Question

Guys, what's your stance on E-A-T being a ranking factor? Most E-A-T optimization is really good advice, but do you generally believe it's a ranking factor?  

Answer 1

When the LION's hungry he EATs.  

Comments

Confirmed; Google is a Lion

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Someone needs to make a new acronym out of L-I-O-N

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Latent Idiotic Optimization Non-sense

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Hey @roup7457 see above. we have a new one.  

Answer 2

Ok, well EAT isn't actually a thing. That's the raters guide that was created for non-search professionals to understand what they were looking at and rating. SEOs started using that term and so some Googlers just rolled with it. There are very few trust related patents/papers and nearly none on 'expertise' and 'authority'. The post in question is also hyperboloc. Google didn't confirm shit. She's just quoting a paper. That's funny, cause it's the kinda shit the paper is about (dealing with misinformation). I lulzed. That paper actually talks about the raters in her so called "statement" from Google. In fact, even in the part Marie highlighted it states, "The resulting ratings do not affect the ranking of any individual website, but they do help us benchmark the quality of our results, " Sooooooooo Furthermore, that paper is more about how they deal with "fake news" etc. Not really about EAT nor is it, again, any form of statement on it's use and how it's calculated. It's really more of a press release. not an information retrieval paper. So, until any SEOs can actually tell me the types of algorithms and associated scoring is used to determine EAT, it's nothing more than suggestions to the raters and webmasters alike. It's not really something you can define and ultimaetly optimize for. Some have drank the Google kool-aid and state "authority" is links. but fine. then worry about link building if that's what you believe. Talking abut EAT tends to just muddy the waters at this point IMO.  

Comments

@deathless Thanks for the honest and very detailed reply! :) That's basically what I also think about this EAT thing, just interested in a few more opinions of the seasoned SEOs ;)

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No probs. it's been something @roup7457 and I (and the rest of the crew) have been talking/debating about over the last while. it's becoming a bit of a smokescreen for Google methinks. we latched on to the EAT from the raters guide. we made the kool-aid and Google was more than happy to let us drink it. hehe

Answer 3

Does it really matter? EAT is a great indication of the search engine that Google are trying to build and therefore acts as the guiding principles for building a website that will rank on Google, Focus on the long term picture and you will never have to care about what the current ranking factors are, or stress because an algorithm update has exposed your quick hacks.  

Comments

But EAT is just lip service. smoke and mirrors. how does one build a website with EAT? lol. It reminds me of all the dumb-ass buzz about Hummingbird, RankBrain, BERT et al. one doesn't really optimize for EAT.  

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No. EAT is not an indication of the search engine Google wants to build. It's JUST a way to get the quality raters to judge search results using the same criteria rather than unknown bias each person might bring.  

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So you would both advise people to build untrustworthy websites which don't show expertise or authoritativeness?  

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Yea ok. so hey, care to tell me (algorithmic-ally) how one ranks/scores a site for that? Then we can all go and do it for our clients. oh wait. there's no such bloody thing. As u were. it's like when Google says "create quality content" but never defines it's definition of "quality". Ya know?  

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@deathless So let's recap. I implied that EAT doesn't matter. I stated that it should just be used as an 'implication' of the search engine Google wants to build and that it should be treated as A (not THE) 'guiding principle' for building websites. You have said that you don't understand how the phrases expertise, authority, trust or quality can relate to websites; but you still want me to explain how all these things work as ranking factors within Google's algorithm? I'll pass.  

Answer 4

In my space (healthcare), it’s super important. You have to build business models that allow you hit a lofty bar. It was a lot of work and expensive to move all our content to medically reviewed and written.  

Comments

@posse934 Thanks for your comment! Yeah, I guess healthcare websites need on the whole a lot more optimization today. Did you see significant improvement after investing into content optimization?  

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I think it's a big part of us growing from 300K (when we switched) to 1. 8M organic arrivals from Google a month!  

Answer 5

I also think E-A-T or something like it impacts link equity. I'd much rather have a ProPublica link than a Forbes one, for instance.  

Comments

Well, links would certainly be something I'd consider to be an "authority" factor (and whom is linking to you)

Answer 6

You are what you eat!  

Comments

Love to talk. but I am EATing some client sites at the moment.  

Answer 7

There is no E-A-T signal. But creating good content is always a good thing. I wouldn't go so far as to add notes saying "this article was reviewed by expert so-and-so" because that won't have any effect on any algorithms. It might make some quality raters laugh but they don't have anything to do with your rankings.  

Comments

Yea well it's nothing more than Google's new "create quality content" and SEOs latest crap they can sell to clients (see; Hummingbird, RankBrain, BERT et al)

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I have a collection of literally hundreds of Google patents/papers and couldn't put together scoring elements that make up EAT if you offered me a million $$. ok. maybe I could. but I'd be bullshitting obviously ROFL

Answer 8

EAT is a broad and easy-ish way of representing technical ranking factors and algorithmic patents including page rank (can be represented by domain/page authority by Moz or DR/UR by ahrefs); document proximity to authority (represented by Trust Flow in Majestic); and relevance represented by link On page factors, anchor text, link context and placement, and link profile of the link itself. EAT means absolutely nothing - only the combos of those items + your actual rank & traffic can tell u if your site is where it should be : )

Answer 9

The components of EAT (what the letters stand for) can help with rankings either directly or indirectly. Some algorithms that rank pick up signals and ranking factors will look for the components of EAT, The EAT algorithm itself not actually a ranking factor but just educating the algorithms that are looking for certain factors and signals on what would be seen as Expertise, Authority or Trust, as far as I understand.  

Answer 10

Not a factor. It just means they're smarter at understanding meaning of words and matching with intent.  

Answer 11

I view quality rater guidelines as a test for what Google would like to do algorithmically. It's a good indication of where Google is going. As machine learning algorithms advance, I can see EAT becoming a stronger algorithmic factor. The fact that Google wants taters to take an authors EAT into account backs this up for me. I see EAT as a great way to format content strategy now, knowing what Google wants to see

Answer 12

Another silly catch phrase

Answer 13

This is one of those times that understanding data science would come in handy. Pretty hard to quantify EAT.