A month ago, Google rolled out what it called a broad core algorithm update, beginning on August 1. Within days, SEO forums were reporting health sites that had lost a large share of their traffic overnight.
Barry Schwartz of Search Engine Roundtable nicknamed it the "Medic" update, because so many of the affected sites were medical and wellness sites. Finance and legal sites were also affected. Google has not used that name. Its position is that this was a core update and that there is nothing specific to fix, other than to continue producing excellent content. That guidance offers little practical help to a site that has just lost half its visitors.
However, a pattern emerges from the sites that gained and lost ground. Google is asking a question it will clearly continue to ask: who are you, and why should anyone trust you?
Which sites did the Medic update affect, and why?
A few weeks before the update, in July, Google revised its Search Quality Rater Guidelines. This is the long document provided to the human raters who evaluate search results. These raters do not change rankings directly; they help Google verify whether its algorithms are performing as intended. The new version places greater emphasis on E-A-T, which stands for expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness. It also adds guidance on checking the reputation of a site and of the people who create its content.
E-A-T matters most for what the guidelines call YMYL pages, "your money or your life": health, money, legal questions and safety. These are pages where inaccurate information can cause real harm.
As a result, a supplement site publishing anonymous articles with ambitious claims now compares much less favourably with a hospital page or a site where a named physician reviews the content. Based on the analyses published so far, this is broadly what is happening in the rankings. No one outside Google knows the complete formula, but the direction is clear.
Why do expertise and trust matter for every business?
At first glance, this appears to concern health sites only, and a dive business is not a medical site.
Diving, however, does involve safety-critical decisions: medical questions before a dive course, how long to wait before flying after diving, which certification is required for a given site, and whether the current there is too strong for a new diver. These are safety questions, and a dive centre's website answers them. From this perspective, many more businesses are close to the YMYL category than they realize: a contractor explaining electrical work, an accountant's blog about taxes, a rafting company describing river conditions, and, of course, a pharmacy.
Even when the topic carries no particular risk, the same logic applies. Google wants to show pages from sources people can trust, and customers want the same thing. It is sound business practice that also benefits SEO.
What should a small business show on its website?
Who writes your content?
Attribute your content to a real person. "Posted by admin" tells neither a reader nor a search engine anything. "Written by Marie, who has been a licensed electrician for 20 years" tells both a great deal. Give that person a short bio page and link to it from the articles.
For a small business, this is usually straightforward, because the owner is the expert. The plumber knows plumbing, and the website should say so.
Which credentials should be visible?
Licences, certifications, association memberships and years in the trade. For a dive shop, these are instructor ratings and the agency under which you teach. For a contractor in Quebec, it is the RBQ licence number. Place them where customers make their decision, not in the footer. If your trade has a regulator or an association with a public directory, link to your listing so people can verify it.
Moderation is also important. A large number of badges can undermine credibility. Show the ones that matter to customers.
Why does current information matter?
This aspect is frequently overlooked: prices from 2015, opening hours from before a renovation, a staff page listing people who left two years ago, or a blog post announcing something "new for this season" four seasons ago.
None of this is false as such, but it gradually erodes trust, both with people and with search engines. If a page still receives visits, review it periodically. Add a "last updated" date to any content where freshness matters, and make sure that date is accurate.
How can customers verify that the business is real?
A physical address, a phone number that is answered, a Google My Business listing that matches the information on your site, and reviews on a public platform. These are the elements the rater guidelines instruct raters to look for when assessing a site's reputation, and they are the same elements a cautious customer checks before booking.
Where is Google heading with this?
We see this as the beginning of a trend rather than an isolated event. Google has been emphasizing quality for years. Panda, in 2011, targeted thin content, and the questions Google published at the time about what makes a high-quality site closely resemble today's E-A-T principles. Google's own guidance on creating helpful, reliable content is worth reading with your own pages open in another tab. It asks questions a business owner can answer honestly, such as whether the content demonstrates real expertise and whether a reader would leave satisfied.
What changed this month is that Google appears to be getting better at verifying the answers, and that capability is likely to keep improving. We recommend preparing ahead of it.
How can you check the trust signals on your own site?
Open your website and view it as someone who has never heard of your business.
- Can you tell within ten seconds who runs it and where it is located?
- Is there a real name and face anywhere?
- Are the credentials that matter in your trade visible?
- Is any information clearly out of date?
- Is there a phone number, an address, and a way to reach an actual person?
If the answer to several of these questions is no, those items form your action list. A full SEO audit goes further, but most small sites we review would gain more from addressing these five points than from any technical adjustment.
The Medic update has had a significant impact, particularly on the sites it affected. In our assessment, Google is now formally applying the criteria customers have always used to decide whom to trust.