Hello, fellow content peeps!

This week has gone by at lightning speed. We’ve got a lot to get into…

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The Results of the Content Forward Reader Poll

Thank you to everyone who took the poll in last week’s edition.

40% of you want to see more updates on the things we’re testing in indie media and content, so I will make sure to bring more of those updates. Maybe I can also wrangle a few of my friends to share what they are working on.

I will get to work on that.

The rest of you still love the SEO and content updates, so I guess we continue with all of those as well.

I’ll do my best to keep digging up the news of the day and share my thoughts with you.

There are many SEO and content marketing newsletters out there, many of which I subscribe to. I hope this one stands out.

I promise you this—I will continue to share everything I know from my vantage point as an operator who has been in the space for a decade and who actively tries to figure this out every week.

I’ve really enjoyed curating and writing these newsletters. They give me a good reason to keep a pulse on the industry and dig deeper into what’s currently working and what’s not.

Let’s face it. The playbooks for content and SEO need to change whether we like it or not.

2024: The Shift in Digital Media Right Now

We are in the middle of a bonafide shitstorm in digital and niche media right now.

Google has nuked almost anything that looks like, acts like, or appears as a typical niche content site.

Big media and brands are celebrating their big wins. As each update rolls out, they seem to become more untouchable.

AI is still a real deal threat to creatives and writers. Behind the scenes, many, many big publishers and media companies are using AI to support their content creation in some way.

This has created this new urgency to rise to the top and produce faster.

Smaller, human publishers cannot compete with the velocity of content from big-time publishers, but is that really where we want to play anyway?

With all of these things happening all at once (and at breakneck speed), we can’t help but wonder, what’s next?

I don’t know.

I’m just here for the ride.

This week, I read another newsletter that encapsulated how I’m personally feeling in so many ways.

Trish Sammers is an editor and content professional currently on sabbatical. In her deeply personal newsletter, she shares her thoughts while she takes some time to reflect.

The latest post, titled “This is the 2nd time robots have tried to take my job” is an eye-opening read on one human’s real reactions to the digital world we’re living in right now.

You can read it for yourself here:

Trish breaks it down here:

“Google is causing bedlam in many corners of Content Land right now. By my estimates:

• 45% of content folks are panicking (“Chat GPT is taking our jobs!”)

• 45% are waiting for things to go back to normal (“Google just temporarily lost it mind and tanked our business, but it will come around…”)

• 10% (the folks at big brands) are enjoying their new status as the feudal lords of the SERPs.”

This is pretty much what’s happening. Okay. Time to put on our big boy/girl pants and figure out a way forward, which I love.

For me and my team, we’re embracing these two values of our company right now:

1. Pure, unadulterated scrappiness.

After the bloodbath of the HCU, we are a much smaller team. The team we have now has to be able to do more and figure things out.

Instead of pushing out more and more content, we have decided to take a different route.

We’re focusing on more intimate ways to connect with our readers, such as newsletters, forum discussions, social media, and video—anywhere we can.

2. Go slow, to grow fast.

Quality content does not come from a high-speed conveyor belt, no matter how efficient that conveyor belt is.

Real, original, in-depth content takes time and expertise to create. Moving forward, I would rather work with a smaller group of really dedicated creatives who can create original content + share and move that content.

The Latest Google Updates. Let’s Play Two Truths, One Lie — Can you spot the fake?

Remember the game, two truths, one lie? Well, we’re going to play a round of that right now. I’m going to share three statements with you here. There will be two truths and one lie, and I want you to guess what the lie is here, okay?

Statement One:

Google is only giving manual spam penalties to sites that were using AI-generated content, either partially or fully.

Statement Two:

There have not been any verified full recoveries from sites that were hit with the Helpful Content Update classifier in September of 2023.

Statement Three:

Google has consolidated the Helpful Content ranking system into the core ranking system.

Okay, friends, let’s get into these statements, shall we?

Statement One: The Lie

If you guessed statement one is the lie, you’re right!

While Google is doing a really good job inferring that the sites that were given a manual spam penalty were AI-created spam, this is not the full truth.

I really want to clear this up because I keep seeing industry leaders summarizing these spam penalties, inferring that the only sites that were hit were 100% AI content.

Where did the confusion come from?

Many people are citing this study from Originality that showed that out of the 14 sites they reviewed, 100% of them had AI content published. But here’s the kicker — they only reviewed 14 out of the 1446 reported sites that were hit with this manual penalty.

So, while all of the sites they checked used AI, we cannot say that ALL the sites hit with this penalty used AI.

Yes. I’m sure many on the list used AI, but not all.

Example: A site that was given the manual spam penalty, The Food in My Beard.

Yes, this site was originally penalized manually for spam. It has since been reindexed, but I don’t think this solo creator used AI.

I mean, there are a ton of E-E-A-T signals all over this site. Original images. Published cookbook author. He even has a clear content mission statement:

“The Food in my Beard is my recipe playground, so the recipes you see here were on my table or in my beard just a few days before being posted.”

I don’t know why this site was considered spam or what the owner did to get it de-indexed. Looking at the site on March 4 (in Wayback Machine) vs. today, it seems very similar.

I’m not sure why this was considered pure spam, but at least it’s back up today.

Statement Two: A Truth

Okay, this one may be tricky because I’ve heard certain SEOs claim to have seen some recoveries from the HCU.

Until I see receipts, proof, timelines, screenshots, I’m not buying it.

I would say the majority of site owners and SEOs would agree that, as of right now, there have been no major case studies or examples of sites recovering from HCU.

Where’s the confusion coming from then?

Well, there is a lot of confusion in the SEO world right now. I suspect that because Google rolled out so many updates back to back last year, some may have thought it was an HCU hit when really it was just from another core update.

Statement Three: A Truth

This one is also true and changes things a bit. Instead of waiting for another Helpful Content Update, Google says it’s just a part of its core ranking system now.

What this means for publishers who are hoping to recover from the HCU remains a mystery.

A Video on All of This Worth Watching

The SEO world is fraught with wild tales and half-truths, as we have seen today.

While we go through these massive Google updates, we must remember that these changes and shifts have real-world implications as well.

Many publishers, site owners, and content creators are losing their livelihoods, with little warning and little direction on how to recover.

Lily Ray had some sobering thoughts on what’s really happening I think this video is worth watching. She clears up some of these myths as well and shares the insights from her vantage point as someone who is self-confessed obsessed with these things:

Lily does offer some solutions for site owners dealing with these hits, such as de-indexing or removing unhelpful content. I would love to see a real-world example of this working, but we might not see it for a while, as she explains in this video that recoveries could take a year or more.

So, while we wait…

Can we start a “Bing it Up” campaign?

While we wait for powerhouse Google to figure their shit out, wouldn’t it be great if another search engine took some of the market?

A few of the cool kids these days (okay, maybe just me and a couple of other SEO nerds) are trying to make Bing cool. I’ve already begun recruiting.

So, maybe instead of saying Google it, we just say ‘bing it up’ okay?

Seriously though.

I know I am extremely biased, but I like Bing much better these days, at least for rabbit-hole searches. If I want to go deeper, I go to Bing. If I want a quick answer, I may still Google something.

Google has really shrunk its search results, at least above the fold, but Bing… Bing brings all the action. Yes. It can be a bit of a minefield over in Bing land, and the UX is clunky and old-school, but if you are on a mission to go deeper, it might just be giving us a better experience.

The Ripple Effects: Mediavine Gives the Little Guy a Chance to Monetize Sooner

Things are shifting already in our industry and we’re seeing the ripple effects in other parts of the industry.

This week, Mediavine announced that it is creating a new way for smaller publishers to get their ad network. Instead of having to reach the 50K mark, smaller publishers can monetize sooner.

While I love this advancement from Mediavine, it shows a real ripple effect of what’s happening in the niche content site world. Even if Mediavine won’t come forward and say that many of their publishers have been losing traffic, we all know that this is the reality right now.

So, what are ad networks to do? The publishers are losing traffic. The ad networks are losing revenue.

Find more publishers.

I am thrilled that Mediavine is giving smaller pubs a chance to earn money. I am still 100% rooting for them. We need those voices on the internet.

🤔 Content Musings of the Week

👫 Find your people. Get yourself a cheerleader, a mentor, or a group of people to share ideas with. That is how you grow.

🏆 You can always find a win if you look hard enough.

💎 If I had to choose between authenticity and polish, I would, hands down, always choose authenticity. Anyone can polish. We have a lot of polish in this world, but not enough authenticity.

Things to Read, Watch, and Ponder

▶️ Want a fresh content improvement tip? This week, Jared Bauman shared how he uses authentic images + Chat GPT to help find information and gain opportunities to improve his content. He walks you through the entire process in this video; check it out!

▶️ Whether we realize it or not, cognitive biases influence every stage of the customer journey, from discovery to retention, and it’s up to us as content marketers to understand how these biases inform our marketing decisions. Thankfully, Giulia Panozzo has created the guide to walk us through what we need to do. Read it here!

▶️ One area of SEO I’m really excited about is Headless SEO. Larger companies have embraced this and it makes content distribution that much easier. If you want to dive into Headless SEO, this full introductory guide with 6 best practices from Despina Gavoyannis is a great start! Check it out!

▶️ Ever wonder what a Content Designer does? This fresh guide from Kai Tomboc breaks down this role in content really well. Read it now! 

Thank you for being here. Before I leave again to start my weekend, I want to leave on this note:

If you are following a small publisher and love the content they are creating, please reach out and let them know.

It means so much.

Small independent creators put their heart and soul into their work, often for small gains and, hopefully, a few long-term rewards.

If something you read hits you, teaches you something, or is truly helpful, spend a few minutes to let that creator know!

Cheers! Amy

P.S.) I’ve been speaking with a few of my eComm friends about what they are doing for content marketing and SEO this month, and I’m learning a lot.

Unlike the SaaS or Services world, eComm hasn’t really taken advantage of SEO and content-led growth with as much intensity.

So, I’m wondering why, and I’m on a mission to find out.

I would love to talk to a few more eComm owners about their digital marketing strategies, whether they have tried content marketing and their plans for 2024.

This is purely a fact-finding mission.

If that sounds like you, and you’d be willing to give me 30 minutes of your time, I would deeply appreciate it.

Book some time with me here:

Some Bonus Newsletters You’ll Love

If you want to get into the weeds on these topics, here are some newsletters that I read regularly that I think you’ll enjoy: