It's quite interesting to see how Google is changing direction on this topic, but I don't think this is the first indication that they were heading this way. I think they've realized people want the quick in and out answers. That's gotta be why so many video search results from RU-vid take you straight to the most relevant section of the video. Shorter watch time but happier user. They've shown their hand🤓
Agree on the key takeaways part. Making sure that you've answered all the queries that your audience has will translate into your blog posts being effective in terms of content. Great video, btw!
I’ve been doing intro snippets for 90% of my content and I’m getting a growth spurt since HCU began. Time on page is like 30 seconds. But users are coming in and for sure getting their answer, so it may finally be paying off.
there's a long established article format obviously designed for 'dwell' time on site but couched in the 'complete answer' smokescreen... the headline might say How To Do This Thing... but the article plods along with section after section of 'What is a Thing' 'Why you want this thing', Who Else Likes This Thing... How many things are there... etc etc... As Google becomes more intelligent hopefully common-sense will prevail. Thanks for the video.
Excited for how seo pros like you design page layout for single product review and product roundups... Especially if you want to promote physical products ❣️❣️
Good point regarding time on page, prioritizing time on page is often outdated advice, in my opinion. It's entirely query-dependent. It made more sense to pay attention to when people actually followed blogs and read through articles more deeply, and articles were written for an existing audience. My sites primarily target info, question-based keywords and try to win the featured snippet. That's led to a simple, straightforward and clear answer to the main question under the first H2. Seems like my sites should benefit from Google prioritizing easy answers, though I've seen 0 movement on any of them since the Helpful Content update dropped.
Well, you have come up with a good approach for Google's helpful content update. I will wait for your video on the new content layout. Although, some websites are already incorporating sections like Key Takeaways and Statistics. I will look to implement some bits of your content structure for my blog soon.
Excellent video. Many of us who have the standard Top 10 best articles with 3000 words of buying guides "before" the top 10 should be able to just shuffle things around to start.
Great video Matt! The search intention needs to be solved quick and clear. I think Google will have a big challenge knowing if the visitor "satisfied" his search. I will review my articles with your advice. Gracias amigo!
So, the formula is not too little time, but not too much time... an ideal range, like a bell curve or a peaky curve... some kind of range of time on page.
Can't wait for the Cooking Recipe Blogs to catch onto this so I don't have to scroll thru a life's story about their Roast Chicken before seeing how to make it.
I already noticed this thing today's morning. While scrolling Google results I show the site which I recently purchased. There is feedback form popup for the users point of view.
Awesome video, thanks Matt and keep 'em comin'! Two questions: 1. Key Takeaways being the first heading, would you go with H2 or H3? 2. Bullets or numbers?
Great Video, thanks for sharing. Do you think that structural helpers such as Tables of content , Anchors and Schema MarkUp with URLs will be valued more and more ?
I've been researching these surveys for the last couple of weeks. How "Google" of RU-vid to suggest your video. At the least, parallel thinking is a thing. Just to be clear, the word "easy" doesn't just mean "convenient" - it first means "approved" or "conforms to acceptable standards" or "follows the requirements listed in terms of service". The point is that "easy" does not mean "free". To provide a stable, secure platform like the Google space, it takes an extraordinary enlistment of energy, experience, economics and "experimentation". The last requirement for "everything for everyone everywhere" service provision is often the most costly. I call it, "end user conditioning". It means that, if "they" (users) are happy with the "ease of access" to our (provider's) free, public services, then we must make (edit favorably) the information that preserves the service (search results) a top priority to maintain (predict) public happiness (acceptance of regulated ideas). Which, maybe is a necessary evil?
Can all the Food Recipe sites hear this? We really don't need the nutritional backstory and family recipe history for cheese bake chicken. Just the recipe would be ok.
1. Super helpful and informative videos ! I love our content and use ALOT of it for my agency ! 2. I love your shirt in this video! On my Crypto site I used " Eat Sleep Trade Repeat" haha you are my spirit animal !! 3.Affiliate marketing is my Jam and you are a very big piece of how that all started ! Thank you ! -T
Thanks Matt may i throw a few words in - time spent on page is mostly because it carries a lot of content (not because of frustration), pages with large amounts of content can also be authoritative and take time to read - it carries granular info that may lend to the idea that they know more about the topic than others (experts always have the most to say), which is also heavily used to rank those pages. These types of deep content pages often garner organic backlinks because it actually does add value to another page (ideal backlink situation) - so although you're 100& on the money (UX signals are super important - but there has got to be a balance) - i wouldn't focus it all on thin-content pages that have more calls to action than text and hope to get a fantastic ranking. Id go as far as to say the feedback form will disappear as fast as it arrived because bots are going to eat those feedback forms like a plague of locusts. Dont knock pages with more than 2000+ words :P. So what i am saying is it isnt to do with time page when they ask - how easy was it finding what you want - you may have found exactly what you want, and then spend 5 minutes on that page because the content covers all bases
One misconception that a few people made about this video is that is a commentary on word length. Actually, I never mentioned it at all. It's only about making an answer easy as possible, whether that be 500 or 50000 words.
Thanks so much!! This is GOLD my friend!! I notice this survey google has been doing and was like hmmm this is interesting and now you confirmed it :) Sub 4 Life man!
For me, it still comes down to backlinks. You can have the best answers (quick and/or detailed), fastest speed, most original content, clearest content, and high personal authority (highly published PHD in something), and if your site doesn't have high quality backlinks, you're not making the top three organics. Forbes, Home Depot, and any news site will be in front of you regardless of their lack of relevance. This started after Panda and Penguin and hasn't changed since. The best we can do is fight for the crumbs, which is what I do.
This actually isn't true. One of my new websites with TWO articles on it (total) ranks #1 in Google search results for a high volume search phrase (which is also the title of the article). Domain authority 2, zero backlinks.
