Is this a Google September 2022 Broad Core effect? Or something else?

[jesslikescawfee]

Which September 2022 Algorithm do you think caused this? I'm thinking Core update, but there were many (local, useful, product, core) that I'm not sure. That dip started on 9/21 or 9/22. And the dip is consistent across more than 10 similar websites. We are an automotive service provider with many locations/brands. This is the Channel report in analytics drilled down to organic/google. The sessions report looks similar. We are working on site updates for local, core and useful, so hopefully this can be reversed.

 

[carolyn2]

@jesslikescawfee - can you confirm where the drop occurred in October 2022? Might it have been on or around Oct 10th 2022?

 

[keyserholiday]

There wasn't a local update in September. This looks like you dropped right as the product review update rolled out.

 

[jesslikescawfee]

@jesslikescawfee - can you confirm where the drop occurred in October 2022? Might it have been on or around Oct 10th 2022?

September 21st or 22nd.

 

[jesslikescawfee]

There wasn't a local update in September. This looks like you dropped right as the product review update rolled out.

There are mentions of an unofficial local search ranking update on seroundtable.com. See link below. We don't have product review content. Our locations get reviews and we have the star ratings and some reviews from google that display. So I'm not sure. Everything I read and viewed about product review updates had to do with those sites that post product reviews and articles about products. Am I incorrect?

• Google Local Search Ranking Update Around September 7th | September 14, 2022

 

[keyserholiday]

There are mentions of an unofficial local search ranking update on seroundtable.com. See link below. We don't have product review content. Our locations get reviews and we have the star ratings and some reviews from google that display. So I'm not sure. Everything I read and viewed about product review updates had to do with those sites that post product reviews and articles about products. Am I incorrect?

• Google Local Search Ranking Update Around September 7th | September 14, 2022

That wasn't a ranking update. It was a bug where Google had issues displaying rankings for SABs. The core update was finished on the 26th of September so it wasn't product reviews, it would be the core update.

 

[Joey Abna]

If you can parse that data a little more you might find some answers. If you have UTM's set up on your Google Business Profile see if it shows the same pattern as all of your organic Google traffic. Also, look at it from a landing page view and of course dig into Google Search Console.

I would try to focus more on whether the issue seems to be sitewide, map pack, a particular page, particular keywords etc.

 

[recurpost]

I would go with what Joey said above. The next thing would be to look at what pages have lost the rankings the most. Is it site-wide or just a group of pages?

 

[Conor Treacy]

Just throwing it out there; I know you filtered down by the channel, but could there be an attribution issue where maybe one of the other channels perked? Meaning, there wasn't an overall drop, but maybe organic says down by 100 but email says up by 100 for the same period?

 

[keyserholiday]

I think everyone is missing the key facts here.
1. The dips are happening on more than 10 similar websites.
2. The dips happened on the 21st/ 22nd of Google.

Yes, other channels are important, but organic will make or break a business. Google traffic is down and it's a massive decrease and it's only getting worse.
I would look at your website content and see if it needs to be updated.