Google has initiated the rollout of the August 2024 core update. The August core update aims to surface useful content from small and independent sites. This update is not your typical update. Google got some feedback from the September 2023 helpful content update that had a negative impact on many small and independent publishers.

John Mueller, Search Advocate at Google, wrote:

"Today, we launched our August 2024 core update to Google Search. This update is designed to continue our work to improve the quality of our search results by showing more content that people find genuinely useful and less content that feels like it was made just to perform well on Search."

Mueller added:

"This August 2024 core update 'aims to better capture improvements that sites may have made, so we can continue to surface the best of the web.'"

In addition to the August core update, Google posted several updates to its help page about core updates, including more in-depth guidance for those who may see changes after an update.

The Potential Impact

With Google's update rolling out now, they are some functions that will happen in the SERPs for sites that have unhelpful, low-quality, and unoriginal content and create content for search engines rather than people. For sites that are following SEO best practices and creating content that satisfies the end users' information needs and is relevant and useful, they should not be impacted. Some sites that were impacted by previous core updated are hoping that they will see improvements since the September 2023 helpful content update rolled out, especially if they did not see any improvements in the March Core update. Now, with this August 2024 core update, many of those sites hit by previous updates will be watching closely to see if their sites recover over the next few weeks.

Why is Google Doing This?

Google's job is to provide end users with the information that they are looking for and to provide users with useful content and user experience. Google routinely updates their algorithm as part of their ongoing efforts to improve search quality and provide users with more relevant and helpful content.

What to Expect and What to Do?

Over the next few weeks there may be some changes in rankings as Google continues to roll out updates to various systems within the overall core system. Since this change has started to roll out, it is recommended to monitor your website and observe any fluctuations in traffic and most important of all don't panic.