The SEO world is in an uproar thanks to the recent search algorithm change that Google has dubbed “Penguin”. Cute names aside, Penguin, just like its predecessor “Panda“, has affected more than a few websites and experts in negative ways.
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Penguin has been directed for the most part against content and link based SEO spam in an effort to root out websites that were providing low quality, search irrelevant pages but have gamed the system by buying links or overdoing the keyword use in their site text. Across the web, some site owners and SEO companies have spoken of huge de-rankings of their business efforts while other claim they haven’t noticed any difference.
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However, that some websites and even whole sectors of the online marketplace have been affected goes without a doubt based on the evidence so far.
That said; let’s go over how Google’s penguin update is most likely to affect your website and what the algorithm change reacts to most. Best practices in dealing with penguin also bear mentioning.
What Penguin is Targeting
Based on what’s been observed so far and what Google itself has made reference to, Penguin was designed to hit hardest at websites that were engaging in two different “unethical” practices: Unnatural link structures and keyword stuffed content.
Unnatural Links
With regards to unnatural links, we’re talking about things like paid for text links whose anchor text is suspiciously identical to the keyword or phrase from the site that’s doing the payment or exchange in an effort to rank highly for that particular keyword or phrase. Additionally, things like comment links that have been spammed into questionable websites and backlinks from suspicious websites like porn pages, malware sites and warez web pages are all considered suspect by the algorithm and possibly capable of causing a website to be de-ranked.
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Other kinds of “low quality” links that were possibly affected by Penguin include those that come from massive submissions of keyword stuffed content to article directories and content mills. In general, link-backs that come from within content or anchored text on pages full of low quality, suspicious or irrelevant to subject web pages and directories are all sitting in a danger zone thanks to Penguin. One of the key link structure traits of many penalized sites was that they relied on inbound links from pages that weren’t relevant to their subject matter; the links came from much more generalized third party pages.
Keyword Stuffed, Low Quality Content
There are plenty of content mills on the internet and aside from them, plenty of search results that take you to pages whose information was obviously designed more for tricking search bots than for engaging human readers with high quality information. This is where Penguin apparently hits hard as well. The algorithm was designed to go after websites whose content is over-filled with keywords and phrases while at the same time being low on real value. Obviously a computer algorithm can’t effectively judge whether a given piece of text is informative or not, but quite possibly relies on judging the likelihood based on whether or not the use of keywords is unnaturally dense.
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In this regard, it’s easy to see where Penguin could have offended a number of SEO experts and site owners who genuinely thought their keyword densities were fine only to get hammered by a suddenly lowered rank: the line between quality content and information designed to attract a high index rank can be a fine distinction sometimes, especially if the difference is being judged by a machine.
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How to Deal with the Penguin Update
In a general sense, keep yourself safe from Penguin and others algorithm changes that might follow by really trying to build an online presence that is directed at your target audience and the niches they occupy. At the same time you should honestly be trying to create naturally written, subject relevant and engaging content for all your website copy. These are the kinds of things any legitimate online business should be doing anyways. However, in more detail:
Learn More About Google’s Penguin Update
Best Practices for Content
Create honestly informative and engaging content for all your web pages. Don’t worry about keyword density that makes your text seem unnatural or for squeezing phrases in such a way that the natural flow of your copy comes across badly. Just write about your niche subject, inform heavily and concisely on meaty details and watch your keywords and phrases naturally fit into place in a way that isn’t overly dense and likely to get you penalized. You should aim for content that informs enough to make people want to share it; this brings us to our second best practices tactic.
How to Write Valuable Content for Your Website?
Also See Content Strategies for Ecommerce Website
Organic, Relevant Backlinks
Forget about Link farming, comment and forum spamming and link exchanges or purchases to general interest sites that offer these kinds of deals. Instead, focus on creating a solid reputation for quality information that other bloggers and site owners in your niche will appreciate by posting links to your own pages on their own sites. Furthermore, offer to create guest blog posts or articles for other sites in niches relevant to your own; if what you write about is informative the answer will often be yes and the value of your post’s backlink will be organic and thus highly unlikely to get penalized.
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Also See Importance of Internal Link Building
