Google’s John Mueller talked about YMYL, specific to the health space, and mentioned that it is if you are writing about a topic on health that you are not an expert on then you are starting off already on a “shaky foundation.” He said it probably makes sense for you to find experts to write or review what you wrote so that the content is “correct and it’s trustworthy.” He added it is content you want to feel comfortable that your friends can share with other friends.
This question was asked by Tom Bourlet.
John said:
It’s something where if you’re already saying they know a lot about this but they’re not experts then that is already kind of a shaky foundation right. So that’s something where maybe it makes sense for them to work with experts and to put together some real expert content where it’s clear to anyone who’s reading those pages that actually this information is correct and it’s trustworthy, it’s something that an expert has written or an expert has reviewed and accordingly it it’s essentially something that anyone can take and forward to their friends and say this is kind of something to watch out for or something important that you should read on this topic.
Here is the video embed:
John also mentioned the ranking team also always tells him that it is better to improve the content than just remove it, so he said take that with a grain of salt. He did add that it is not always feasible to do that. He discussed the various ways to remove content either by removing it, noindexing them or something else. Either way, Google will now evaluate your web site around the content they see now and reprocess that information.
Here is the video embed of this part:
So it sounds like if you are in health or YMYL you really need to get an expert to write this content for you or at least review it with their stamp of approval.
A great 6 minutes based on my question for @johnmu re: health/medical content published by a site that doesn’t entirely focus on the niche. Nuke, improve, noindex? And then a follow-up question re: a site that writes about CBD w/authors that aren’t experts https://t.co/pqXhzUsU81 pic.twitter.com/vgbStiYJoR
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) July 23, 2019
John explained again that when speaking w/the ranking team, you should look to improve the content if you can. And if you don’t focus on the health niche any more, then it’s ok to nuke. And if you know you’re not an expert, then that’s a “shaky foundation” https://t.co/pqXhzUsU81 pic.twitter.com/HsNVX2XcMx
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) July 23, 2019
Have YMYL content not written by an expert? More from yesterday’s hangout video -> Via @johnmu: “Maybe you can work together with an expert to create some expert-level content. Make sure users know it’s correct, trustworthy, expert-reviewed, etc.” https://t.co/xNYE42kcin pic.twitter.com/oaNzDqMENq
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) July 24, 2019
Great answer from @JohnMu from today’s @googlewmc hangout on the importance of trusted experts on medical topics:
If you aren’t a medical expert, it makes sense to work together with one to make it clear your content is accurate & trustworthy. https://t.co/m9LLMz2Pct
— Lily Ray (@lilyraynyc) July 23, 2019
Forum discussion at Twitter and YouTube Community.
I hope the headline isn’t surprising to anyone 🙂
— 🍌 John 🍌 (@JohnMu) July 24, 2019