Danny Sullivan, the Google Search Liaison, wrote on X, “Another thing to keep in mind is that some of the sites I’ve looked into, where someone thinks they have a helpful content issue — they’re fine.” Meaning, those sites may have seen competitors see a lift and jump up ahead of them but their traffic is down because of the competition ranking better, not because of any unhelpful content issues.
“They’re ranking in the top results. There’s no fundamental content issues. It’s more that other things might have moved up even slightly,” he added.
He wrote this a while ago over here as well, saying, “But I also think it’s important to understand that your content might be great, not have any issues to correct, but it’s just relatively speaking, perhaps it’s slipped a bit down in the rankings.” That was him addressing a specific case.
Here are those posts:
Another thing to keep in mind is that some of the sites I’ve looked into, where someone thinks they have a helpful content issue — they’re fine. They’re ranking in the top results. There’s no fundamental content issues. It’s more that other things might have moved up even…
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) February 12, 2024
Katie, if you’re trying to understand how to improve, the key page from us is this: https://t.co/NaRQqb1SQx
But I also think it’s important to understand that your content might be great, not have any issues to correct, but it’s just relatively speaking, perhaps it’s slipped a…
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) December 11, 2023