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Google is coming after bad SEO content again — www.amediaoperator.com

There are three guarantees in life: death, taxes, and SEOs trying to game Google. But when there are 5.6 billion searches per day, is it any wonder that people will try to get their piece of the pie? Now however, Google is cracking down on those blatantly gaming the system.

This overview of the changes from Jacob Donnelly is really helpful from a publisher perspective. There are two big changes worth noting: one is that sites deemed to have 'relatively high amounts of unhelpful content' are going to be penalised (Google have provided a long list of questions to ask yourself to determine how unhelpful you might be!)

The second change is affecting publishers who re-write or curate original reporting. There's a tonne of history and quite complex issues with this change which I don't have space to get into here. But generally these changes are good for quality publishers with original content.

This publisher was the victim of a ransomware attack: how they minimised the impact and lessons you can apply — www.newsmediaalliance.org

In June 2022, a local, independently-owned publisher found its servers had been hacked and were being held ransom. The good news is they were prepared. Here are their lessons you can take and apply. This has just given me a kick up the butt to refresh some of our own security.

10 free sources of data on the media industry — www.journalism.co.uk

Journalism.co.uk has rounded up ten best places for media research on the internet to help you get the relevant numbers on everything from digital news to diversity.

The biggest challenges facing subscription publishers — toolkits.com

Toolkits went and asked a few thousand publishers what subscription challenges are top-of-mind at the moment. Unsurprisingly, subscriber acquisition and retention topped the list, but data and analytics, pricing and promotional approaches and emerging technologies also featured heavily.

Podcast throwback:

Wareable.com's James Stables on surviving a catastrophic loss of search traffic — voices.media

The SEO changes reminded me of this interview with James Stables (not that I'm suggesting his site is low quality at all!) He talked about the effects of a total overnight SEO wipeout, and how they used expertise and authority to bounce back.

Magazine Street – 29 September — internationalmagazinecentre.com

We're loving seeing so many events on the calendar over the next few months. It's good to be coming together again. If you're in the magazine space, Magazine Street from the International Magazine Centre is a must-attend (our own Peter Houston is speaking on breathing new life into an old brand).