2024 was the worst year niche websites and independent publishers have ever faced, all thanks to Google and its algorithm/core updates. Instead of bringing quality, they’ve broken their search engine more times than I can count, and there are thousands of reports from SEO experts all around the world saying the exact same thing.
As a full-time blogger, SEO expert, and content creator in general, I’ve been writing for most of my life, and after 16 years of experience, I finally broke. Most of my niche blogs lost all of their rankings, resulting in almost zero income from Google AdSense, while my affiliate earnings went to the bottom of the ocean. Many other bloggers who I personally know experienced the same problem, losing their rankings, earnings, and in the end, their minds.
I would argue that only low-quality content has vanished, there are many blogs that are providing high-quality, fact-checked, and expertise that many people appreciate, yet they’re now nowhere to be found. When it comes to my own content, I’ve spent days upon days researching and writing, all for the sake of one article, all for providing the best content I could possibly create for my audience, yet Google didn’t appreciate that at all.
It’s not just me. I’ve talked with many bloggers over the past few months, and here’s what one travel blogger has to say:
I’ve been making over $3,000 per month from my affiliate links. That money went for our rent, groceries, clothes, and basically for all of our family’s expenses.
Once Google released the HCU update, she lost all of her rankings, and her blog stopped making money within days (not even a month).
That’s from a travel blogger who left her country with her two kids to move to Greece. Since then, she has been living in Athens, traveling through different cities, finding the best places and spots for families who visited the country, and generally providing great and useful information that I, as a Greek, completely approve of. I mean, there are many travel creators who write about Greece, but there are only a few who are actually experts, upload their own photos and videos, and realistically speaking, know what they’re talking about.
Now? There are only articles from already popular websites that not only do their publishers not visit those places, but they don’t even have their own images and videos, paying to get them from stock websites such as Getty Images. Yet they rank first, and they now make even more money than they used to make, as smaller companies, niche websites, and independent publishers vanished from Google’s search results. That’s not an improvement, that’s too much power for a single company that can destroy millions of jobs and people’s lives.
What has amazed me even more is that many bloggers who lost their rankings and all of their earnings are afraid to write about their experiences. They believe that if they do, the company may find that article and completely remove their blog from their search results for good, and instead wish that a new algorithm/core update may bring back the golden days.
When did we end up being scared of a single company? Why did we give them such power? And why so many content creators don’t take action? Those are all great questions, but I am afraid, I am not sure I know the answer.
As a web developer who manages many websites and niche blogs for clients, I can only say one thing: The only blogs and websites that haven’t lost their earnings are the ones that didn’t rely on Google. Instead, they’ve built their audience on social media platforms, newsletters, memberships, and even by sending them browser notifications. Those were the “lucky” (or the smarter) ones.
It’s funny, because it was a few days ago when I read about a new Pew Research Center analysis that showed that 38% of webpages that existed in 2013 are no longer accessible a decade later. Why’s that funny? Because I know a few bloggers who deleted decades-old archives as they didn’t believe in losing their time anymore.
Some suggested to me that Google has to pay huge amounts of money in order to understand and stop releasing such bad updates, yet we’ve seen how courts are failing to do so. “By saying, ‘You have to pay 500 million’ won’t do anything, it should be lots of billions, enough to bring them to their knees – and more than enough to re-think how they release those algorithm updates,” a client told me when we were talking about the future of SEO in 2025.
Are we the only ones? Of course not.
Here’s one simple tweet:
2024 – the year Google destroyed my business overnight. Other than my post about going to HQ, I personally haven’t written anything for 4 months. With every update I see more people being wiped out. Just feels like it’s only a matter of time, especially in the travel niche.
Another great example [source]:
We were 15, including full-time and contractors, and we had to immediately just reduce the number of articles that we were publishing and the number of products that we could buy because we just couldn’t afford it.
Hundreds of SEO experts have also reported how brutal the last few core updates have been:
The reality is harsh, and although I do understand that Google is facing some of the biggest challenges a tech company could face and that they’re trying to combat all that spam, they aren’t doing a great job. They’re killing nice websites, smaller companies, and each individual who has a dream of working full-time as a content creator.
In the end, I think it’s our own fault. We are the ones who use Google, so we are the main reason they exist. But even if another search engine becomes more popular – let’s say, Bing, for the time being – would that actually change our lives? Would that bring all those individuals and smaller companies back to their golden days? I’m not sure, but I feel things will get even worse than they already are, and, like many others in my field, I’m currently changing all my plans and focusing on different things.
Before wrapping this up, I’d like to mention that Google does actually reply to some people and SEO experts – usually through X (Twitter) – but their replies are just words that mean nothing. Here’s an example of a reply that John Mueller gave to a person who asked why Redditors outrank other websites:
“Both are websites, but also, they’re quite different, right? Finding the right tools for your needs, the right platforms for your audience and for your messages – it’s worth looking at more than just a simplification like that. Google aims to provide search results that are relevant & useful for users, and there’s a lot involved in that.
I feel this might fit, perhaps you have seen it before -“
Understood anything? No? Well, me either.
For now, enjoy results with AI-generated spam, Reddit threads only, and a future full of uncertainty for each publisher and small company.
Have you experienced a downfall in your website’s ranking and earnings? Do you know other publishers who face the same issues? I’d love to hear your thoughts and experience on this, so don’t hesitate to drop your comment down below.
Uh, oh! Legal stuff! Yikes.. Yet important! Affiliate Links Disclaimer: Many of the links on my articles are affiliate links. That means if you click on one and make a purchase, I might earn a small commission, and I'll keep doing what I'm doing, reviewing everything with absolute honesty. Sounds good? Good.
