Google's E-A-T: How To Rank Your Website

If you're like me, you love watching the reality show Survivor. In the show, contestants try to outwit, outplay, and outlast the other players. During the game, players can find hidden clues to an immunity necklace. This clue provides a player with an advantage and serves a guide or path to winning the million dollar prize. 

Google's Quality Raters Guidelines serve as a clue or guide for websites that want to rank. While it's not a million dollars, ranking on Google is an important step to gain new website visitors. There is no guarantee your site will rank by following these guidelines, but it is a step in the right direction.

What are the Google's Quality Raters Guidelines?

The guidelines are a document produced by Google for a team of "Quality Raters." The guidelines aim to teach these "Quality Raters" how to assess the quality of a website.

How Do the Quality Raters Impact a Site's Ranking Ability?

The Quality Raters have no direct impact on analyzed websites. A website labeled as low-quality by the raters is not affected in rankings. Instead, the information helps Google's engineers in creating better algorithms to assess quality on the web.

Where Can I Find the Quality Raters Guidelines?

Google did not release the Quality Raters Guidelines until 2015. You can find the latest version of the Quality Raters Guidelines here. The current document provides examples of what Google considers high and low-quality measures.

What is Google's E-A-T?

E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. A website's content, information, and reputation are all ingredients in the E-A-T recipe.

What does the E in Google's E-A-T stand for?

The "E" in Google's E-A-T stands for expertise. In this context, expertise represents knowledge or skill in a specific field. It's evaluated at the content level rather than at the organizational level. Google is looking for content created by a subject matter expert.

What does the A in Google's E-A-T stand for?

The "A" in Google's E-A-T stands for authoritativeness. Your reputation among other experts and influencers in your field defines your authority. Quality Raters search the web for insights into the reputation of a website or individual to determine authority.

What does the T in Google's E-A-T stand for?

The "T" in Google's E-A-T stands for trustworthiness. Trust is about the legitimacy, transparency, and accuracy of the website's content. The raters examine whether the website states who creates the published content.

We list and link to our blog authors on the BlinkJar website (yes, the site you're on right now). While tempting, this link is not an invitation for you to lurk on my bio page or slide into my DMs. We identify the content creator at the bottom of every web page. This transparency helps build trust with readers. Check out Dan Davidson's bio. That guy knows his sports.

Are there certain types of websites affected more by E-A-T?

Yes, "Your Money, Your Life" (YMYL) websites are more scrutinized by E-A-T. According to Google, any page including content that can affect someone’s health, happiness, safety, or financial stability is a YMYL page.

What are YMYL sites?

• Sites giving medical advice.
• Sites giving legal advice.
• Sites giving financial advice.
• Sites that allow the sale of products or services.
  

Is Google's E-A-T a ranking factor?

The answer is "sort-of." E-A-T is not a direct ranking factor. E-A-T is a guideline Google uses to determine the quality of a websites' content. Google raters provide feedback to Google engineers for testing future ranking factors. So, while it's not a direct ranking factor, Google's E-A-T indirectly influences your rankings. By the way, "sort of" is the best answer to every question.

Why is Google's E-A-T so important?

E-A-T guidelines tell human reviewers exactly what type of content Google considers high-quality. It provides you with the ingredients to rank on Google.

Do you like the sauce at Raising Canes Chicken Fingers? Yeah, so does everyone else! Wouldn't you love to know the secret sauce of the Cane's sauce (see what I did there)? We may not know every ingredient, but our eyes and taste buds are our best bet on what makes up the sauce. Our senses serve as our guide of sorts. Mine are telling me it is some combination of ketchup, mayo, ranch, and pepper. 

The same scenario holds for Google's secret sauce - its algorithm. By releasing the Quality Raters Guidelines to the public in 2015, Google is telling you what they consider high-quality content. This information can have enormous implications for content marketers and businesses. 

As updates take place around Google and E-A-T, we will provide helpful content to make sense of it. As for now, all this food talk has made me hungry. Who is ready to E-A-T?