I’ve been studying new sites that are thriving on Google since the September Helpful Content Update (which decimated most sites).

My goal is to gather clues about what the algorithm now rewards.

I’ve made a bunch of fascinating discoveries.

Sponsored Ad

A Web Asset Builders Special Offer

We’re spilling the beans on everything we’ve learned from building 150+ niche site, in a short ebook titled Lessons From 150+ Niche Sites

Come grab the ebook - it’s free for a limited time for all NSG subscribers!

Get 40% Off Niche Site Packages
or Get a Niche Site for Only $399/month

You can now get a massive 100,000 words (about 50 articles) niche site for only $399/month for 6 months.

Or get a 50,000 words niche site starting at only $1350!

What’s included:

🧭 Niche Selection Help
🔍 Keyword Research
📅 Content Planning
✍️ Superior Content optimized with KWHero
🖼️ Awesome Templates
📤 Content Publishing & Design
⚙️ On-Page & Speed Optimization
🔗 Affiliate & Internal Links, Ongoing Support

All Niche Site Growth Subscribers Get 40% Off On
WebAssetBuilders.com

Perhaps the most fascinating discovery I’ve made is that NOW is a great time to launch a new website and rank it on Google.

Yes, even despite Reddit, Quora, and any DA 90+ site ranking for practically everything.

Because the HCU destroyed so many sites (I’d guess 95%+), many people are abandoning their attempts to rank on Google and have turned to Pinterest and Facebook for traffic instead.

But from my observations, they gave up on Google too early.

In fact, this might sound crazy… but it appears that Google’s HCU only applied to sites that existed at the time of the update.

Websites launched during or after the update (which rolled out from September 14-28) don’t appear to be held to the same standards.

Why do I think that?

I launched a new niche site on September 20th. All content is 100% AI. I check for accuracy, change the formatting, and include non-AI images, but that’s it.

(By the way, I reveal the URL and all my strategies in my premium community).

Check out that traffic spike:

Sorry, I couldn’t resist sharing the Ahrefs screenshot. I know it’s annoying when site owners share Ahrefs instead of their actual analytics haha. It just looks so much more epic!

Here’s the actual traffic according to Plausible Analytics which is installed on the site:

The majority of that is organic traffic from Google.

If the HCU rolled out now instead of September, I doubt this site would survive. But it was indexed by Google at the very end of the HCU rollout, so for whatever reason it appears the HCU rules don’t apply to it.

Now, you’re probably thinking this is a weak argument and you’d be right. So, I present you with point number 2:

I found a site that hit 120,000 visitors/mo in just 50 days. It’s the subject of this tweet:

The fascinating discovery that I made is that the owner redirected his old site to a different domain and almost fully recovered all the lost traffic.

This is the old site:

The new domain was registered on November 29th, which is probably when the redirect was made.

As you can see, traffic was at 120K/mo when the HCU hit. And now, the new domain (with the same content from the old site) is about to reach 120K/mo.

I should clarify - it’s not a completely fresh domain. It shows up on the Wayback Machine as early as 2010. But for many years it was just parked without any content or backlinks, and then dropped entirely. The Domain Rating was 0 and it had 0 backlinks the day before the redirect was made.

I won’t share the URL, but I did promise to share the niche it’s in. ‘Tis the aquarium niche.

The takeaway from this observation is that if your site was hit by the HCU, just do a 301 redirect to a new domain and your old rankings and traffic might actually come back. The new domain isn’t subject to the HCU hammer.

Two more weird observations about this site before I move on:

If that’s still not enough evidence that post-HCU sites/domains aren’t subject to the HCU, I present you with point number 3:

I’m aware it’s no surprise that a straight AI site does so well, but it’s shocking how well it ranks compared to MUCH better sites started before the HCU.

Just seems like more evidence that sites built after the HCU have free rein to rank on Google, whereas their pre-HCU counterparts must continue to suffer.

The site in question is: https://britishrecipesbook.co.uk/

Even the author image is AI (just look at the hands! 😆)

This is the site I was referring to in this tweet:

My observation:

The domain was registered on September 28th, 2023.

The exact day the HCU finished rolling out.

This site has no business ranking so well, and yet, because it was started AFTER the HCU, it has the green light from Google.

I’ve seen the same thing over and over again when looking at new sites. As long as they were built after the HCU, their growth is up and to the right. Even without backlinks (like my site and the British recipe site).

I should mention that topical authority definitely matters. All the brand new sites I’ve observed with massive traffic spikes have good content clusters, not straying to topics outside their typical coverage.

Hot take: ranking in Google is surprisingly easy right now, despite what you’d think after seeing everyone get hit by the HCU.

What are your thoughts on all this? I’d love it if you reply and share what you’ve been observing!

A couple more things before I end this email:

I’m going to start sharing more observations about sites that survived or recovered from the HCU in my premium community, Website Growth Mastermind. I’ll even reveal the URLs.

I’m considering raising the price soon as well. It’s currently $15/mo. So if you want to join, do it ASAP to lock in the current price.

Also:

My database of websites with tons of useful metrics (Site Stats Database) is now MUCH bigger.

I added 61,174 new sites in January, including sites monetized by AdSense (as far as I know, no other site database includes AdSense sites).

Site Stats Database is an absolute steal at $29/mo. It won’t be that cheap for much longer.

If you want to lock in the low price, sign up today!

(If you’re confused about what Site Stats Database is, read more about it here).

That’s all for now.

Thanks for reading!

Ian