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Google Pandas and Penguins
| There have been 2 main types of updates over the last 2 years that rocked tens of thousands of websites. The first type is called Google Panda, and the second (more recent) type is Penguin Beware the Panda Google's Panda update was aimed at one thing- improving the experience of Google search engine users. Because Google had figured out that visitors hated going to small, spammy looking websites with poor quality content, they decided to target sites that had these characteristics:
There were other factors as well, but these are a few of the biggest ones. Even though Google had been moving in this direction for a while, this solidified the fact that automated, spammy stuff didn't work anymore. Marketers who had been using SE Nuke, Xrumer, Article Marketing Robot, Scrapebox, and dozens of other software the gives automated backlinks lost their entire businesses overnight. Meanwhile, other websites that had been built up "the right way" shot up in rankings. While some marketers were crying their eyes out, others were jumping with joy. But this wasn't quite enough. Even though the Panda updates (which kept coming for a few years) had caused some huge waves, Google wasn't done yet. Enter the Penguin Even though the Panda updates were huge, Google's Penguin updates really shook things up. According to Matt Cutts- Google's spokesperson when it comes to SEO- the websites with a giant bulls-eye for getting crushed were those that were "over optimized". What did this mean? Well besides the factors mentioned above, probably the biggest change was concerning incoming backlinks' anchor text. In other words- if 97% of a website's backlinks all had the anchor text of "how to lose 10 pounds in a week" or whatever- Google thought that looked fishy. And it kind of does, when you think about it. How many people are going to link to an article they found with anchor text like that? Instead, a more realistic anchor text profile would include lots of other keywords, like how to lose weight, lose weight fast, lose 10 pounds, how this guy lost 10 pounds, this article, etc. Something else that Google looked at was this- where is most of this website's traffic coming from? Is it ALL coming from my search engine? Or is it also coming from guest posts, Facebook, articles, videos, press releases, and lots of other places across the internet? Again, this makes sense. A popular website will get traffic from TONS of different places- not just Google's search engine. Meanwhile, a website that has been over-optimized may be receiving tons of traffic from Google, but none from other places. The Penguin didn't like this, so these websites got CRUSHED. The Aftermath Tens of thousands of websites have been hurt by the Panda and Penguin- but some actually prospered. Now that we're done with the history lesson, let's get into the REAL meat of this report- how to build a rock solid SEO foundation. Source: Panda Penguin SEO Secrets | |
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