December Core Update Boosts Brands in “Best Of” Searches
▼ Summary
– Google’s December core update rewarded websites with specific category expertise, causing them to gain rankings over broader, generalist sites for queries like “best of” lists and mid-funnel product terms.
– In the ecommerce sector, specialized retailers and brands like Columbia increased rankings for product queries, while broader retailers like Macy’s lost visibility.
– News publishers experienced significant volatility and traffic losses, particularly on Google Discover, affecting both international and major U.S.-based outlets.
– The update suggests Google may be reclassifying some “best of” queries as having commercial intent, pitting publishers’ recommendation content directly against brand and retailer pages.
– Sites impacted by the update are advised to focus on demonstrating deeper expertise in narrower topic areas rather than competing on breadth.
The recent December core update from Google has concluded, and early data reveals a clear shift in search results favoring specialized authority. Running from December 11th to the 29th, this broad algorithm adjustment continues a long-term trend where category-specific expertise is being rewarded over generalist content. This is particularly evident in searches for product recommendations and commercial information, where brands and niche sites are gaining significant ground.
International SEO consultant Aleyda Solís provided a detailed analysis, highlighting changes across several key areas. The core effect seems to be that pages demonstrating direct, unambiguous expertise for a given query are climbing in the rankings.
In the publishing sector, many sites have lost visibility for “best of” style queries that Google now appears to treat with a more commercial lens. For example, general gaming guides from sites like Games Radar dropped for searches such as “Best Steam Deck Games,” while official catalog pages from Nintendo and Epic Games rose for those same terms. This indicates a move away from treating these queries as purely informational.
The ecommerce landscape saw a similar pattern. Large, broad retailers lost rankings to specialized brands and retailers that show clear authority in a specific product category. Searches like “winter boots women” or “men’s cologne” saw Macy’s decrease while brands like Columbia, The North Face, and Fragrance Market increased their presence. Specialized retailers are outranking larger platforms by demonstrating focused product knowledge.
For SaaS and business software queries, the update impacted non-specialized platforms and general publications. Queries such as “accounting software for small business” saw drops for sites like Zapier, Adobe, and CNBC, while dedicated software providers like Freshbooks and Xero gained with their targeted landing pages and resource content. Solís summarized the update as another step to “reward specialization, expertise and showcase more commercially oriented content from brands or specialized retailers.”
News publishers experienced intense volatility throughout the update period. Data showed notable declines for several India-based news publishers in U.S. search results, and SEO professionals like Glenn Gabe reported widespread movement for news outlets across many countries, including major U.S. publishers. A significant and troubling trend for publishers was a sharp drop in traffic from Google Discover, with some reporting they “lost a ton of Discover visibility/traffic.” This volatility in a key traffic channel creates a serious planning challenge, especially for publishers without a strong niche focus.
This pattern suggests Google may be refining how it interprets user intent, potentially reclassifying ‘best of’ queries as having commercial intent. For content creators, this means product recommendation pages now face direct competition from the brands manufacturing those products. The playing field has shifted toward demonstrable, on-topic authority.
For sites impacted by these changes, the recommended path involves a strategic pivot toward depth over breadth. Creating content that showcases deep, narrow expertise in a specific category is likely more effective than attempting to cover a wide range of topics superficially. The update has solidified that in today’s search landscape, demonstrating category authority is paramount for ranking success in competitive commercial spaces.
(Source: Search Engine Journal)