Latest SEO Updates | Google Algorithm Change History

Google Updates Local Search Algorithm (Pigeon Update)

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Tue, 19 Aug 2014 22:42:00 -0700

Google’s recent update – unofficially labeled the “Pigeon” update – is impacting the local search listings associated with Google Maps (the 7-pack).

Although not a lot is known about the update yet, Google did say that it ties local results more closely to Google’s regular web ranking signals, and provides them better accuracy over distance and location rankings.
Early Results

1. One apparent outcome of this update is a significant change in which local search terms result in the display of the 7-pack (Google Maps) as reported by Mike Blumenthal (and later updated), including the inclusion of SEO, Web Design, and Marketing in the local results for the first time in over 5 years.

2. For those industries that are heavily associated with directories and review sites (i.e. restaurants, hotels, etc.), the individual businesses are showing up in the Google Carousel, but the Organic listings on the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) are filled with the directories (i.e. Yelp, Urbanspoon, and TripAdvisor).

Given Google’s confirmation that the update aligns Local Search more closely with regular ranking signals, this shift makes sense as the larger directory and review sites should have stronger search signals than individual businesses.
Marketing Implications

1. Periodically check your industry/business related Local Search terms to make sure that they haven’t changed – you may need to update your strategy if they do.

2. If your industry keywords are suddenly resulting in “local’ search results (i.e. web designers) – time to get optimized for local search.

3. If your industry keywords are no longer resulting in the local search 7-pack, focus on Organic SEO to make sure that you are appearing in the organic results.

4. If your SERPs are filled with industry directories and review sites, do what you can to make sure that your business shows up in those directory results – register your business, completely fill out the information, and collect positive reviews.

5. If your local ranking drops as a result of the update, you probably need to develop stronger Organic SEO signals – on-page optimization, backlinks, etc – to accompany your local optimization.

Source: http://blog.echelonseo.com/goolge-updates-local-search-algorithm-pigeon-update/

4 Conspiracy Theories Matt Cutts Wants to End - Google AdWords, algorithm, SEO tools

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Thu, 5 Jun 2014 06:01:00 -0700

There are quite a few different SEO myths out there that just won’t seem to go away, so Cutts addressed some of these in a video. He talked about four of the most popular:

You will have higher organic rankings if you pay for Google AdWords. He also discussed how the opposite of this theory is just as prevalent (that you will rank better in organic if you don’t buy ads).
Google changes its algorithm so people will be forced to buy ads. It make sense that Google wants you to buy ads and if you have low traffic, then you will be more apt to buy these ads. Of course, Cutts explained that this is very far from the truth.
The latest black hat fad will help you rank. Cutts wants people to think for themselves and stay away from the latest fad about what is going to make you rank. Black hat tactics will never help you rank.
SEO tools will always help you. There are quite a few tools out there that claim to do it all and guarantee you’ll rank number one. Unfortunately, many can get you penalized.

Cutts ends the video by saying that it’s important to realize Google’s goals and then align your strategies with those goals. This will help you differentiate between a myth and a fact. It’s not about money for Google, it’s about giving the searcher the best possible results.

Did Google Panda 4.0 Go After Press Release Sites?

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Thu, 29 May 2014 22:43:00 -0700

Nine days ago when Google released Panda 4.0 – which aims to filter out “thin” content from top rankings – we focused our attention on the big Winners & Losers charts, Since then, some have noted that press releases may have also been hit big time.

Read More>>

Google Panda 4.0 search algorithm update: what entrepreneurs can learn from the winners and losers

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Thu, 29 May 2014 22:37:00 -0700

You have probably heard about Google’s Panda 4.0 search algorithm update by now. You might even have seen a list of the winners and losers from this update.

eBay received the most attention. The company lost 33 per cent of its organic traffic, according to several rank-trackers. And when big brands are penalised by Google, the search engine optimisation (SEO) community goes berserk and experts begin to speculate why.

However, it turns out that eBay wasn’t hit by the Panda 4 update at all. An anonymous source has revealed that eBay was hit by a manual penalty, which Google released in conjunction to Panda 4. As opposed to algorithmic adjustments like Panda 4, a manual penalty is the result of a human review of the website.

The Panda algorithm in fact would have affected entire domains, not individual pages. If eBay had been hit by Panda, you wouldn’t find their website when you search for “eBay” on Google.

So despite all the expertise of the SEO community, it’s still not clear why eBay was penalised – only Google and eBay know that.

Remember: eBay is a company with a team of some of the brightest SEO experts on the planet. If it was a known and obvious “black hat” violation, they wouldn’t have done it.

That’s the thing about SEO that few experts will admit: it’s often hard to identify the exact cause of a penalisation. Heck, sometimes it’s hard to tell what is and isn’t OK in SEO. What was hailed as “white hat” a few years ago is frowned on today. Read More>>

18 Types of Backlinks Violating Google’s Guideliness

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Wed, 26 Mar 2014 22:47:00 -0700

When doing SEO for your website, it’s vital to know what are the backlinks that are violating Google’s webmaster guidelines. These backlinks can cause vulnerability and eventually a penalty. In this article, I will talk about the unnatural backlinks that you should avoid, along with Matt Cutt’s take on these links.

Link exchanges
Participating in blog networks
Widget backlinks:
Advertorials
Paid links that pass PageRank
Article directories
Hacking and hiding links in CSS and Javascript
Site-wide and footer backlinks
Low distribution of anchor text
Backlinks from foreign language websites
Low quality guest posting
Backlinks that are automatically generated
Low quality web directories
Bookmark websites
Irrelevant backlinks
Backlinks from websites with duplicate and spinned content
Low quality backlinks
Any link intended to manipulate PageRank

Google's Matt Cutts On Telling If Your Site Was Hit By Algorithm

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Wed, 26 Mar 2014 00:37:00 -0700

The truth is, for an experienced SEO, this video sheds nothing new about the question on determining if your site was hit by an algorithm or not.

Matt describes three reasons why a ranking drop might occur:

(1) Manual Actions
(2) Crawling Errors or Issues
(3) Algorithmic Penalty

Here is the video:

Google’s Matt Cutts: We’ve Taken Action On A Large Guest Blog Network

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Thu, 20 Mar 2014 02:00:00 -0700

Google’s head of search spam, Matt Cutts, announced really early this morning on Twitterthat Google has taken action on “a large guest blog network.”

Cutts previously warned the webmaster and SEO community that guest blogging is done, at least for SEO and link building purposes. Well, it might not have been done — it obviously still had and has some impact on Google’s algorithms for Google to have gone after and taken action on a large guest blog network.

Someone Outranking You With Your Own Content? Use The New Google Scraper Report

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Thu, 27 Feb 2014 23:14:00 -0800

One of the most frustrating experiences for any publisher is discovering that someone not only has copied your content but outranks you on Google for searches related to that content. Now, Google seems to have heard the complaints and has launched a tool to help.

Called the Google Scraper Report, it was announced by the head of Google’s web spam team Matt Cutts on Twitter:

Matt Cutts ✔ @mattcutts

If you see a scraper URL outranking the original source of content in Google, please tell us about it: http://bit.ly/scraperspamreport …

1:09 AM - 28 Feb 2014

2014 Google Pagerank Update Schedule

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Sun, 23 Feb 2014 21:25:00 -0800

1. March 2014 (14 March – 25 March)
2. June 2014 (1 June – 14 June)
3. September 2014 (15 September – 30 September)
4. December 2014 (10 December – 26 December)

Google’s First Major Algorithm Update in 2014?

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Sun, 23 Feb 2014 21:22:00 -0800

After a promised quiet holiday period, Google’s search results started fluctuating again on the 8th of January culminating at a massive 2.91 roos on the 17th. This is the 6th strongest SERP fluctuation we’ve seen in a year and the first major result shake up in 2014. Read More>>

Lessons From Google On Optimizing Your SEO

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Sun, 23 Feb 2014 21:21:00 -0800

Dan Cobley, Google UK’s Managing Director, recently revealed that Google’s infamous 2007 “50 Shades of Blue” experiment involving ad links in Gmail increased revenue by $200 million a year. These results switched the balance of power from design-driven to engineering data-driven decisions, and famously led Google’s top designer, Doug Bowman, to ultimately to resign in frustration.Read More News>>

Google Restaurant Menu Knowledge Graph Box

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Wed, 12 Feb 2014 21:40:00 -0800

Searchers are noticing a new knowledge graph answer from Google regarding restaurant menus. If you search for a restaurant and add menu to the query, you may see the menu directly in the search results.

An example is searching for [red lobster menu], as shown by Moz on Google+:

Google is somehow figuring out the structure of the menu, either by indexing the menu on their web site or getting it from a structured menu data source, and showing those details directly in the search results. Read More Article>>

Source: http://www.seroundtable.com/google-restaurant-menus-18100.html

Finally Page Rank Update - Google Rolls Out Their Most Awaited Page Rank Update

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Fri, 6 Dec 2013 02:58:00 -0800

In a recent conformation from Matt Cutts on Twitter regarding the most awaited Google Page Rank Update he stated, “Google won’t be pushing out a new Google Toolbar Pagerank Update this year”. However, it seems that a page rank update has taken place today.

Niels Bosch asked on Twitter if we should expect an update to PageRank before 2014. In response to that, Matt Cutts said, “I would be surprised if that happened.”

It has now been 8 months since the last Google Toolbar PageRank update. In fact, the last update was on February 4, 2013 and honestly, I was thinking PageRank is finally dead.

However, today’s update really surprised me and it seem page rank has still a long way to go. Though I haven’t seen any official updates about this page rank update, but I am quite sure since some of my site really received a good page rank.

Source: http://www.techdroll.com/finally-google-rolls-out-their-most-awaited-page-rank-update/

No More PageRank Updates This Year - PageRank is finally dead?

noreply@blogger.com (Yogesh Godse) — Mon, 7 Oct 2013 23:42:00 -0700

Google’s head of search spam, Matt Cutts, said on Twitteryesterday that Google won’t be pushing out a new Google Toolbar PageRank update this year.

Niels Bosch asked on Twitter if we should expect an update to PageRank before 2014. In response to that, Matt Cutts said, “I would be surprised if that happened.”

It has now been 8 months since the last Google Toolbar PageRank update. In fact, the last update was on February 4, 2013 and honestly, I think PageRank is finally dead – at least the Toolbar PageRank.

I’d be surprised if there was another Toolbar PageRank update ever. Maybe Google will do one next year and then let it quietly go away forever.
( Source : Search Engine Land )

Confirmed: Google Panda Update: The "Softer" Panda Algorithm- Panda Recovery — July 18, 2013

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 25 Jul 2013 21:43:00 -0700

Source: SEARCH ENGINE ROUNDTABLE

Update: Google confirmed there is a Panda update going out now that is "more finely targeted."

There is renewed chatter in the WebmasterWorld forums about another shuffle taking place in Google. The consensus is that this update is likely Panda related.

We know Google has now slowed the Panda rollout to happen over several days and we also know Google will not confirm Panda updates anymore. We also know that Google wanted to soften the Panda algorithm a bit.

The chatter in the forum seems to back up the soften part where many folks, not all, are saying it looks like a Panda recovery has been pushed out.

Google’s Panda Dance: Matt Cutts Confirms Panda Rolls Out Monthly Over 10 Of 30 Days

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 20:00:00 -0700

(Source: search engine land)

Google’s head of search spam, Matt Cutts, released another video today named What are some misconceptions in the SEO industry? In short, Matt outlined three topics in this five-minute video.

(1) SEOs confuse algorithm updates with data refreshes.

(2) Panda & Penguin algorithms are not about making Google more money in the short term.

(3) SEOs spend too much energy and time focused on link building and only thinking about search engines.

Google Penguin 2.0 Update is Live

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 23 May 2013 05:35:00 -0700

( Source: Search Engine Watch )

Webmasters have been watching for Penguin 2.0 to hit the Google search results since Google's Distinguished Engineer Matt Cutts first announced that there would be the next generation of Penguin in March. Cutts officially announced that Penguin 2.0 is rolling out late Wednesday afternoon on "This Week in Google".

"It's gonna have a pretty big impact on web spam," Cutts said on the show. "It's a brand new generation of algorithms. The previous iteration of Penguin would essentinally only look at the home page of a site. The newer generation of Penguin goes much deeper and has a really big impact in certain small areas."

In a new blog post, Cutts added more details on Penguin 2.0, saying that the rollout is now complete and affects 2.3 percent of English-U.S. queries, and that it affects non-English queries as well. Cutts wrote: Read More>>

Penguin 4, With Penguin 2.0 Generation Spam-Fighting, Is Now Live

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 23 May 2013 03:20:00 -0700

( Source: Search Engine Land )

The fourth release of Google’s spam-fighting “Penguin Update” is now live. But Penguin 4 has a twist. It contains Penguin 2.0 technology under the hood, which Google says is a new generation of tech that should better stop spam.

Matt Cutts, the head of Google’s web spam team, announced the new Penguin 2.0 update during This Week in Google (Episode #199). He referenced the earlier video of him talking about the next generation Penguin update and said this is being rolled out “within the next few hours.”

Webmasters and SEOs: expect major changes to the search results. Matt specifically said that 2.3% of English queries will be noticeably impacted by this update.

Cutts later posted some more details about this roll out on his blog. He explained that the launch is now complete, including for non-English languages, and that “the scope of Penguin varies by language, e.g. languages with more webspam will see more impact.”

Major Google algo update coming – a few weeks left to get your site ready for Penguin 2.0.

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 21 May 2013 10:31:00 -0700

"Penguin 2.0 … will be much more comprehensive than Penguin 1.0 and it will go deeper and have a larger impact than the original." Matt Cutts

Happy Birthday Google's Penguin Update

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 09:01:00 -0700

Today is the one year birthday/anniversary of the release of Google's Penguin update - it was released on April 24, 2012.

Since then, we've had two additional updates of it on May 24, 2012 and then on October 5, 2012. Now we await the fourth update which is expected to be really big sometime this year.

This update was felt by more SEOs than the Panda update. In fact, our polls (very scientific ones) said 65% of SEOs were impacted by the update. And our polls also show that94% didn't fully recover from the Penguin update. So this update is serious business for SEOs, webmasters, businesses and of course, Google. Read More>>

Google's Targeted Penalty Webmaster Tools Notification

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 9 Apr 2013 08:32:00 -0700

A WebmasterWorld thread has a webmaster sharing a notification message he received via Google Webmaster Tool. The interesting part is that this notification is very specific that although the site has a penalty, the penalty is only being applied to a specific page or section of his site.

Google said the penalty is "very targeted action to reduce trust in the unnatural links," but not in the other links pointing to the site. Google said they took "very targeted action" because they know these "links may be outside of your control" and thus don't want to penalize you for that.

Google did add that they "recommend removing any unnatural links to your site" and when you do, you are recommended to "submit a reconsideration request."

This is the first time I've seen someone post a webmaster tools message of a penalty with this type of language.

We do not know that Google does often take very targeted and granular action on sites, as to not impact the whole site or all the links. This came up recently with the BBC penalty and has come up before.

Have you seen this message?

Personally, I think this is great because the previous penalty notifications were never that specific and webmasters went overboard to remove all links pointing to their sites. Hence the disavow tool.

Source: http://www.seroundtable.com/google-targeted-penalty-message-16617.html

Google's Final Manual Panda Refresh Here? #25

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 16 Mar 2013 10:20:00 -0700

All signs are pointing to a Google update being pushed out yesterday afternoon into today. The speculation across the SEO forums is that this is the Panda refresh we were expecting to see this weekend.

Google's Matt Cutts said we should expect to see a refresh of Panda sometime this Friday or Monday. It seems like the Panda update started actually yesterday afternoon and is continuing to propagate throughout now.

The ongoing WebmasterWorld thread has dozens of SEOs and Webmasters claiming rank changes for better or worse. Here are some examples:

Past Google Panda Update:

Panda #25 on March 15, 2013
Panda #24 on January 22, 2013
Panda #23 on December 21, 2012
Panda #22 on November 21st
Panda #22 on November 21st
Panda #21 on November 5th
Panda #20 on September 27th
Panda 3.9.2 on September 18th
Panda 3.9.1 on August 20th
Panda 3.9 on July 24th
Panda 3.8 on June 25th
Panda 3.7 on June 9th
Panda 3.6 on April 27th
Panda 3.5 on April 19th
Panda 3.4 on March 23rd
Panda 3.3 on about February 26th
Panda 3.2 on about January 15th
Panda 3.1 on November 18th
Panda 2.5.3 on October 19/20th
Panda 2.5.2 on October 13th
Panda 2.5.1 on October 9th
Panda 2.5 on September 28th
Panda 2.4 in August
Panda 2.3 on around July 22nd.
Panda 2.2 on June 18th or so.
Panda 2.1 on May 9th or so.
Panda 2.0 on April 11th or so.
Panda 1.0 on February 24th

Source: http://www.seroundtable.com/google-panda-25-16506.html

Create SEO Content Your Users Will Love

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 07:24:00 -0800

What is your niche? When you are creating content for your site and for your readers, SEO tactics should not be the only things in your mind. You have to make sure that you are creating posts and articles for your blog, and for other sites, that people are really going to want. This means that you have to spend some time really understanding your niche so that you can create content that your visitors are going to want to experience.

You already spend time making sure that you have the best Premium WordPress themes and that the look of your site is perfect. It is a good idea to make sure that you actually have content that is going to make people truly love everything about your site. Here, you will find some good ideas on how to create SEO content that can help to make your site shine.

Written Content Onsite and Offsite

When you are writing content for your site, take the time to explore all of the facets of your niche. While you are going to have certain types of topics that you are going to cover with some regularity, it does not mean that all of your articles have to be the same. Consider some other options, such as creating lists, writing reviews, conducting interviews, and having guest posters to your site. These are some of the things that you can do to make familiar content a bit more exciting.

Something else that you are going to want to do is look for some topics that are different from the norm. You want to keep the subject close to your main niche, but you will find that you can explore the periphery of that niche and give your readers something a bit different to enjoy. To be sure, you are going to want to focus on your main niche most of the time, but a bit of exploration outside the comfort zone can be helpful.

This is true when you are writing content that will be directly on your site, as well as articles that are going to appear in different places.

Onsite Video and Audio Content

Many people do not consider the video and audio to be SEO content, but when you are loading the content to your site, you will be able to add tags and titles. These are going to help with your SEO ranking, and having new and different types of content can help to breathe a bit of new life into your site and make it a fun place to be.

When you are creating the audio or video content for your site, make sure that you are creating high quality content that reflects your company in a good light. You will want to have the content on your site, but that’s not the only place that you will want to offer it. For example, if you have video content, you are certainly going to want to add it to video sharing sites, such as YouTube. Make sure you title your video with SEO in mind, and always make sure that you are adding a link back to your site.

Consistent Content Helps with SEO Rank

One of the issues that many individuals and companies have is the fact that they are not able to provide content on a consistent basis. If you want to have people keep coming back to your site, you cannot only offer static content. Make sure that you are able to post with regularity. You might find that hiring an outside source to help with content creation is needed.

About author Anny Solway is a dedicated writer at ThemeFuse – a leader in the Premium WordPress Themes area. She likes to discover new ideas about internet marketing, social media and blogging.

Google Panda Update Version #24; 1.2% Of Search Queries Impacted

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 02:16:00 -0800

(Source - Barry Schwartz )
Google has announced a new Panda refresh, making this version number 24.

This refresh has a noticeable impact 1.2% of English based queries according to Google.

The previous confirmed update was #23 and it impacted 1.3% of English queries on December 21, 2012. Prior to that was a refresh on November 21st that impacted 0.8% of queries. It seems like Google is now rolling out these updates every 4 weeks or so.

Last week there were significant reports of a Google update, which Google denied.

Stronger Reports Of A Google Update

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 06:47:00 -0800

(source by Barry Schwartz)

The WebmasterWorld thread sparked up again with a lot more feedback and chatter from webmasters about Google changes. Also, I am hearing a lot of reports onTwi tter as well.

A senior member at WebmasterWorld wrote today:

I'm seeing quite dramatic changes in SERPs today, I suspect quite a major update of some sort is crunching... too early to tell if it's Panda.

Some suspect EMD, some think Panda, but it is hard to tell if it is anything at this point.

Currently, all the automated monitoring tools don't show anything but they haven't updated with Monday's results. So keep an eye out for the tools including MozCast,SERPs.com and SERP Metrics.