What Fact Check Is

Fact Check is a new Google tool that integrates fact-checking reviews from reliable research organizations like PolitiFact and Snopes into search results. Fact Check will appear below the search result snippet with an overall rating of the content’s “truthiness” and links to the reviews about all individual claims made in the content.

How to Get Fact Check

For Fact Check to be present, the content’s publisher has to add a Claim Review tag from schema.org. This enables Google’s algorithm to consider reviews from the two preferred fact-checking agencies about the claim to which the tag is applied.

Claim Review tags can be added for each individual claim a site makes and for differing analyses from multiple reviewers. Users can also provide fact-checking feedback (and this would be the only time a human gets involved in the fact-checking process…everything else happens via algorithm).

Who Can Use Fact Check

Fact Check is intended for use by reputable news sources (as defined by Google’s algorithm). So, basement bloggers and grassroots news organizations may have difficulty getting Fact Check results to show up next their content in search results, even when the Claim Review tag is applied.

So far, Fact Check is only a news fact-checking tool. It does not verify marketing claims or prices posted on business-to-consumer websites.

Fact Check and You

Fact Check is a tool for publishers to demonstrate the reliability of their news. Users can’t hit CTRL+[some button] or a Function key to bring up Google Fact Check to scan a site for “truthiness.” However, Fact Check does make it easy for you to see at a glance if a news story is blatantly fake, mostly true or 100% fact. Fact Check reviews are also clickable, so you can navigate to PolitiFact, Snopes or user feedback to read the complete write up about a claim.

Fact Check’s integration into news results is just a first step to fight fake news, but it is one that eases the burden of research on news readers who want to stay reliably informed without having to go on a fact-checking crusade every day.

Signs and Symptoms of Algorithm Change

When algorithms change, search engine activity changes. According to Search Engine Land, major search engine tracking tools, including MozCast, Algoroo and RankRanger, all picked up on irregular activity on February 1, 2017. In addition to these trackers, a number of private blogging networks reported slow activity, including slow link indexing.

Who’s Been Affected

Major algorithm changes usually make headlines because either we know it’s coming or nearly everyone is affected. This possible update has flown under the radar is because its effects are limited. The target of the change (if any) is link spam. As a result, most of the sites affected are either:

• Link-heavy in nature, i.e., the volume of links needing to be indexed make the algorithm change more noticeable

OR

• Sites relying on black-hat link building strategies (yes, they still exist)

Sites that rely on white-hat SEO and organic link building strategies may not have noticed any difference in ranking, traffic or analytics at all.

What You Need to Do

Because SonicSEO.com adheres to white-hat SEO strategies, including link building, you likely do not need to do anything. Links leading to your site have either been created organically or have been requested from reputable sources.

If Google confirms an algorithm update and changes are likely to affect your search engine performance, we will let you know and take a proactive approach to keeping your site at the top of the results pages.