E-E-A-T

Purpose

Use E-E-A-T, Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trust, to judge and improve how credible a page and its creator appear, using the same concepts Google asks its search quality raters to apply. It comes from Google's Search Quality Rater Guidelines; Google added the first E, for Experience, in December 2022. Raters do not change rankings directly, but their assessments inform how Google evaluates its ranking systems, so E-E-A-T is a reliable guide to what "good" looks like, especially for topics that affect people's health, money or safety.

Frameworks & Standards

Item	Value
Framework ID	e-e-a-t
Category	Search Visibility — Content Quality
Version	2.0.0
Source	Google, Search Quality Rater Guidelines
Key change	"Experience" added December 2022 (E-A-T became E-E-A-T)
Related guidance	Google, "Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content"

The Four Elements

• Experience: first-hand experience of the topic, such as having used the product or visited the place.
• Expertise: the knowledge or skill of the creator.
• Authoritativeness: whether the creator or site is a recognised go-to source for the topic.
• Trust: whether the page is accurate, honest, safe and reliable. Google describes Trust as the most important member of the family; the other three support it.

YMYL ("Your Money or Your Life") topics, those that could significantly affect health, financial stability, safety or society, are held to a higher standard.

Core Principles

• Trust is the centre. Experience, expertise and authority matter because they make content more trustworthy.
• Show it, do not assert it. Bylines, credentials, sources and first-hand evidence demonstrate E-E-A-T; claiming it does not.
• The standard rises with the stakes. YMYL content needs demonstrable expertise.
• E-E-A-T is a quality concept, not a single ranking factor. There is no score to optimise directly.
• Experience can matter as much as credentials for topics such as product reviews.

Applications & Use Cases

Use Case	Application	Element emphasised
Health, finance and legal content	Named expert authors, cited sources, review dates	Expertise, Trust
Product reviews	Evidence of real use, original photos and testing	Experience
About and author pages	Clear identity, credentials and contact details	Authoritativeness, Trust
Content audits	Assess pages against the four elements	All
Corrections and updates	Visible update dates and correction notes	Trust
Site reputation	Earn independent mentions and reviews	Authoritativeness

Usage Guidelines

• Decide whether the topic is YMYL; if so, require demonstrable expertise and sourcing.
• Attribute content to a real, identifiable person or organisation with relevant credentials or experience.
• Cite primary sources for factual claims and date the content.
• Show first-hand experience where it applies, with original evidence.
• Make trust signals easy to find: who runs the site, how to contact them, and policies.

Prompt Template

You are assessing content against E-E-A-T (Google Search Quality Rater Guidelines).

PAGE AND TOPIC: [[url or summary]]   YMYL? yes / no
EXPERIENCE: what first-hand evidence is shown?
EXPERTISE: who created it, and what qualifies them?
AUTHORITATIVENESS: is the creator or site recognised for this topic? Evidence?
TRUST: accuracy, sourcing, transparency, safety. Any red flags?
IMPROVEMENTS: specific changes, most important first, centred on Trust.

Ethical Guidelines

• Never fabricate credentials, authors, reviews or experience. Fake E-E-A-T signals are deception and violate Google's spam policies.
• Do not present AI-generated or unreviewed content as expert-written.
• Correct errors visibly, especially on YMYL topics.

Testing Strategy

• Audit samples of content against the four elements on a schedule.
• Track performance of pages before and after trust improvements, accepting that search effects are slow and confounded.

Success Metrics

• Share of YMYL pages with a qualified named author and cited sources.
• Organic visibility trends for audited pages.
• Independent mentions, reviews and links.

Collaboration Protocol

• Inbound from: seo-specialist · article-writer · authority-builder · content-creator
• Outbound to: CSO office for YMYL claims in regulated domains
• Cross-framework: Google Search Central for the full guidance; Schema.org for marking up authorship and organisation; LLM visibility, where the same trust signals help.

Related Skills

• composable-skills/frameworks/google-search-central/SKILL.md — Google's official guidance
• composable-skills/frameworks/schemaorg/SKILL.md — marking up authors and organisations
• composable-skills/frameworks/llm-visibility/SKILL.md — credibility signals for AI answers
• composable-skills/frameworks/no-fabrication/SKILL.md — evidence-bound claims

Reference Materials

• Google. Search Quality Rater Guidelines. (current edition at guidelines.raterhub.com / Google Search Central).
• Google Search Central. "Our latest update to the quality rater guidelines: E-A-T gets an extra E for Experience." December 2022.
• Google Search Central. "Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content."

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