1. What is Google’s E-A-T? In August 2018

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1. What is Google’s E-A-T?
In August 2018, Google dropped a big algorithm update. This update was also known as the “medic update” and it affected the ranking of many websites.

E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness. These are benin telemarketing data things that Google uses to see how worthy a website is for ranking.

E-A-T is a little tricky to explain because it does not directly affect your SEO ranking the same way that your site speed or headings might. However, Google does use “search raters” which are people who confirm whether algorithms are working properly and if websites are providing the best user experience possible. These people are given guidelines which include the E-A-T criteria.

Danny Sullivan, Google’s search liaison, explains it like this in a 2019 tweet:

“Is E-A-T a ranking factor? Not if you mean there’s some technical thing like with speed that we can measure directly. We do use a variety of signals as a proxy to tell if content seems to match E-A-T as humans would assess it. In that regard, yeah, it’s a ranking factor.”

Danny Sullivan Twitter Thread Describing Google E-A-T (Screenshot)

To put it a different way, E-A-T certainly can affect your ranking, but to determine if your website is a good candidate to rank high they can’t just put in some technical parameters into Google’s algorithm.

For example, long-form content tends to rank higher on Google searches, but just because something is long doesn’t mean it’s useful or reliable.

Google wants to produce results that give people information that’s trustworthy, and they use quality raters to make sure that happens.