What’s the Google Medic Update and why should you care?
Back on 1st of August 2018 Google finished rolling out its latest algorithm update. This was one of the “broad core algorithm updates”, which Google usually does several times each year. Most of the time these updates are rolled out on the down-low, with little to no updates or explanation. This looks to be the case with the Medic update too.
The official party line from Google when they’re justifying or explaining these broad core algorithm updates is that there are no fixes for any impacted pages, other than to continue to produce great quality, unique content. This doesn’t help SEO analysts much, but it does give content creators a clear direction that they need to be heading in.
So who was affected by the now named “Medic Update”
Well, firstly it’s only know as the Medic update because Barry Schwartz (Search Engine Land Editor and owner of Rusty Brick) called it that. It doesn’t have anything to do with medical websites.
Google has kept their lips pretty sealed too, which is always useful when you are trying to recover from a dip in search visibility.
What is slowly becoming apparent is that brand searches seem to be appearing differently in search (brand searches are searches focused around a company name like Coca-Cola and Pepsi). Commercial websites also seem to be doing better in the post-Google update era. This means that more e-commerce websites are moving up and taking search positions previously held by brochure or content websites.
The general consensus in the search industry is that the Medic Update is about intent. Google recently added the concept of “beneficial purpose” into the Quality Rater Guide. This means that pages are being assessed based on their benefit to the user, as well as the quality of the content.
It might send SEO analysts and marketing agencies running for the hills, but these updates can have a beneficial impact on the online content that’s being created. Remember, all Google wants to do is provide the best experience for their customers and users, who are in all cases the people searching for answers.
If you review your website content to make sure it benefits users and fulfils their search intent your website should recover and all will once again be well in your universe.
