Google March 2019 Core Update: Consequences and Steps to Be Taken

Google has released an algorithm update on the 12th of March this year.  And with it, come to a lot of speculations over the scale of its impact, and what niches and sites are to be most impacted. 

But before we dig deeper into the consequences this latest Google update imposes, it is important to look at what the update is exactly and what the search engine giant, Google has to say about this March update.

When asked if this update reverses the previous ones, a Google spokesperson said, “We’re constantly improving our algorithms and build forward to improve.” 

What is interesting is that the search engine giant never said no to the question:  Does this update reverse the previous updates? Google said it makes changes with the effort to improve their algorithms. The search engine brings algorithm updates every year, and each effort is aimed at making improvement. The way Google quipped, this update seems to solve some of the issues they had with the previous core updates.

With all that being said, data shows some of the sites hit by the past updates got improved with this March update. But this is not the case with many sites, and they are still not doing well in the search engine. 

According to Google, this is not related to any of the past penguin updates. The search engine said, ““This wasn’t a Penguin update, because we no longer have those, as we’ve said before.” 

This is the core update but not the biggest one. In fact, Google said “But it is far from being the biggest update Google has ever done,” implying this update compared to other updates were much larger.

Also, as Google said, “this is not related to the neural matching updates.  In fact, no neural updates were released at the same time as any of the core updates were.  

So this March update, as the search engine itself said, is a core algorithm update. And so there are definite repercussions on the websites. 

 How Does March 2019 Core Update Impact Websites?

To measure the impact of the update on rankings, Rank Ranger analyzes the SERP using the following metrics.

• First Result Exact Match
• Second Result Exact Match
• Third Result Exact Match 
• Top 3 Results Exact Match
• Top 10 Results Exact Match

The ‘Exact Match’ metrics look at the percentage of occurrences where rankings at one point in time exactly matched (i.e., domains in the same order) the rankings at another point in time. For example, if on January 1 sites a, b, and c are the top three ranking sites for keyword “X” and are again the same top 3 sites (in the same order) for the same keyword on January 2, that is an exact match. 

Using those metrics, it analyzes the websites in the following niches:

• Travel
• Home & Garden/Retail
• Gambling
• Finance 
• Health

What the data shows is quite different across the niches. In travel filed, there was a fair amount of consistency within the volatility displayed by sites. Even the top ranking sites witnessed a huge difference in the ranking.

The data within the home and garden retail shows but all the same as travel niche.  Top sites in search results saw more volatility than the sites within the travel niche. Other metrics were almost similar. 

But the increase in the volatility within gambling industry remains the same as in the above niches.  This saw an increase of 50% volatility within top 5 results on SERP. But this volatility increase for travel and home& garden niches were 2% and 40%, respectively.

Steps needed for recovering the sites affected by this update 

There are many reasons your website might lose traffic and rankings after this update that Google rolled out in March this year. In most cases, your SEO strategies may not be working any longer. And also the focus of Google will be on a better website that provides superior quality content.

Whatever the case, there are ways out that can help you reverse the plunge if you are experiencing any. And as usual, you need to focus on Google E A T (expert, authoritativeness, trustworthiness) quality. 

Websites, which had  gained a rank boost last year by building backlinks using techniques such as Private Blogging Networks, were hit by March 2019 Core Update. But the sites with high-quality, natural backlins saw a spike in their rankings and traffic. 

So once again your SEO strategy needs to focus on Google E A T quality signals, and the most of your effort goes on increasing your website’s E A T ratings. 

These are some of the ways you can increase your website E A T ratings:

Use author byline in all blog posts 

Adding byline to blog posts help Google understand how relevant the post is to users. Google wants to know the authenticity of the person providing the information to the users.  The search engine wants to provide its users information from the experts who are trustworthy.

Remove scraped content 

The quality of content is crucial to your website E A T score.  The websites using scrapped content or content from other sites are more likely to be hit by this Google algorithm update.

So it is better to not use such content. If there is any duplicate or scrapped content on your site, you should remove such content to avoid the consequences of the update.

Focus on personal branding

You can turn the update into your favor by adding a about us page and providing valuable inputs to Google in the form of      a schema markup.

Also, positive testimonials and customer reviews among other things responsible for personal branding will do a great job. 

 If your site is within YMYL category, add information such as contact and customer support details.

Get more quality backlinks

According to Google, websites with high quality backlinks have a higher E A T rating.  Building low quality backlinks is just waste of time and money. So make sure your entire link building effort wanders around high quality backlinks that increase E A T ratings for your website.

Add SSL certification to your site

Google gives more priority to security. Websites that provide secure and safe experience to users have better E A T rankings. In fact, security is a key to E A T rankings. 

Securing your site with SSL certificate will up your chances of getting your website E AT ratings increased. Note that Google Chrome shows sites not secured with HTTPS as insecure, which explicitly shows how importance the privacy of users is for the search engine.

Google March 2019 Core Update, though is one of the biggest updates, will have huge impact on websites, making your site rankings and traffic go down. But the update has also positive impacts sites with higher E A T ratings and high quality backlinks.  SO increasing E A T rankings is crucial to avoiding the negative impact and making most of the Google March 2019 Algorithm Update.