Every website needs good content, but not all websites create content that will meet Google’s standards. Are you a news site or dealing with a topic like healthcare or commerce? You might fall into the category of a YMYL site.
YMYL is a system that Google uses to ensure that sites dealing with the most vital topics are held to a higher standard in reliability. If your business falls into these categories, here’s how to make sure you stay on Google’s good side and move up the search engine rankings.
What Is YMYL?
Google Quality Rater guidelines provide a way for the search engine’s webmasters to determine which sites get promoted up the search engine rankings and get knocked down to the back pages.
Ratings are significant for any site that falls under the “Your Money Your Life” (YMYL) category and reflects that these sites deal with universal topics. Misinformation here impacts society at large, not just the individual.
The official classification is any site that could impact a person’s future happiness, health, financial stability, or safety beyond the digital world. Some of these are relatively clear topics, like any site involving health advice or information on prescription drugs.
Any site that claims to be a news site but is publishing inaccurate or outright false stories will also fall afoul of Google’s guidelines. Sites that offer financial advice like stock tips or offer mental health advice that goes against expert recommendations can also be penalized by Google’s standards.
How to Get Started?
If you’re blogging for a YMYL site, it’s important to know your priorities. Keeping up on Google’s guidelines and staying factual is your first goal, but figuring out how to get traffic under these standards is a close second.
The first step is to figure out which keywords are searched most commonly in your industry. You want to create content that targets these words and helps you stand out from the crowd.
Figuring out how to do this can be especially tricky in the medical industry, so it’s vital to be strategic. Once you figure out what those top keywords are, don’t piggyback on them. You might wind up competing with the biggest names in the industry.
Find out what some less-searched synonyms are or what parallel topics people concerned about the first keywords are likely to search. Filling in the gaps will help you carve out your niche.
Blogging tips for the YMYL niche are available from companies like PureLinq and can help you get your foot in the door, but it’ll ultimately come down to the quality of your content. You’ll want material that’s engaging and can pull in curious readers while sticking to the facts and giving you credible and reliable evergreen content.
Implement E-A-T Strategies
Google’s Medic update a few years back clarified what they’re looking for from YMYL industries, and it all starts with the E-A-T system. This is a three-pronged test that all sites—especially YMYL sites—go through before being ranked on Google’s metric.
Sites are judged on three points – Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness. They’re looking for reliable information delivered by those who know about it and backed up by cited information from authorities in the field.
These tests apply to more sites than you might think, including eCommerce sites that might advise on investing or cryptocurrency. Getting a passing grade on the E-A-T scale starts with reliable information, but it doesn’t end there. Google will also be looking to make sure that your site represents a company with enough of a paper trail to be held accountable.
That means one of the most important places on your website is your contact page and other information. Your contact page should make clear who the webmaster is and how to reach them.
Likewise, you should have an About Us page that establishes who runs the company and how to contact them in case of problems. Every page on your website should have a distinct purpose and be labeled correctly. Any content should be high-quality and clearly attributed to an author with a similar paper trail.
Pass the Test
The E-A-T standards can seem high-stakes, especially in a YMYL industry. But it’s often as simple as making sure the content you put out is something you’re proud to stand behind. Represent your business in the best way possible, and Google’s guidelines will follow.
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