Google's algorithm update versus your brand
Google made the (still unexpected) decision to announce a core update before it happened. It's called the "helpful content update" because that makes it hard for people to object to it and because it readies an army of SEOs to now push their clients to have more helpful content. I have no objections to the tactic. At first blush, the update makes sense. As so strongly signposted, the goal is to reward helpful content, and the expense of content made just for search engines. You can imagine the latter type, cookie-cutter templates, low-quality churn, and if you're imaginative, you might even waggle a warning finger at all those guest posts which are variations on a theme. Brands that care about their content, and most do, should have nothing to worry about. This update is about moving some search oomph off the internet's lower end to reward the content creators' upper tier. In just a bit, I want to explain why I've titled this post "Google's alg
