This is what Google thinks of most niche sites right now:

That’s one of my sites.

I think the content is helpful.

Real users think so too. I had someone reach out saying they were learning a lot and wanted a daily newsletter with my latest articles.

It’s not every day users actually WANT you to market to them more.

When that happens, you know you’ve got helpful content.

Or do you?

Before scrolling further, I’d be most appreciative if you would read the following:

I built a tool called Site Stats Database that shows traffic, DA, age, niche, language, monetization, and more for 278,604 websites and growing.

It’s ridiculously useful for niche research, competitor research, and more.

And…I’m about to launch the most exciting feature yet:

Traffic change pre and post-HCU.

That means you can sort the ENTIRE database by % change to find winning (or losing) sites post-HCU. In bulk. Not just one at a time.

No other tool provides this feature that I know of. Site Stats Database will become one of the most useful website research tools on the planet.

Today, I reduced the price of the Lifetime plan by 33%.

Buy access before it goes back up.

It should be true that helpful content = better rankings in Google.

Even Google said they seek to reward helpful content.

So if Google (the Helpful Content Police 🙄) kills your site, your content must not be helpful after all.

Which begs the question…

What does Google think helpful content looks like?

Actions speak louder than words. Even (especially?) for Google.

Evidently, if you want your content to show up in Google, it does’t matter whether you think your content is helpful. Or what your users think.

All that matters is what Google thinks.

So, let’s find out what they think!

The best way to find out is by looking at the websites Google is rewarding in their latest round of updates.

Study them.

Figure out what they’re doing differently.

But…maybe wait until the updates are over before forming any conclusions. A lot can change.

Here are a few I found:

Stallanspice has just 202 articles and a DR of 21, yet is at nearly 400,000 visitors/mo!

I made a few interesting observations looking through the site.

So to recap, the site has lots of UGC in the form of comments, there’s a real person behind the recipes, they have real, unique photos, and there appears to be no use of AI.

This site gets everything right.

Real person. Original photos. Human-written content. Good schema.

But most importantly, a real brand and massive social signals.

Bake with Zoha has 257,000 followers on TikTok and 585,000 on Instagram. I’d guess those numbers make this site untouchable during any update.

Build a brand like this, and Google updates will never scare you.

Again, this site has a real person behind it, and the content is original and 100% human-written.

One thing I love about this site is that the top performing article is less than 300 words. There’s no useless fluff.

The articles all look incredibly helpful. Check out this one for example. You’ll notice the author pulls information from several different sources online and adds her own thoughts and resources. No one can convince me this isn’t helpful content, and apparently Google would agree.

If Bake With Zoha got everything right, Homesteading Family gets everything right and then some.

Real people behind the site. 100% original, human-written (and helpful) content. Huge social presense (over 800,000 subscribers on YouTube and 160,000+ on Instagram).

They offer multiple paid workshops.

They even have a podcast.

It’s no surprise Google’s treating them so well.

I’m not revealing the domain because it’s small and probably shouldn’t be doing this well.

In fact, it’s the exact type of site Google wants to target. The top performing articles are obviously made for search engines, and include a decent amount of AI content.

Yet, this site is soaring.

And I have a couple theories why:

I have many more examples of winning sites I could share, but I’ll end the list here.

If you want to see all the winning sites I’m keeping track of (including their URLs and traffic numbers every day since March 5th), join my community. In the Algorithm Updates section, you’ll see a link to the spreadsheet with over 18,000 tracked websites.

I also reveal my site that got hit in my community, if you’re curious to see it.

Hopefully you got some value out of this email and my analyses.

Actually, if you leave me some feedback I’d be very grateful. 😊 

P.S. I’ll be launching the % traffic change update to Site Stats Database soon. I’m aiming for early this coming week. The 33% lifetime discount will end shortly after.

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