Everything you need to know about the Google MUM update

 In the world of link building, Google updates have been a topic of great concern as of late. The Penguin update , Pigeon update and now the most recent, the Google MUM update!

               What is it? Well, as you might guess from this article’s title – we don’t know nearly enough about it to call it anything yet – but we do know that the news was announced yesterday. So what exactly IS it? Let’s find out:

The Google MUM – Search Quality update has been a tricky beast to deal with. For those who haven’t been following the updates closely, Google released a short statement about their recent search quality update on August 9th 2011. The message was brief and to the point:

” This week we launched a broad core algorithm update. A significant portion of these changes rolled out yesterday and were aimed at reducing rankings for low-quality sites—sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites—sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on.”

Google MUM: What we know so far…

             (from https://searchengineland.com/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-google-mum-update – 07/13/2017) The full name of the update is “Google Medic Update.” It seems to be affecting sites with low quality health or medical content, pages that may be thin or missing pages, and/or spammy ad experiences.

“We will see this impact across local SEO as well because it is one of many ranking factors in both algorithms.” This concurs with what Gary Illyes said about 10 days ago when he said that Google would start to take into account user experience and site quality when deciding how to change search results.

It seems logical that any pages that are serving up low quality content will be impacted by the algorithm release. Generally speaking, we expect spammy websites and pages with poor content would likely see impacts from this change. Sites with high-quality health or medical information may not notice a significant impact, though it does depend on the specific page(s) impacted by this update.

The SERP landscape for major healthcare-related verticals has remained relatively unchanged over the past few months (unlike other industries). So although we can’t be 100% sure of the potential impact this change will have, we’re continuing to monitor any fluctuations and making necessary changes as required.

It’s also worth mentioning that Google has not publicly stated there has been a direct update to the Quality Score algorithm so it’s up to us as SEOs to determine how our pages are performing and what steps we need to take should we see rankings drop off. If you’ve seen an increase in impressions without increases in clicks lately, these changes may be due for a variety of reasons (including other updates like this).

               Why it’s happening: Google did not announce a reason for the release of this particular algorithm update. They do typically take into consideration user experience and site quality when determining how to change search results.

What we know:

• Affects pages with low-quality health or medical content. Sites that have these types of pages are likely seeing negative impact in rankings

• Pages that are thin or lacking good content could also see ranking declines

• Spammy ad experiences can result in a loss in rankings

• Google did not say why this update is happening, but stated they do take into account user experience and site quality when deciding how to change search results.

               Our thoughts: It seems logical that any pages that are serving up low quality content will be impacted by the algorithm release. Generally speaking , we expect spammy websites and pages with poor content would likely see impacts from this change. Sites with high-quality health or medical information may not notice a significant impact, though it does depend on the specific page(s) impacted by this update.

Google MUM: what we’re doing about it

As with all updates, whether there’s an announcement or not, SEOs should always work hard to create great content that is relevant and beneficial to readers. In the case of this algorithm release, we think pages with thin or poor quality content may be impacted as a result of Google’s change.

               As always, it’s important to create new, unique and helpful content for your website visitors. We do believe any site with “thin” health or medical pages could see ranking declines; however, if you are targeting Quality Score keywords related to health or medicine (which I’m assuming many sites probably are) then your page(s) should rank well organically.

The SERP landscape for major healthcare-related verticals has remained relatively unchanged over the past few months (unlike other industries). So although we can’t be 100% sure of the potential impact this change will have, we’re continuing to monitor any fluctuations and making necessary changes as required.

The important thing here is that you’re monitoring your own site. Google has not publicly stated that there’s been a direct update to the Quality Score algorithm – so it’s up to us as SEOs to determine how our pages are performing and what steps we need to take should we see rankings drop off. If you’ve seen an increase in impressions without increases in clicks lately, these changes may be due for a variety of reasons (including other updates like this).

If you believe your website or specific pages on your website may be affected by these types of content quality issues, please contact us ASAP! We’ll review your site and make recommendations moving forward.

Also Read: We Use Them Every Day, But What Is The Overall Purpose Of A Search Engine?

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