Google De-Ranking small businesses.



Its not you, 

Google search results are unhelpful 

- On purpose!

I have contemplated posting this since late March of 2024.

Don't want to come off as whining, but I feel like people outside the sphere should know.

We were in the top 10 of results for multiple keywords (searches) now we are on page 5, or not ranking at all for those keywords. Websites are ranked by keywords. When you search for "painter near me" - that phrase is a keyword.

These are my observations after spending the last year working on our website to make it better.

Google does what are called Core Updates 3-4 times a year. That last Core update in March, pretty much de-ranked our website across those keywords

Everyone claims that its all about content, good helpful content. I have spent hundreds of hours creating one of a kind content for our website. I have typed out over 25,000 words explaining the details of our work for our clients/potential clients. Some of which is turning up on AI generated websites that weren't there before. Trade secret type information which is how I know its from us. I put it out there so whatever. But when you read about needing a bonding agent for plaster on a spammy website? Yep thats from us. They scraped our site for information then ran it through AI (which gets most aspects of plaster repair wrong by the way) and then reposted it online. (Just one example)

There are no generic or AI created images anywhere on our website. All images are of actual work.

And as I am finishing up that work, Google de-ranks CarriganPainting.com across multiple keywords 

 I am of the position that google, is actually targeting small businesses that can't afford to drop $10,000 on a website. 

In March (when the update rolled out) we had 2. Not 20. Two. Two calls for work.  



So on top of all the other crap we have to deal with, now google, is de-ranking small businesses. 

There is no fixing it either. Its Google. There is no calling Google, there is no tech support at google. 


Edit: 5-2-24
HouseFresh (They independently review air purifiers) wrote a lengthy article about it for anyone who looking for a more insightful take on google search:
https://housefresh.com/how-google-decimated-housefresh/

This is a serious problem for small local businesses as most people use google to find local services. To put this into perspective, we lost 75% of our traffic from google compared to February. Thanks Google.. 

That directly affects our company and many like us. Some small businesses won't survive through no fault of their own simply because of googles actions.

Scary


By: Dave Carrigan 

Location: Akron, NY 14001, USA

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