Your Money or Your Life (YMYL) content is any web content that can impact the reader’s money, health, or happiness. This content could hurt a person’s well-being, financial or otherwise, if inaccurate.
There’s a reason Google has a specific definition of this content. Google expects that YMYL content is written by people who have expertise in that particular field. If not, the chances are higher for the content to be erroneous and unhelpful, which can affect your SEO efforts.
Here, we take a closer look at YMYL content and how it can impact your business as well as your search engine rankings.
Types of Content YMYL Can Include
YMYL content can include anything from news, law, and finance to shopping, health or medical advice, and even groups of people, such as veterans. Google has high standards for YMYL content because all of this information has the potential to be damaging when presented inaccurately.
As a result, it’s imperative that YMYL content be written with EAT, Google’s acronym for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. The content creator should either be an expert on the topic or have the credentials to be considered a recognized professional in that field for authoritativeness and trustworthiness.
In addition to health, finance, and news, YMYL content can also include:
- Government or politics
- Legal issues
- Information about making purchases
- Claims about groups of people
- Fitness and nutrition
- Housing information
This list isn’t exhaustive—there are many types of YMYL content. Even the weather forecast can be viewed as YMYL content in certain situations. However, if it’s content that can impact a person’s well-being, it’s safe to consider it YMYL content and use EAT when creating it.
How YMYL Impacts Your SEO Efforts
YMYL content impacts SEO because search algorithms aim to provide the most beneficial results to users. Generally, the more authoritative and trustworthy content is, the more likely it is to be accurate and helpful to searchers.
Therefore, if your business puts out any YMYL content, your search rankings will be impacted by whether the content was written with EAT. YMYL and EAT are both factors in high-quality content that can affect search rankings and improve your SEO efforts.
So, in addition to providing the best user experience on your website, YMYL content helps you provide better information to your customers; that is, information that is accurate, helpful, trustworthy, and written by professionals in that field.
If your business is not creating content that has the power to influence someone’s financial, physical, or emotional health, it’s still important to develop high-quality content; it’s just not as important as YMYL content.
YMYL and Your Business Authority and Reputation
One of the positive things about YMYL content is that understanding Google’s definition and abiding by EAT guidelines can help strengthen your business authority, trustworthiness, and reputation, all of which can support your SEO efforts.
In addition, putting out high-quality content can also better help your web visitors, further building trust and improving your rankings. So while YMYL content has the potential to hurt your rankings when done improperly, it can also help your business when you do it right.
Discover Your Best Content Strategy
Contact Gazz Digital today to discover your best content strategy as it relates to YMYL content and non-YMYL content so you can provide the best information to your audience and improve your rankings for a successful and impactful online presence.
