Best practice for eCommerce in search according to Google.
Google is now rolling out a new search algorithm update named the ‘December 2021 products reviews update’. NZ Digital is focused on keeping you up to date with the latest information around these Google updates so you and your site are prepared for it and not caught off guard.
This is the second time Google has pushed out a review of their products this year; the first one rolled out in April 2021.
This update is “designed to better reward” product reviews that “share in-depth research, rather than thin content that simply summarises a bunch of { E-commerce } products,” a spokesperson told Search Engine Land in April. Reviews that are written in a way that has “insightful analysis and original research” will be rewarded, especially “content written by experts or enthusiasts who know the topic well,” Google said.
Google said that if you made changes between now and the last update, you may see improvements to your rankings since the last update. Google wrote, “if you have made positive changes to your content, you may have noticed an increase in your search results since then.”
Google also said the search company has “received more feedback from users on what type of review content is deemed trustworthy and useful, motivating us to provide additional product review guidance. Users have told us that they trust reviews with evidence of products actually being tested, and prefer to have more options to purchase the product.”
Google provided two new best practices around this update, one saying to provide more multimedia around your product reviews and the second is to provide links to multiple sellers, not just one. Google posted these two items:
Google said the update is now rolling out for English-language pages. It will take about three weeks to complete.
The Google product reviews update aims to promote review content that is above and beyond much of the templated information you see on the web. Google said it will promote these types of product reviews in its search results rankings.
Google is not directly punishing lower quality product reviews that have “thin content that simply summarizes a bunch of products.” However, if you provide such content and find your rankings demoted because other content is promoted above yours, it will definitely feel like a penalty. Technically, according to Google, this is not a penalty against your content, Google is just rewarding sites with more insightful review content with rankings above yours.
Technically, this update should only impact product review content and not other types of content.
The “focus overall is on providing users with content that provides insightful analysis and original research, content written by experts or enthusiasts who know the topic well,” Google said about this update. That is similar advice to the core update recommendations mentioned above, but here is a list of “additional useful questions to consider in terms of product reviews.”
Google also linked to its blog post from earlier this year named providing better product information for shoppers.
If your website offers product review content, you will want to check your rankings to see if you were impacted. Did your Google organic traffic improve, decline or stay the same?
Long term, you are going to want to ensure that going forward, you put a lot more detail and effort into your product review content so that it is unique and stands out from the competition on the web.
If you are having any issues with your rankings after this update or even a previous update please reach out to the NZ Digital team below so we can get your rankings back.
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