It’s been a little more than a month since Google released the newest algorithm change, dubbed Penguin. (Gotta say, it’s a mystery to me where they get these update names!)
Already, a little more than a week ago, the first update, Penguin 1.1, was released. The target of these updates? Webspam.
What is webspam, and how can you be sure you aren’t being hit by Google’s housecleaning projects? That’s the topic of today’s post.
Google’s agenda: good, clean search results
Webspam is Google’s term for bad search results, and in all honesty, I like the term. Like spammy emails, search spam is junk.
You see, people perform a Google search because they want relevant, useful information about a particular topic. Their goal is to get that information in as few clicks as possible.
But the old algorithms allowed people to optimize a web page to rank well even if it had no useful information. SEO (search engine optimization) had become a game, with beating out Google as the goal.
But these manipulations led to a bad browsing experience for searchers, which, over time, could give Google a bad reputation. The result? A concerted effort by Google to stop the game playing.
As a web user, I appreciate Google’s attempts to clean house. As a reputable online business, I appreciate it even more. Let me explain…
“Old-fashioned” SEO
As I mentioned above, SEO was a technique for “ensuring” that a web page ranked well in the search engines. Internet marketers had figured out that certain techniques improved ranking, and they were using these tricks on junk pages. Techniques like:
- Keyword stuffing
- Link schemes
- Serving different content to search engines than to users
- Undisclosed redirects or “doorway” pages
- Duplicate content
Pages with honest-to-goodness helpful information were being pushed down in the search results, often to page 10, 15 or beyond. Meanwhile, spammy sites would overuse keywords or pay for linking services and rank in the top ten.
Panda and Penguin
In 2011, Google’s Panda update addressed bad keyword stuffing practices. Previous to that, if a web page had a high ratio of keywords to content, it could rank higher than a page that talked about the keyword in an intelligent way.
Suddenly content became more important than keywords. If a page didn’t offer value to its visitors, it was less likely to show up in a Google search.
There was just one problem. These algorithm changes used external links as a way to measure the quality of a web page. (External links are formed when a blog or website links to a web page.)
So that became the new focus. Web masters could continue manipulating the system by buying links or engaging in link trading. What they didn’t realize is that Google is encouraging content, not manipulation and game playing.
Which is why Google released the Penguin update. It targets websites that use paid linking services to make it look like their site it well read.
Let the manipulations stop here
I’m not into the “outsmart Google” games that many online marketers have engaged in. I know SEO, and I use it. But I use it the way Google wants it to be used. As a result, with each update from the search engine giant, my ranking improves.
I don’t have to constantly revisit my website to “clean it up,” because I’m already doing what Google wants: delivering quality information that addresses my readers’ needs.
A great website will rank well. Period. But it’s not going to happen overnight. It takes time to create a body of useful information.
So what’s an online marketer to do? Start writing content that your visitors will enjoy.
Need help with that? In my next post, I’ll share the four things you need to focus on if you want to improve the quality of your content.
