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In February, Danny Sullivan said that that Google's "systems aren't looking for EAT." "There are many different signals that, if we get it right, align with what a good human EAT assessment would be," he added. In March, nice find Marie Haynes, Google repeated that with an update to its post on "What webmasters should know about Google's core updates."
Here is what Google added to that blog post:
Note (March 2020): Since we originally wrote this post, we have been occasionally asked if E-A-T is a ranking factor. Our automated systems use a mix of many different signals to rank great content. We've tried to make this mix align what human beings would agree is great content as they would assess it according to E-A-T criteria. Given this, assessing your own content in terms of E-A-T criteria may help align it conceptually with the different signals that our automated systems use to rank content.
Now, if you read this carefully, Google is clearly saying that E-A-T is not directly in the ranking algorithm but Google does use different signals (not EAT but different signals) that may align conceptually to EAT on some level.
This isn't new, the statement, but Google did update that blog post last month some time:
Is E-A-T a ranking factor? Just noticed G added this to their document on core updates.
— Marie Haynes (@Marie_Haynes) April 13, 2020
Assessing your E-A-T as described in the QRG can help your content align "conceptually with the different signals [Google's] automated systems use to rank content."https://t.co/RlB8CvCtIx pic.twitter.com/yLXFZRC3Zv
Here is Danny's tweet from February:
Our systems aren't looking for EAT. Our raters are using that to see if our systems are working well to show good information. There are many different signals that, if we get it right, align with what a good human EAT assessment would be. See also: https://t.co/1fs2oJ9Gtl pic.twitter.com/GBbnYEjJUV
— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) February 19, 2020
Forum discussion at Twitter.
