Your Guide to Google E-A-T & SEO

What is Google EAT?

EAT: The three letters stand for Expertise, Authority and Trustworthiness. The terms appeared for the first time in 2014/2015 in the Google Quality Rater Guidelines, which Google subsequently referred to as Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines. EAT is one of the concepts Google uses to rate websites, but not just websites. Meanwhile (since 2018) Google also assesses the expertise, authority and trustworthiness of the authors of online texts (authors).

The search engine wants to make sure, especially on info pages, that Google users actually get trustworthy, good information on the pages that appear at the top of the search results. This is particularly important for Google for pages with a so-called YMYL topic that is highly relevant to the finances and/or life of Google users. In addition to the search engine itself, Google employees, so-called quality raters, also make judgments about the EAT of pages and authors.

What is Expertise at Google?

The expertise always refers to the author of a text. So Google assesses how competent the respective author is to write about the topic he has chosen. The fact that the author really understands a lot about the topic is of course of different importance for different topics. For example, if he writes about the last game of the German national soccer team, a lack of expert knowledge has little impact on the life of the reader. If, on the other hand, he writes about legal or medical topics, incorrect information can have fatal consequences for him in the worst case.

Google distinguishes everyday experts and experts . The subject of "diabetes" is a good example: The experts are of course diabetologists with a medical degree. A daily expert, on the other hand, can be someone who has had diabetes for several years, runs a self-help group and has posted a well-known blog on the subject. Of course, expertise cannot be simulated very well. You have to own them for Google to register them. But you can make it easier for Google to include information about existing expertise. For example, through an information block about the author of a text on the page on which the text is published.

What is Authority on Google?

The authority (authority) is about the image, i.e. the level of awareness of the page or the author. And about how much the site or the author is trusted to deal with a topic competently. To make the difference clear: someone can objectively have a lot of expertise, but still not be considered a capacity in their field. He then has expertise, but is not an authority. The same goes for an expert author's website. If no one cites them, their authority tends to be low.

An important expression of a website's authority are still backlinks , i.e. links that refer to the page content. However , Google has now learned to differentiate between good and bad backlinks. Good backlinks are those that the operator of a well-known website places out of conviction. Bad ones are, for example, those from sites that were actually only put online to distribute any backlinks.

What is trustworthiness at Google?

Trustworthiness is of course in line with expertise. Someone who does not qualify as an expert on a subject that calls for experts cannot be trusted. But trustworthiness goes beyond that. After all, a person could be an expert, but not independent. And an expert site could also lack the independence necessary for trustworthiness.

A classic example are influencers who promote certain products because they get benefits from them. The fact that they were able to become influencers perhaps makes it clear that many factors play a role in online popularity. Trustworthiness can be increased, for example, with certificates or seals from well-known organizations or with encrypted data transmission (HTTPS). Reviews of a website on forums and review sites also feed into judgments about the credibility of a website and/or an author.

What is quality content?

The value of content is particularly important for Google on informative pages. In the case of entertainment such as comedy in written form, the following generally applies: each user decides what is of high quality. In the case of informative texts, on the other hand, more objective criteria can be used to assess the value of the content. When it comes to information, it is of course about factual correctness. No informative content is of high quality if it contains nothing but factually incorrect information. Originality is also a criterion for Google. A text can be completely factually correct, but only reflect content that has already been reproduced on numerous other sites. If it does not contain a single new aspect, it is rather not of high quality.

Formal criteria also play a role in the assessment of value. The topic of textual content on a website should be reflected in headings and subheadings. Last but not least, spelling and grammar are also included in the judgment.

What is YMYL?

High-quality content is particularly important for so-called YMYL topics. The four letters stand for "your money, your life" . It is therefore about topics with particular relevance for money (finance) and/or the life of Internet users. Relevance to life is something very individual. News about the Bundesliga is highly relevant for some and not relevant at all for others.

However, Google judges a general relevance for life in YMYL topics more by the effects that misinformation can have . They are usually low for football information, but high for medical information. And pages with investor tips (YM: your money) can also have catastrophic (financial) consequences in the worst case.Internet pages with YMYL topics are therefore particularly in the focus of Google when it comes to EAT. However, the following also applies: In principle, EAT plays a role on all pages, but only a little more on pages with YMYL themes.

Which sites are ranked by Google for YMYL?

In the case of YM (your money), it is of course primarily websites with financial and investment tips that Google has a particular eye on as pages with YMYL topics. After all, the right or wrong financial decision can have a significant impact on a Google user's livelihood. Online shops and other e-commerce offerings are also finance related, so they too are part of the finance aspect of the YMYL space.

The section (your life) is much broader. Of course, it includes the topic of health, because misinformation here can also have a major impact on the life or immediate environment of those seeking information. The same applies to topics such as law or education. In addition, there are YL topics such as politics, in which misinformation may change the individual life of the user less. Instead, they may change attitudes to the detriment of the community. The same applies to pages with information about groups with characteristics such as a certain religious affiliation or affiliation with a certain ethnicity.

What are the Quality Rater Guidelines?

Quality raters are auditors commissioned by Google who visit websites on Google's behalf and rate them according to specified criteria. The correct term for these evaluators is Search Quality Evaluators. They check the respective page in areas such as content, web design and maintenance of the website as well as legal notices and navigation. The rating scale for the respective areas includes ratings in descending order from highest to high, medium and low to lowest.

In addition, the quality raters try to understand the intentions of the site visitors and, on this basis, to assess how well the checked website lives up to the intentions. In principle, the Quality Rater Guidelines are the written instructions for the auditors. The guidelines are known today as the Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines. They refer to EAT as one of the most important factors in the overall assessment of page quality.

Is EAT a ranking factor?

There is some debate as to whether EAT is a ranking factor. Google itself wrote about EAT (Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness) for a website in a white paper (translated:): “Our ranking system recognizes neither the intention nor the factual accuracy of a specific piece of content. Nonetheless, it is specifically designed to identify websites with high scores of expertise, authority, and trustworthiness.” That sounds like EAT could be a ranking factor. On the other hand, when asked “How do Google's algorithms evaluate expertise, authority and trustworthiness?”, the same white paper states: “The resulting evaluations do not affect the ranking of an individual website, but help us to assess the quality of our results, which in turn allows us to develop algorithms that recognize results that meet high quality criteria worldwide.”

So: not really a ranking factor after all? If you compare EAT with such concrete ranking factors as length of stay and number of (good) backlinks, then expertise, authority and trustworthiness are ranking factors at most in the broader sense . EAT is definitely not a ranking factor that is represented by its own score value. Rather, it is a kind of concept that is always included in the evaluation of a website.

What affects EAT?

Generally speaking, everything influences EAT, which demonstrates the expertise of the text authors. Which is good evidence that a website or author is highly respected and trustworthy in a subject or in general.

Of course, the influencing factors include the texts: They should be based on information pages based on thorough research , be factually correct and - depending on the topic - be written by expert authors, who the page then also names as authors. The expertise of the respective authors should be comprehensible on the internet. Backlinks from important portals and websites also influence the EAT. Intelligent link building therefore remains an important strategy for making a website prominently visible on Google.

Opinions about a website published on rating portals are also likely to have an impact, and user-generated content such as comments and the age of the domain could also be influencing factors. Last but not least, Google should also have access to pages such as the imprint, because these pages can also provide the search engine with important clues for a judgment about EAT.

If you know the influencing factors on EAT, you also know where to start in order to optimize it. Especially with YMYL topics, experts should get to work as authors. Of course, the work of a ghostwriter is possible. But an expert should then urgently check the text for factual accuracy and the text should be published under his name. An additional info box with information about the author is often even better.

The experts should strengthen their reputation as specialists on the Internet with specialist articles and forum posts if possible and the contents of information pages are best prepared in such a way that readers can form their own judgement. This can include, for example, naming pros AND cons of planned measures, even if the expert positions himself clearly for or against. As mentioned earlier, having a good strategy for gaining good backlinks is an asset. If a company or another website operator can show certificates and seals, they naturally belong on the website with the appropriate information for optimization. On the other hand, encrypted data transmission with "HTTPS" and the offer of trustworthy payment methods are almost no longer optimization for sites with payment transactions such as online shops, but a must.