Google's Penguin Update

[acrylix]

Personally haven't been hit by this one yet (minus one small blog). But have had Google smack down a quality handwritten site before which never recovered, so I feel the pain. That site was my pride and joy...but it got knocked out after some scraper posted thousands of off-topic anchor text links to me all over various spammy sites. That happened years ago, but the usual cadre of Google worshipers were still bahhing about how Google would never do such a thing.

For those who still think that just playing by the rules, and creating quality original content will keep your sites safe, I ask what you will do when an external "over-optimization" penalty comes knocking at your door? File a re-inclusion request?

Google has finally admitted that other webmasters are "able to harm your ranking or have your site removed from our index."

http://support.google.com/webmasters...n&answer=34449

Google works hard to prevent other webmasters from being able to harm your ranking or have your site removed from our index. If you're concerned about another site linking to yours, we suggest contacting the webmaster of the site in question. Google aggregates and organizes information published on the web; we don't control the content of these pages.

Did you get that first sentence?

[$5 submissions]

I hear where you are coming from. This is still the adjustment phase. Expect more wild gyrations soon.

With that said, BH and gray hat forums have been buzzing endlessly about Penguin's inner workings.

Maybe this is a signal to focus on a few sites and really work on quality and creating a meaningful user experience through ETHICAL means, no?

[ckamp1]

That sucks!

[Cash4Me]

Penguin update is still alive, don't bother too much.
Negative SEO is a problem that we know for years and now google scientists say it's true, sarcastic.

[signupdamnit]

Much of the issue is that Google is primarily concerned about hitting large corporations and brands. Smaller brands and sites seem to be seen as some sort of collateral damage. It is easier to get hit by a "spam penalty" if you are a small fry than if you have a bigger site and brand. There almost appears to be a presumption where if your site is small or less popular then you are some sort of spammer or low quality.

If Google can't make an algorithm change without causing 10% or higher false positives then if they had any sense at all they just wouldn't do it until they could prevent this. The song and dance about only affecting 3% of queries is obviously a bunch of bullshit. Google doesn't lose a thing besides some Goodwill by screwing a big percentage of smaller webmasters. But it's their site so what can you do besides but up some links to Bing?

[VforVendetta]

[just a punk]

Check this out: http://www.google.com/search?q=python+hosting

[$5 submissions]

Originally Posted by CyberSEO

Check this out: http://www.google.com/search?q=python+hosting

OK

There's other examples of the #1 result being an empty page

[just a punk]

Originally Posted by acrylix

Personally haven't been hit by this one yet (minus one small blog). But have had Google smack down a quality handwritten site before which never recovered, so I feel the pain. That site was my pride and joy...but it got knocked out after some scraper posted thousands of off-topic anchor text links to me all over various spammy sites. That happened years ago, but the usual cadre of Google worshipers were still bahhing about how Google would never do such a thing.

For those who still think that just playing by the rules, and creating quality original content will keep your sites safe, I ask what you will do when an external "over-optimization" penalty comes knocking at your door? File a re-inclusion request?

Google has finally admitted that other webmasters are "able to harm your ranking or have your site removed from our index."

http://support.google.com/webmasters...n&answer=34449



Did you get that first sentence?

https://docs.google.com/a/google.com...E6M Q&ndplr=1

[Cash4Me]

Originally Posted by CyberSEO

Check this out: http://www.google.com/search?q=python+hosting

Serps relevance is lost for a lot of queries.
What a great goal.

[Klen]

Originally Posted by CyberSEO

Check this out: http://www.google.com/search?q=python+hosting

Interesting considering some people said how with this update keyword domains will lose it's advantage,this prove opposite.

[Spudman]

Originally Posted by VforVendetta

this is brilliant, made me laugh!

[acrylix]

Originally Posted by CyberSEO

https://docs.google.com/a/google.com...E6M Q&ndplr=1

Another Penguin success story. I'm sure the Google webspam team is busy as we speak analyzing each of the tens of thousands of pleas to reconsider penalized "quality" sites. NOT

[acrylix]

Originally Posted by $5 submissions

Maybe this is a signal to focus on a few sites and really work on quality and creating a meaningful user experience through ETHICAL means, no?

It's always a good idea to create quality sites. But with the current volatility of Google, I wouldn't be putting all my eggs into just a few. As posted above, Google has openly admitted that you can be smacked down, and even de-indexed, due to factors completely outside of your control. Though many of us believe this is nothing new...the fact that they're not beating around the bush anymore about it is.

Interestingly, they make no mention of contacting Google about any shady "over-optimization" tactics a competitor may be doing to you. Instead, their helpful suggestion is to contact each of the hundreds/thousands of sites which are linking to you.

Add to that the way Penguin's been slaughtering folks since it waddled into the SERPs...and I'd say it doesn't exactly create a climate where one feels safe about pouring their blood, sweat, and tears into just a few super high-quality sites.

[2intense]

Originally Posted by VforVendetta

[CyberHustler]

[SpeedoDave]

My blog AussieGayGuy.com has been fluctuating from 2K google results a day 3 months ago, then down to 500, back up to 1,000 and then last week it jumped back up to 2K.

Business as usual here but some pretty wild traffic swings I tell you.


Dave

[georgeyw]

Originally Posted by SpeedoDave

My blog AussieGayGuy.com has been fluctuating from 2K google results a day 3 months ago, then down to 500, back up to 1,000 and then last week it jumped back up to 2K.

Business as usual here but some pretty wild traffic swings I tell you.


Dave

Aren't you the guy who speedo was suing?

[asdasd]

Amusements!