Every day, tons of new content gets published online. So how does Google decide which content is the best for users? Before you roll your eyes at the title of this post and think, “Not another acronym! I just want more traffic”, hear us out: E-E-A-T is a key SEO trump card. It helps Google see your content as high-quality, which can boost visibility, build user trust, and improve site performance. But what exactly is E-E-A-T? Let’s see!
What is E-E-A-T?
E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. This is a mix of considerations exhaustively detailed in the Google Search Quality Rater guidelines to determine if content is helpful and relevant enough to be recommended to users.
It’s important to note that E-E-A-T is not a search ranking factor. It guides Google’s human quality raters, whose evaluations help inform algorithm updates over time. However, it’s still a valuable assessment to make sure you are creating reliable content that can succeed in Google Search and grow your traffic. See it as wearing your nicest suit to a party and gaining the trust of the host (Google) to introduce you to their big circle of friends (the users).
What do E-E-A-T signals mean?
- Experience: Experience is the most recent addition to the original E-A-T framework. Back in 2022, Google decided to include the experience factor to further assess whether the search ranking systems deliver useful and relevant information. People with first-hand experience on the topic create your content, which demonstrates this attribute. It could be from someone who has actually used a product, visited a place, or described a process or situation they personally went through.
- Expertise: This is used to consider the level of knowledge or skill the content creator has over a certain topic. Authors should demonstrate their background and credentials on a subject for Google to interpret their content as reliable. For instance, who would you trust more for advice on how to fix your car? A) A mechanic or B) A salesman who has never touched a bolt in their life.
- Authoritativeness: Your website’s authority reflects the reputation you hold within your niche. Having quality content that other reputable sites want to refer to through mentions, citations, and high-quality backlinks is like them finger-pointing to Google that you are a trustworthy source. This plays a key role in your Off-Page SEO strategy, helping to boost your search engine rankings.
- Trustworthiness: According to Google’s Search Quality Rater Guidelines, trust is the most important element in E-E-A-T. Trust is a consideration of whether the page provides information that is safe, accurate, and honest. Google wants to deliver users with trustworthy information, meaning search engines value websites that show transparency, provide clear contact information and policies, and feature fair reviews.
Who should use E-E-A-T?
E-E-A-T is critical for brands or content creators that cover Your Money, Your Life (YMYL) topics. YMYL touches on sensitive subjects that could impact on a person’s health, financial stability, safety, and future happiness. This type of content can appear in a medical blog, an online newspaper, an e-commerce site, etc. Therefore, qualified experts should review the information and publish it on a reliable site.
Even outside YMYL content, users prefer to learn from someone with first-hand experience on a certain topic. Following E-E-A-T guidelines remains a valuable strategy for everyone looking to improve search performance and boost credibility.
Why E-E-A-T matters for SEO
As Google seeks to provide users with helpful content that’s relevant to them, E-E-A-T plays a role in ensuring your content meets the standards for potentially earning a high position on the results pages. But remember: E-E-A-T is not a direct ranking factor.
E-E-A-T influences Google’s ranking algorithms as it prioritizes high-quality content that is trustworthy. It’s essential to adopt these practices in your SEO strategy as they’ll help to improve search visibility, deliver a better user experience, and increase your chances on being referenced by the LLMs in generative searches, which boosts your discoverability.
💡 Recommended read: Learn the differences about SEO, AEO and GEO in this article.
How to demonstrate E-E-A-T on your website
- Use case studies, personal stories, and testimonials to showcase real-life experience.
- Highlight your credentials, certifications or add an author bio (extra points for including a link to a LinkedIn profile!) in your articles to prove your expertise.
- Get backlinks from reliable sources and media mentions from sites with decent domain authority scores to assess your own authoritativeness.
- Adhere to ethical standards, demonstrate transparency with clear policies, use HTTPS to keep your site secure, get some nice reviews from platforms like Trustpilot, and provide accurate information to build trustworthiness.
Pro-tip: A solid “About us” page is a great SEO practice that serves to cover a lot of ground on E-E-A-T optimization. Don’t cut yourself short when it comes to showing who’s behind the content and why 😉
Key takeaways
- Google’s Search Quality Raters use Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness to evaluate whether content is helpful and relevant enough to be recommended to users.
- E-E-A-T is not a direct search ranking factor, but it’s important for SEO as it influences Google’s ranking algorithms to prioritize content that is reliable.
- Make sure to reference real personal experiences, add author credentials, earn quality backlinks, and always demonstrate transparency to build trust.
Before you hit “post” on your next content, ask yourself: Can a user feel that this content demonstrates my experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness?
As with almost everything with SEO, E-E-A-T is a long-term approach that’ll serve to strengthen your online presence. If you need some extra resources to help increase your organic traffic for higher ad revenue, take a deep dive into our Refinery Academy or get in touch with our experts.
