What Is Your
Money or Your Life Content?
Google can be
frustratingly opaque when it comes to sharing how their search
algorithm works, but they’ve also done SEOs and small business owners a
big favor by publicly sharing their quality rater guidelines.
Quality raters manually review websites and the data from these ratings
is used to influence Google’s search algorithms, which means these
guidelines offer us the best insight into what Google values in a
website and how they categorize Your Money or Your Life content.
According to their
quality rater guidelines, Your Money or Your Life topics include:
- News
and current events,
with exceptions for entertainment, lifestyle, and sports. Anything
involving politics, international events, business, science, and
technology is considered YMYL.
- Civics,
government, and law,
such as information about voting, social services, and legal
issues.
- Financial
topics, including advice and
information on investments, taxes, banking, insurance, etc.
- Shopping, which includes not
only retail websites where consumers spend money but also websites
with product reviews and recommendations.
- Health
and safety,
such as pages dealing with health and medical issues, medications,
and emergency preparedness.
- Groups
of people,
or specifically, claims about groups of people based on age, race,
sex, sexuality, age, etc.
- Other
YMYL topics
include fitness, nutrition, parenting, job hunting, housing
information, and more.
YMYL content has a high
bar for accuracy and truthfulness because it involves information that,
if inaccurate, dishonest, or deceptive, could impact someone’s
finances, health, safety, or even general happiness.
Of course, this can be
subjective, particularly in regards to information that could
negatively impact someone’s happiness. Instead of getting caught up in
the minutiae and spending your time trying to decide if your content
qualifies as YMYL, we recommend you simply have the mindset that as a
business, your content needs to meet higher standards.
YMYL and E-A-T
Because all businesses
exist to make money, and your website is a tool used to persuade
potential clients and customers to choose your business, you should
consider all of the pages on your site to be YMYL content—and not just
for Google’s benefit. Creating high-quality, authoritative content is
good for your business, regardless of the SEO implications. This means
you should focus on building your E-A-T.
E-A-T is one of the
most important factors in determining the quality of YMYL content.
E-A-T stands for:
Expertise
The creator of the
content on a page should have credentials and expertise. The level of
expertise can vary here, though. If you own a toy store and you’re
writing a blog post about the hottest toys for the upcoming holiday
season, your expertise as the business owner will suffice. If you own a
gym and you’re posting content with diet recommendations, it should be
written by a nutritionist. (Note that content can be written by a
ghostwriter and given a byline for someone on your team, provided that
they review it for accuracy.)
Authoritativeness
The authority of a
website is determined by the content of the page, the content creator,
and the rest of a website. Are you (or your business) a recognized
authority on the topic in question? Do you have a presence on the web
outside of your website as an expert in your field? (Guest posts can
help boost your authoritativeness.)
Trustworthiness
Trustworthiness means
people who visit your website can trust that you’re providing honest,
up-to-date information. Is the information on your website accurate? Is
content well-written and purposeful?
(Here’s a deeper dive into E-A-T
and what it means for SEO for small businesses.)
Certainly, some
businesses have higher stakes than others when it comes to YMYL, but
taking the approach that all of your content should be high-quality and
have good E-A-T will benefit your search engine rankings and make your
business look trustworthy in the eyes of both current and potential
clients and customers.
Quite
simply, people are more likely to spend money on a business with a
professional web presence, while a website that’s poorly designed,
riddled with errors, and full of thin content generated solely for SEO
doesn’t engender trust.
Best Practices
for YMYL Content
In addition to taking
steps to bolster your E-A-T, the following practices can help your
content rank well:
- Easy
navigation, including a user-friendly menu and a homepage that’s a
single click away from any SEO landing page.
- Content
is consistent and on-topic.
- Contact
information is readily available and bylines appear for every blog
post.
- Website
is maintained and regularly updated.
- Site
design is professional and up-to-date, without script or loading
errors.
While search algorithms
change, the one constant is that Google rewards useful, well-written
content from reliable sources. Focus on providing this to your audience
and you can’t go wrong!
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