⭐How to improve E-E-A-T for your website (Google cred)

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Glad to be with you. Glad to be anywhere, honestly. In today’s feature: Quick ways to be sure Google sees your website as credible (we’re going beyond Google, though). Then you’ll get:

The Knowledge Base (includes bot defense & self-persuasion)
~~Self~~ Help (wise up & lay down)
Facts & Stats (upcoming AI crackdown?)
Today’s Hack to use right away

Now, let’s hit this feature story.

How to Improve E-E-A-T

Watched a great MOZ Whiteboard thingy on improving E-E-A-T – aka your site’s credibility in the eyes of Google. The Googsters are in a fight with bots, AI creatures, and loons tossing up anything that resembles helpful content. Your website is in the middle of that fight, which means it’s critical to make your site super-duper-credible.

(E-E-A-T means Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, & Trustworthiness)

Quick wins are available, says MOZ Dude if you simply use:

Real authors with legit bios & links
Proper schema markup
Time & date of article posting / updates (more on this coming)
Original images
ChatGPT or Grammarly AI to punch holes in your pages
Experts (hired or interview them directly)

Don’t fret… I’ve got more intel on those six, plus real-world examples, including the ultimate credibility – over a game of poker.🤔🃏

How to Show Off E-E-A-T for Article Authors

Start by not hiring any from Ivy League schools. Hire them from legit institutions – like SEC schools! Nick Saban was easy to hate, but he didn’t plagiarize other coaches’ playbooks.

More tips below:

Have the author’s face attached to articles
Update that photo regularly (make it seasonal aka real-time)
Author links should be active (no social pages with cobwebs)
Let writers use pics of their dog in articles

Yes, dogs. If the writer owns a cat*, probably shouldn’t have been hired.

*Exclusions apply. If you can hire Chris Guillebeau, ignore this rule.😹

How to Improve E-E-A-T with Post Timestamps

First thing I look for on an article? When was it posted.

Same thing for hovering over links to see if they have a date in the URL slug.

If the info was posted four years ago, it may be pretty useless unless it’s an evergreen topic but…

I’m ok with a site not updating an old post – some one-person bands don’t have time for updates. What I don’t care for is having no date on articles at all. It makes me work to figure out how old the info is – and worse?

I make a point to not bother with that website anymore because I assume they’ve omitted the date so I won’t bounce. They’re not credible because they’re hiding info from me. It’s the opposite of how to improve E-E-A-T.

How to Improve E-E-A-T with Original Images

Here’s where I could post a selfie of myself typing this article. And focus on my first-hand experience writing about trust and credibility. Yet, my keyboard is shamefully dusty so just try to envision the scene😁.

My Lab’s way more photogenic than my tapping fingers anyways.

Why are original photos better than stock images?

Stock images lack personality (they all exude cookie-cutter joy – people smiling like their office is a vacation resort😁).

Smaller brands are likely to be mistaken for larger brands but not when they have memorable original images only they have access to.

90% of consumers consider authenticity important when deciding which brands they support (Stackla)

Just remember, Canva and Unsplash are fine. Most businesses can’t have original pics on every single page of their site.

Last Two Points on Improving E-E-A-T

Unless you know how to finely tune ChatGPT, lean on it less for writing and more for analyzing the credibility of your web pages and content. Even ole Bard or Gemini can do helpful analyzing tasks like that – without embarrassing the Googsters🤐. Also, Grammarly Premium has AI tools for finding gaps in information or suggestions for improvement.

Now for the bad news on using experts to prove your website should be crowned credible by Google. No one trusts anyone anymore – especially experts at the highest ranks. Yay!

Yes, you should still post certifications, degrees*, awards, testimonials, case studies, all that. But don’t be surprised when it isn’t enough. Example. I wanted to order nootropic supplements. Found a good-looking brand on my Wallyworld+ app. 1,100 five-star reviews and only a few 1-stars.

The 1-star review I read, though… said, “Product packaging offers a free bottle if you leave a 5-star review.” Trust broken, and I dumped it out of my online cart!

* Ivy League diplomas won’t help for a while.

Wrapping Up Last Two Points on Improving E-E-A-T

Why did I not dive deeper into schema markup? Don’t know a thing about it! Too lazy to research it. My dogs needed a bath. How’s that for transparent? (I’m currently offering a course on transparency for $117,000, only available to politicians, university presidents, and billion-dollar CEOs. Course includes Common Sense 101).

😉Here are two links for schema markup help: One / Two.

My best advice for building credibility for Google search and doing business in general is…

…do right and offer personal service. Hard for giant organizations – I get it. But not impossible.

My dad didn’t run a giant house painting conglomerate but made nice profits since he was in big demand. Mostly due to credibility running out his ears— customers trusted him 100%. Homeowners never asked for detailed invoices, just asked him how much they owed at the end of the job and paid the man – sometimes with homemade cookies as a bonus.

And sometimes it was a wad of cash handed over as a poker game was paused. Dad needed a “draw” at the end of the week so the wife told him to see her husband at the country club. The husband handed Dad a wad of cash (about $5k) and asked if that covered the week. Dad said it was too much and was told to put it toward next week’s bill. That’s credibility. Knowing you can trust a man to come back and do what he says… not just sometimes, but all the time.

There are lots of technical aspects to getting Googster approved, but being credible really is simple.

Now for that bot defense stuff…

Knowledge Base

💪Knowledge is power – first, give thanks you’re not him

🤚Slap down bad bot traffic

🏆Top 10 best content marketing (agree w/ the winners?)

🫡Prime example of self-persuasion marketing (video)

📧Deep DMARC insights (wear a helmet)

🔨How to nail job interviews (THE question to ask)

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Self Help

Bad news for folks who tire of the same old advice…

Turns out, sleep is still critical to being healthy and not feeling like crap!

And nope, you can just eat healthy and exercise, hoping that overcomes not going to bed at a decent hour (8:47 PM 👍). Because a recent study says lack of sleep increases risk of diabetes – despite healthy eating.

Again, I hate to remind y’all that ancient advice is usually spot on – even in 2024.

Inbox Hackers Shout-out:

📢Jake at Wayard

📣Tim at Rank Media

Facts and Stats

Google predicts their upcoming AI spam crackdown will lead to a 40% reduction in spammy and unoriginal search outcomes (PYMNTS)

A landing page with a video is 53% more likely to be on page 1 of search results (Marketing Insider Group)

New study shows no link between social media engagement and content readership (Search Engine Land)

Bonus: Cart abandonment rate was highest among all 4 age groups in which product category? Answer- clothing or accessories (PYMNTS Intelligence & Adobe)

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Get Hacking

Today’s Hack is to regain trust.

No, your brand probably hasn’t done anything to lose customer trust. It’s just that trust has been ripped to shreds by most of our American institutions. I could post the pitiful stats proving this, but you already know it’s true.

So take one step today that shows your business is worthy of your audience’s trust – can be as simple as writing a personal email to 20 of your most engaged email subscribers to ask them if there’s anything you can do better. No forms, no survey – just ask them to write you back.

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