By now, you’re probably tired of COVID-19 news, COVID-19 talk, your house, your neighbor that has 5 children, all of which are aspiring musicians that practice all day, and that tank of gas you bought in February that’s still in your car.
Looking for something else to think about? If you focus on your law firm’s search rankings, we have good news! Google has rolled out a broad core algorithm up.
Broad Core?
Google rolls out updates to their algorithm on a daily basis as they constantly try to improve the quality of their results, add new features, or make their searches responsive to new data. It happens every day and it’s why search engine rankings can look like this:
However, 2-3 times per year, Google makes a major change which is released as a broad core algorithm update meaning they’re making broad changes to their core algorithm.
Later today, we are releasing a broad core algorithm update, as we do several times per year. It is called the May 2020 Core Update. Our guidance about such updates remains as we’ve covered before. Please see this blog post for more about that:https://t.co/e5ZQUAlt0G
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) May 4, 2020
What’s Going to Happen?
Some websites will go up. Some will move down. Thus far, we don’t have any guidance on what this update is targeting but here is how the CLM team responds to algorithm updates.
Review. Research. React.
Review. We monitor thousands of law firm’s search engine rankings which includes our own clients as well as their top competitors. Our CLM Lounge tracks desktop, local, and mobile searches separately. By reviewing these rankings on a regular basis, our team knows the average positions and can quickly detect any changes.
Research. Once the algorithm rolls out (which can take up to 2 weeks) we will research the winners and losers. We will look at pages that have gained positions and those that have lost. We will assess whether these ranking fluctuations occurred in the map or below map search results and which devices were affected.
React. Once we know what was targeted in the change, if or how our clients were affected (some changes target specific categories and industries), then we can react. A reaction isn’t always about repairing rankings. In fact, many algorithm updates in the past have given our clients a ranking boost.
A broad core algorithm update can show us what sort of content Google now sees as the most valuable. What pages are ranking higher? Which competitors have dropped and what were they doing? Which competitors have moved up and why? We learn all of that by reviewing and researching.
Our reaction is often identifying the rewarded pages and modifying our strategy to boost what is already working.
If your website does experience a drop, it’s not the end of the world. Recoveries no longer have to take months or wait for the next algorithm update. With a sound plan and an exclusive law firm marketing partner putting that plan into action, you can get on a fast-track back to the top of search results.
Whatever happens over the next two weeks, Custom Legal Marketing will be there to Review the results, Research the ups and downs, and React with an appropriate SEO plan for your law firm.
Even if this update doesn’t yield any significant changes, at least we got to focus on news that had nothing to do with the coronavirus.
