aim For Anymore
A defining example of the problem with Google is SportsKeeda, a massive entertainment and sports website based in India, which does SEO-driven content on an incredible scale. They do not aim for helpful content; they scale by writing for SEO, and you can see it in their titling.
Remember our audit? “Reduce RSC’s reliance on patterned headlines in favor of natural subject-verb-object structure.”
SportsKeeda performs these titling practices at mass. “Worth watching?” combined with “[streaming service]” are commonly used search terms in keyword research, and they know exactly what they are doing.
Yes, I know what the response to this will be, and I’ve heard it frequently: “These sites have been around for a long time and have earned their place by gaining a high domain authority and producing quality content over time.”
I do not buy this anymore. Why? If this were the case, the current state of SERPs would show something to aim for. Meritocracy does not exist, and good content is not rewarded.
There is nothing to aim for anymore.
You rise to the top of YouTube if you are a genuinely good YouTuber. If you are good at short video formats, you gain attention on TikTok. If you have a voice worth listening to, you gain more impressions on X.
I have not seen anything in the last 12 months suggesting that Google is providing a similar philosophy.
The “Helpfulness” metrics are now baked into the Core Updates, and it’s becoming the opposite of a meritocracy for millions of websites—a plutocracy driven by monopolistic practices.
The Reddit AI Deal that suddenly made the platform the biggest beneficiary of Google was done in broad daylight, masked by the “apparent” Hidden Gems algorithm.
Reddit was a massive transfer of wealth.
The evidence is what you see – if Google sincerely believed that the direction was not in their business interests, they’d change it- just as Danny Sullivan (Google’s Search Liaison Rep) said about the potential Site Reputation Abuse algorithm in an interview with highly respected Search Journalist Barry Schwartz:
An excerpt from Search Liaison’s Danny Sullivan in an interview with Barry Schwartz about the mythical Site Reputation Abuse Algorithm (Credit – SEO Roundtable).
“The reason we probably won’t have it any time in the near future is because we wouldn’t be exceedingly careful and, and thoughtful in how we do it.”
This can be easily translated: if it harms the plutocracy, the Google Search team has careful considerations. They had no careful considerations when alarms were raised after September 2023, when they had the chance to reverse course.
Google claims that websites need to build a brand first to excel with the algorithms again, which Nate Hake, the CEO and Founder of Travel Lemming, said on X that this is not particularly helpful:
“The main advice given here is still basically “build a brand” and “make helpful content” Neither of which, IMHO, is particularly helpful advice for small publishers.
Building a brand” sounds nice, but isn’t practical for many verticals or types of sites. People can only recall so many brands, so there will always be a bigger brand than you. When “brand recognition” is a deciding factor, it inevitably leads to consolidation among a few players. And it leaves little room for new upstarts.
Regarding the “make helpful content” advice — even if that is what Google is rewarding (it’s not), the bigger problem is Google’s approach to AI has totally killed the incentive to put real effort into content.
Why pour your heart and resources into something that’s just going to be immediately stolen, spun, and regurgitated by a bigger brand — or, worse, by Google’s own AIOs and SERP features (like “from sources around the web”)?
The fundamental tension here is that Google wants small publishers to keep publishing because its needs food for its AI to train on.
But Google’s leadership is not interested in compensating small publishers enough to justify the level of effort that it requires to produce this kind of content
The result is the ecosystem we currently have — where big sites like Forbes and CNN squeeze their brand for every penny it’s worth, while the small creators that actually put in effort can read the writing on the wall and slowly close up shop.
Google either believes that its algorithms are going in the right direction, so the collateral damage is intentional, or its algorithms are broken, and instead of being transparent, it is becoming an unnecessary ideological debate between itself, SEOs, and website owners.
Small publishers, often overlooked, are the backbone of the digital ecosystem, yet they bear the brunt of Google’s algorithm changes.
Small publishers are the meat for their benefactors to chew on.
A final, almost humorous example of when I became alarmed and changed my stance on the whole ordeal is Danny Sullivan’s debate on X about the “recovery times” for an HCU-hit site.
At a conference, he was heard saying it can take a “couple” of weeks to recover from the Helpful Content Update. The result of this? Denying that “couple” means “two,” and a lot of ironic, superfluous fluff afterward:
Danny Sullivan’s comments on HCU recovery times on X.
After ramblings about what “couple” means (it means two, by the way), Danny Sullivan did give a possible recovery time:
“It’s possible that after a couple of weeks, that could happen (where couple of weeks to me is more than two, though I know some might think that means exactly two. But I didn’t mean it as two, otherwise I would have said two). “Couple of weeks” to me in the context of all this was meant several. And I’m pretty sure I didn’t say it would happen in even that short of a period — only that it was possible.
With that context, I should have said it might take several weeks to several months or just several months. Apologies for that. But also, I’m pretty sure I mentioned our documentation to all the attendees at that event I was at. Anyone who wants to understand the helpful content system, that’s what the documentation is for.”
It’s been over a year, and not one documented recovery from the Helpful Content Update from September 2023 is evidenced or proven. SEO agencies/consultants have shut shop in offering audits subject to that algorithm.
Of course, I am jesting when it comes to the “couple” and “two” exchange. I understand that language can, sometimes, be difficult especially when communicating with the masses. The point here is, that communication between small-to-medium businesses and Google is not at its best, at present.
Also, this does prove that if Google really wanted to, they could reverse course on sites hit by the Sept 23 HCU. They just don’t want to. https://t.co/slQRAhM8bx
— Daniel Hart (@Okayy_Dan) September 30, 2024
My Open Letter To Google – Please Stop This And Stick To A Fair Ecosystem
Here is my open letter to Google:
As users and readers, we share a common experience. Most of us rely on Google Maps, Gmail, and Search in our daily lives. This shared trust is what allows us to casually say ‘Okay, Google’ in front of our loved ones.
However, with its immense wealth and power, it seems that Google has lost sight of the internet’s original purpose of being a cool, trustworthy, and diverse space.
Here is my final plea to Google: Please recognize small, independent businesses and creators. Take our concerns seriously. Remember that we are users, too. Reverse punitive actions against us and provide clear data-led advice so we can future-proof our businesses.
Whether the algorithm is broken or functioning as intended, the goal remains the same: restore a sense of order and familiarity to the search ecosystem. It’s time to make search sensible and recognizable again for the benefit of all users and businesses.
Whether the Helpful Content Update or past and present Core Updates harmed us, we must stop this vicious cycle and create paths for a better future.
I would also hope that more search and marketing professionals take a stance to make positive, transparent changes for the future of the internet. With the antitrust cases mounting against Google, it’s time to be on the right side of history. Whether AI is our future or not, we need to do better.
The Future Is Bleak, But We Must Not Give Up On Independent Voices
I highly doubt Google will reverse course. Ready Steady Cut is now a science experiment. We continue to make technical changes and create high-quality, helpful, people-first-driven content to prove that Google’s guidance on the algorithm does not ring true and has become abusive.
The longer we continue this science experiment, the more we can prove the thesis of collateral damage or a broken algorithm and advocate for businesses in any vertical or industry.
Thankfully, in the last 12 months, we have taken further advice from earnest, good SEOs who can see the gaping hole in the search ecosystem.
But I’ve also been motivated and encouraged by the resilience and strength of site owners and small independent businesses, who are willing to speak up and keep the conversation alive on social media. I do believe that Google sees this. A resounding example is the website HouseFresh, which was hampered by Google’s algorithms but has since seen some light at the end of the tunnel in organic search while pivoting to other forms of media, like its YouTube channel.
They have recently published an article guiding users to help them find the best information on Google search, which is an indictment of how bad things have gotten. Here’s what their article says at the start, which articulates the problem perfectly and supports my open letter:
You trust Google to show you good information, but Google doesn’t know the difference between good and bad information because algorithms and AI are pattern-seeking, probability-calculating machines that don’t actually know anything.
I’d highly recommend that any affected site owner or user read this article. We’ve reached a point where Google search is no longer doing its primary job. But more to the point: we need to keep talking. Twelve months ago, when the extinction event began, my main fear was that we were going to be silenced and forgotten about pretty quickly.
But I was wrong.
And I am so happy I was wrong, and for this, I offer my gratitude.
I want to thank everyone who has engaged with me on social media in the last 12 months, even those who have disagreed with me. This article will likely put myself and the site in the crosshairs. I know I’ll find bad actors, trolls, and some professionals who will want to prove a point against me.
Whether you agree or disagree with my statements, opinions, or sentiments in this article, I want all of us to be part of the conversation as long as it is rational and with a common goal of improving the future of search.
The more discussion on this, the better. Google needs to do better.
As part of this feature, I’ve worked with a couple of site owners to share their stories. We must keep sharing our experiences as part of our goal to advocate for a better future.
For FilterGrade, Their Nightmare Began In 2020
Please note that Mike Moloney, the owner of FilterGrade, wrote this section:
Since 2020, I have been outspoken about how Google’s practices have harmed publishers. That was the first time I had an opportunity to really share my message on a larger scale, and it first occurred to me just how crazy Google’s dominance was.
For context, my name is Mike Moloney, and I am the founder of FilterGrade. FilterGrade started as a small webshop for my photo filters and has since expanded into a global marketplace for creators to buy and sell digital products. Read more about us here.
We are 100% bootstrapped and independent and have had our fair share of experiences with Google, Amazon, Adobe, and other behemoths. In this article, I wanted to briefly share a bit more about how different actions from Google have impacted FilterGrade over the years.
Over the summer of 2020, I noticed something strange when browsing incognito to study the search results. Google was using our images from our content in Featured Snippets that were not always clickable through our website. They didn’t even reference FilterGrade, the photographer, or anything from the publisher!
After discovering this wild occurrence with featured snippets, I made a thread on Twitter that blew up! It got hundreds of thousands of views, and we even got a response from Danny Sullivan from Google. Unfortunately, it has since been deleted. I cannot remember the exact response and never got a screenshot. I didn’t think they would remove the response. I didn’t fully know what Google was capable of at the time.
After the thread, I also spoke with Bloomberg for an article about the same issue. It made some noise but ultimately didn’t lead to any material changes. And again, this was 2020. Things have only gotten so much worse since then.
I don’t have a ton of research or insights; I know that something dramatically changed with Google in 2020, and since then, the quality of their search engine has only declined. Google harms publishers by manipulating and stealing their content, making it visible on featured snippets and other locations without actually benefiting the creator, and through thousands of other tiny optimizations that send users back to Google-owned platforms like Shopping, Travel, and YouTube rather than to publishers and websites.
Part of it appears to be greed and an increased share of searches directed back to Google properties. Some may be caused by the rapid changes caused by artificial intelligence and generative AI. Who knows? I know the harm caused to publishers, large and small, is irreparable, and I fear this is only the beginning as the internet changes.
After all the controversy over the HCU, one thought keeps coming back to me:
Why does it seem like so many people want to find faults in independent publishers rather than pointing the finger at Google? It’s pretty discouraging getting attacked by people or told everything I’m doing wrong just because of algorithm changes.
— Mike Moloney (@moloneymike) August 22, 2024
Here are some screenshots to show how the algorithm updates and changes to search have affected us at FilterGrade.
FilterGrade Lifetime Organic Traffic and Referring Domains Stats (via Ahrefs)
FilterGrade Traffic and Referring Domains Showing Heavy Decline Since 2020.
FilterGrade Lifetime Organic Search Data (via Ahrefs)
Gamer Guides Were Unfairly Hit Despite Offering The Best Walkthroughs And Strategies
When I spoke to Claire Farnworth, the co-founder of Gamer Guides, I could not believe Google’s algorithms unfairly hit this gem of a website. Gamer Guides offers the best in-game strategies and walkthroughs. Their website UX is designed to guide gamers through any game. Also, if you are a premium member (it’s worth it if you are a regular gamer), you can download the guides into a handy PDF.
This is the ultimate website for video gaming guides.
Due to my disbelief, I decided to test the website by playing Halo Infinite and using their guide for a few missions. Each campaign mission is broken down into a granular walkthrough via a table of contents. The guide includes handy notes, tips, warnings, and “how to use” quips. The advice is backed up with images, and the menus are easy to navigate. My partner, who plays far more games than I do, always needs guides. This is as helpful as a gaming guide site can get, and I am mortified that this site is not frequently at the top of search engine results.
And the data also supports my view. When I researched their site using SEO tools, I found that their pages/visits were healthy, the average visit duration was good, and their bounce rate was 70%. Their traffic continues to slowly drop as Google cannot decide what to do with them despite the apparent sign that users visit their site and stay and use multiple pages by navigation:
Gamer Guides estimated traffic in SemRush in the last year.
This is what Claire had to say about traffic drops:
Regarding which updates, we were hit in the November 2023 and March 2024 Core Updates, not the initial Helpful Content Update. Many of our longstanding keywords for informational intent, of which is most of our site, were hit, mainly due to the preference for Reddit, YouTube, and the odd wiki page in the SERPs. Interestingly, some of our geos have changed a bit, with an increase in the UK but a fair drop off for the US, which is terrible for gaming because most of what we’re known for is more popular in the US.
To make a lasting point in finishing this article, if sites like Ready Steady Cut, Gamer Guides, and FilterGrade are not allowed to succeed in search, then what is the future of Google? Are we going to hand over the entire ecosystem to Reddit and AI? And if so, to what end?
