# What is E-E-A-T? Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trust, explained

> Google's quality framework.

E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trust — the framework Google's Search Quality Rater Guidelines use to evaluate content. The extra E (Experience) was added in 2022 to weight first-hand authorship. E-E-A-T isn't a direct ranking signal, but it shapes how Google's systems and human raters score quality.

## How E-E-A-T differs from SEO, Topical Authority, AEO

E-E-A-T is a quality framework, not a measurable score. Domain Rating and citation rate are measurable; E-E-A-T is a way Google evaluators (and indirectly the ranking systems) think about whether a page deserves to be cited.

## How Mentionwell handles E-E-A-T

- Author bylines and About pages with verifiable bios rendered on every article.
- Editorial critic enforces evidence-per-claim and citations so authoritativeness signals are visible.
- Stable canonical URLs and clear publication dates so trust signals don't decay.

## Frequently asked questions about E-E-A-T

### What does E-E-A-T stand for?

Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trust. The first E (Experience) was added in December 2022; before that it was just E-A-T.

### Is E-E-A-T a ranking factor?

Not directly. It's a framework Google's quality raters use, and Google's systems are trained against rater data — so it's an indirect but real signal.

### How do I improve E-E-A-T?

Show first-hand experience, name your authors with credentials, cite primary sources, keep a clear About page, and ship HTTPS, accurate publication dates, and stable URLs.

## See also

- [SEO — Search Engine Optimization](https://mentionwell.com/seo): The original — still 50%+ of traffic.
- [Topical Authority — Topical Authority](https://mentionwell.com/topical-authority): Be the deepest source on a topic.
- [AEO — Answer Engine Optimization](https://mentionwell.com/aeo): Be the answer.

## Sources

- [Google Search Quality Rater Guidelines](https://services.google.com/fh/files/misc/hsw-sqrg.pdf) — Google · Source document for E-E-A-T.

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Canonical URL: https://mentionwell.com/eeat
Live HTML version: https://mentionwell.com/eeat
Site index for AI ingestion: https://mentionwell.com/llms.txt
Full reference: https://mentionwell.com/llms-full.txt