EAT signals to Google, elements to add to site pages
They are only three letters, but hide a deep meaning that is linked to the goal of Google to provide quality answers to the questions of users of the search engine: is E-A-T, the paradigm with which the algorithms and Google quality raters assess competence, authoritativeness and reliability (Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) that are behind the content published online. To strengthen the perception of EAT parameters we have some options available, and in particular there are (at least) 8 signals that we can add to the site.
The importance of E-A-T to Google
Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness are one of the new frontiers of Google’s algorithm, which uses various systems to determine whether a website is credible and whether the content it publishes is worthy of ranking high among SERPs or, as recently revealed, to appear in the Google Discover feed.
The weight of E-A-T is felt in particular for the quality evaluation of YMYL content (“Your Money Your Life”), for which several times Google and its public voices have stressed the need to rely on expert authors: for some types of research, In fact, there is an enormous opportunity to share information that can have a crucial impact (even in a negative sense) on the private aspects of people’s lives such as “happiness, health or wealth”.
In other words, Google is concerned that its Serps may show poor quality results, with incorrect information or potentially fraudulent or misleading advice and opinions, on topics such as finance and investment, health and medicine, legal information and so on, which can cause serious harm to users performing the research.
It is therefore to protect people (and the quality of its results) that Google has introduced the concept of E-A-T, well clarified also in the Google Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines to which you must adhere its quality raters in the evaluation of Serps, which therefore serves to increase the chances that the sites located offer a high level of expertise, authority and reliability, especially in sensitive areas such as medical, health and financial issues.
How to improve the E-A-T of our pages
While not technically a ranking factor, E-A-T is an important quality indicator for a site’s pages, and there are some strategies that can help improve Google’s perception of the level of expertise, authoritativeness and reliability of our content.
We should not, however, think of technical optimization interventions, because Google does not use specific metrics or scores to calculate these characteristics, but rather some systems and signals that can help search engine algorithms to understand (and evaluate well) our E-A-T.
Already some time ago we talked about how structured data can help to increase the perceived E-A-T, and today thanks to the contribution of Andrei Prakharevich we can find 8 more signals to add to the pages to improve the E-A-T for Google.
In order to strengthen the E-A-T we need a constant work
These simple interventions obviously serve only as support to improve the E-A-T of our pages and to try to convince Google of the level of competence, authority and reliability that we have achieved, but surely it is not enough just to create a few more pages or to insert additional information.
The starting point is always the creation of quality content, possibly created by real experts: the next step is to use these strategies to communicate to Google the value of these content and try to benefit (also) in terms of ranking.
- Adding (and editing) the author’s biography
One of the most common ways to empower our content is to have it written by an expert or, at least, by a person who may look like an expert. This is why it may be preferable to openly indicate the authors of the content rather than marking the text with the name of the brand or with the words staff/editorial staff.
At the moment, the best practices to make the author known are to indicate the name on the article page and then link that name to a biographical page, always published on the same website – and just recently, with the new update of the guidelines for quality raters, Google pointed out that biographical information of authors can be useful to determine the reputation of a site and content.
This profile page, which serves to give importance to the name, helps us to show various information and – following the latest trends in SEO – we can consider it almost like a microsite, adding a variety of media and links. In general, the author’s bio page includes the following data:
- Photo
- Name
- Work title
- Description
- Links to social media profiles
- Experience (field years, published works, projects, etc.)
- Other articles published on the website
- Linktree
In addition, we can take another step forward and strengthen information about the author with structured data , which improve the way Google finds and identifies such news; in this specific case, there are two types of structured data to implement, article schema and person schema.
The article schema is used on the article page to highlight the author’s name and other details about the content itself: you can add it manually, through a plug-in or with the Google Structured Data Markup Assistant.
On the author’s biographical page, however, we can use the person scheme, which allows you to tag all types of personal details (basically, those listed above, such as photos, descriptions, links, etc.), especially taking care to correctly implement the sameAs property that allows you to tag links to other profiles of the same author, which helps Google to recognize the person and establish it as an entity.
At the moment there is no possibility to use the Google tool to implement the person markup, which then can only be added manually or with a dedicated plug-in.
- Adding a date to the article
Google has repeatedly stated that the date of the article and the freshness of the article in general are not classification factors, but nevertheless the SEO community has carried out various experiments to verify or refute these claims (for example by changing the dates of all articles on a website or by removing the dates altogether), but without having identified a single strategy that works best for everyone.
However, what we do know is that the date of the article is considered important to access Google News and is listed in the transparency section of the Google news service rules; although there is no certainty whether this relevance extends (or not) to non-news articles, it is still a sign that for Google the dates contribute to the credibility of the content in general.
So, also in the interest of full transparency, the advice is to include both the date of publication and the date of the last update of the article, using the article schema to highlight it.
- Use of sources and quotations
According to Prakharevich, “the SEO community is set on gaining authority through backlinks, making sure that other pages connect to your page, but you can actually get some authority by connecting to other credible sources of information in your field”.
In his experience, website owners are often reluctant to link to other websites, “because they are afraid of losing traffic and wasting link juice“, but this should not be a big concern “as long as you link to non-competitive sites” and somehow “downplay the importance of such links, setting them in a boring way that does not encourage clicks”. For new sites, in particular, the potential benefits of being associated with other authoritative sites “far outweigh the risks of pouring some link juice”.
There are some ways in which we can incorporate references to sources in our pages, such as inserting:
- Credits for the images.
- Quotes from industry experts.
- Links correctly anchored within the text.
- Blocks of dedicated references at the end of the page.
According to the expert, precisely the blocks of references are somewhat underestimated in the “regular articles”, but it is “a waste, because they meet all the criteria for a perfect SEO device: the section is clearly entitled for the benefit of Google, each source is described correctly and the whole seems too boring for real readers to click on anything”as in the example from Wikipedia.
- Insert policy pages
There are many Google documents that emphasize how having easily accessible pages of standards and customer support is very important for the credibility and ease of use of a website, and the quality raters have the specific task of searching these pages in order to establish the reliability of the site.
It follows, therefore, that it may be useful to create pages dedicated to all types of policies relevant to our site and to link them in the footer, especially if we are running more promotions and customer loyalty programs.
- Provide details of the company
In maniera un po’ simile al punto precedente, un altro segnale di trasparenza è la divulgazione di informazioni sull’azienda stessa: se forniamo beni, servizi, consigli o anche solo informazioni, gli utenti hanno interesse a vedere chi c’è dietro il sito. Essere trasparenti sulla proprietà del sito è un forte segnale EAT – e, nel senso più pratico, serve anche perché c’è qualcuno da ritenere responsabile nel caso qualcosa vada storto.
Alcune delle pagine che possono aiutarci a creare un senso di trasparenza sono:
- About (vision, mission, history, competitive advantages)
- Team
- Our office
- Contact details
These four pages tell the company from different angles: “this is what we do, who we are, where we work, and that is how you can get in touch with us”, making it tangible so to speak and offering a sense of security to the people who browse the site.
Again, structured data helps us to ensure that Google recognizes our attempt at transparency, and we can tag the business details disclosed by our pages using the Local Business markup.
- The approach to UGCs, user-generated content
Having user-generated content on the site can be a way to “prove that your website attracts real users and involves them enough to leave comments and reviews”, and so it may be worth, in terms of EAT, allowing visitors to leave comments, reviews, questions and other types of UGCs.
As we know, however, this is also one of the most common fronts of spam and Google might actually penalize the site because of a section of comments not adequately maintained, but with some countermeasures you can avoid problems – for example, preventing the automatic creation of accounts, activating moderation functions and revising user content to search for any automatically generated posts, spam links or malicious comments that may spread sensitive information or offend other users.
- Serve HTTPS pages
There are not many doubts about the importance of HTTPS as a signal of reliability of a site, reaffirmed both by the guidelines for quality raters and by the Page Experience (of which it is one of the technical factors, together with the Core Web Vitals, the optimization for mobile devices and the absence of interstitial).
Therefore, if we have not yet enabled HTTPS on the site it is good to check with the hosting provider (which often offer a free SSL) or get a free SSL certificate from Let’s Encrypt, which however must be updated every six months.
- Exploit external signals
The latest advice from Prakharevich “is a bit of a trick”, because external signals are not added to the website itself, but they help to strengthen the overall EAT profile and can also be “checked”such as the backlink profile and the Google My Business tab.
The quality and size of the site’s backlink profile “are the only EAT signals that Google can algorithmically measure”, but of course we must try to send the opposite signal, which is an unnatural profile with backlinks from pages or spam sites.
If we have a business headquarters, then, a Google My Business tab is crucial, because this tool is now the ultimate business directory and the key place to which users will go to learn about a local business activity.
The quality of the GMB profile – that is the completeness of the information, the number of reviews and the average rating – are taken into account for the positioning on Google Maps, as well as on other Google platforms. In addition, the GMB profile is also one of the places that quality raters control when assessing the EAT position of a brand, which is why it is crucial to take good care of the information entered. A further step forward would be boosting user feedbacks, responding to positive reviews, trying to solve problems reported by negative ones and encouraging our customer base to go to Google and actually leave a review.
