Brownie Bites Blog

Recipe Blogger and Writer. Author of The Unofficial Dollywood Cookbook. New content on hold due to Google HCU update.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@searchliaison Project BluePot disturbs me immensely. Google actively moving from a search engine to an "answer engine" by keeping users on their site and keeping clicks away from small publishers. Unethical.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@LeToamasina @googlehonesty I'm so sorry, and I'm in the same boat. I had such passion for my blog and the content I created, just to have it ripped out from under me with NO information about what I did wrong or what I can do to fix it.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@searchliaison @aleyda It is troubling that you keep repeating that sites aren't de-ranked simply because they are small sites. Might Google be collecting material to play in a courtroom when they need to prove that they did not target independent, small, niche creators?

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@foley_seo @Google @searchliaison @dannysullivan I agree that this statement is a low blow, and I feel sorry for you SEO guys in all of this, too. But realistically, us small publishers are not going to pay for audits when no recoveries have been shown from revamped sites.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

Google always has a motive. The "we care" facade is just that... a facade.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

The double-talk and lack of transparency is what frustrates me more than anything.

[PAPPACLARTUS @_GTArena_]

@foley_seo @Google @searchliaison @dannysullivan They are saying that no amount of SEO will fix HCU hit sites. That's because literally sites are shadow banned with some kind of classifier. Yet in the same breath they have also said there is no classifier/shadow ban. Make it make sense.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@KumarpalKp @Okayy_Dan Nah, I've never used LinkedIn.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@AVerySmallWorld @Okayy_Dan Except apparently their big giant building was completely void of workers, empty parking lots and all. /snicker

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

This would be one solution. I doubt Google would spare the manpower to do it, however.

[RockAction @allthewaywego22]

@Goog_Enough @rebekah_creates @searchliaison @searchliaison or why can’t you propose a manual creator verification system so genuine sites can be manually assessed on quality. Heck, creators would even pay for it so it’s zero cost to you.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@iambrandonsalt And it was at their expense! It's a bad look that Google just reported record-busting earnings while 20 small publishers who just had their income slashed - by Google - had to pay their own way to feed them more data.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

Please read this if you were hit by @Google ridiculous HCU 'update' Unethical is the perfect word, though as we know... Google does not care about us.

[Kristine (@schachin on Tw*tter(NOW)) 🇺🇦 @schachin]

🔥 #SEO a little personal note on the @Google Creator Summit where they told site owners they had no real chance of recovery.

Literally telling them to move on.

I've been doing nothing SEO since 2004, I've been recovering sites for 14 years.

I have never had a site I couldn't get out of a devaluation, even Penguin, as long as they did what I told them to do.

Until this moment, I thought Penguin was the most unethical algorithm Google ever ran. Not anymore.

[A link to the article I wrote about that here: https://t.co/HGWFdi8Vnl ]

Penguin was so unethical because you couldn't recover until they ran it a 2nd time and the last time they ran it it was 2 years between updates.

This means you could do all the work to fix the issue, that most site owners didn't know they had because some scammy SEO bought links they didn't authorize, and you could not recover that site for 2 years.

Not to mention that it transferred the devaluation to a new site if you tried to create one to get out of the situation and they could tell it was your site.

But this has to be the worst thing I've seen Google as a company do, not blaming any of the people that we communicate with because they try their best and do what they can within the confines of their company to help, I put this all on Sundar Pichai and Prabhakar Raghavan and their push for AI without properly testing.

Anyone remember drinking a gallon of your own urine to cure kidney stones?

Matt Cutts always said he never put machine learning in the core ranking signals because if it broke they wouldn't be able to fix it.

Ge was right and everything points to the fact that Google put this machine learning algorithm out there, it was not properly trained, and it broke.

The site owners affected were not medium to large size businesses. they were small publishers. Many who have now lost their livelihoods completely.

One went from between 15j and 30k visits a day to having to deliver pizza to pay the rent.

The least Google could do is come out and tell them that instead of telling them to move on as though it was their fault.

Eapecially after people at the Summit got confirmation it wasn't their content that was the problem.

Remember this was called The Helpful Content Update, so content was supposed to be the thing it concentrated on.

The fact that it didn't and they can't remove it and there's no evidence that they ever did lift it, despite their claims that that happened in March, puts Google in a terrible light,

And truly Google, if you are reading this, your malpractice is likely what destroyed these people's livelihoods.

Telling them just to move on is not an acceptable answer or solution.

Telling them what happened, even if you have to put them under NDA, and helping them out of it would be the proper thing to do if this was your mistake and it certainly looks like it was your mistake.

It's gobsmacking.

🔗🔥 Article
https://t.co/y9jEkNA2je

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

So grateful for those who are speaking for us! I remain convinced that @Google has no true idea of thedevastation to families their "updates" have caused.. @searchliaison remains silent online, though "he's a nice guy". Nice doesn't restore traffic to countless small publishers.

[Gisele Navarro @ichbinGisele]

My brain is destroyed from the jet lag and I will need time to process things before sharing my thoughts on the Web Creator Conversation.

We asked hard questions, pushed back, showed examples, and shared ideas. We represented small and independent sites the best way we could.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@niharikaverma95 @sbdaysz @CharlestonCraft They did mess up, though if no one can find us, then blogging is going to be dead very soon, if not already. It's great you have a loyal following, though scale matters. It takes hundreds of thousands of loyal, engaged followers to make a difference when it comes to income.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

I have to laugh so I don't cry, I guess? @searchliaison everyone is saying you are a genuine guy who actually cares.. so deep inside, what are your thoughts on this insulting PR stunt?

[Google Screws Webmasters @GoogleScrews]

@searchliaison showing off the new Niche Site Memorial building on the Google Campus

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@ichangedmyname Unfortunately, I think the event existed to fill us small publishers with platitudes. It was a PR stunt to save face. I don't have anything against Danny as an individual, but the company he represents is heartless.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@rustybrick Now reverse this disastrous HCU that has stolen the livelihoods of thousands of bloggers and small publishers.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@google @searchliaison Google has stolen the livelihoods of bloggers and small publishers. https://t.co/ruo7MdM3j3

[Mike Futia @mikefutia]

Here’s how Google can help small publishers @searchliaison —

Give them their traffic back.

[Brownie Bites Blog @erinbrowne]

@searchliaison When do you plan to address, publicly and with transparency, the income that was stolen from small publishers who have worked for years to create useful content for their readers?