Google has used the bulk of 2011 to roll out targeted efforts to reward high quality content on websites, but not only content, acknowledgment for original authors as well. Before the changes it was easy for everybody and their grandma could rip off content and reap some form of benefit without fear of Google reprisal (i.e. Huffington Post).
The algorithmic adjustment dubbed the ‘Panda update’ severely penalized websites that were considered ‘thin’ content websites. Some new tools to help identify high quality websites include new metadata tags. In conjunction with their rel=canonical metadata tag, Google is now recognizing the new ‘standout‘ metadata tag. Here’s what you need to know.
Best practices to implement the tag include–well–not using the tag. Criteria to use,
<a rel="standout" href="https://www.example.com">My Article</a>
Include:
- Your article is an original source for the story.
- Your organization invested significant resources in reporting or producing the article.
- The article deserves special recognition.
- You haven’t used standout on your own articles more than seven times in the past week.
Emphasis mine. How Google determines what’s significant and what deserves special recognition is a matter of algorithm. They’re asking you to help by following the recommendations. What’s interesting is the ‘seven’ use max.
Think about the New York Times. They’re saying NYT should only use ‘standout’ on seven articles a day.
In the least, this new metadata tag should highlight the repeated emphasis on high quality content, and the fact high quality content is exceedingly rare (in the realm of article publishing). Everyone thinks they can write great articles, but in reality Google is suggesting that even the top news outlets produce at most seven pieces of lasting content a day.
Full details from Google here.