STRAP IN- the Next Panda update is here and targets webspam and spinning.

[mrtrance]

I'm just trying to pinpoint what is across all my sites that triggers all to drop in the SERPs at once. I'm assume that there has to be a common thing among them in order for all of them to drop off all at once. The only thing I can see so far is all my sites were EMD and that is the most common thing among them. Sites that I had not worked on for a while or did not build backlinks too got hit just like ones that I had been building backlinks.

So if that is the case then it might not be an issue with backlinks, but maybe onsite structure since all of these are EMDs, used the ClickBump theme, and had about 1% kw density for each page that was using it's keyword.

[mrultra]

Originally Posted by jonathanleger

When searching for "bicycle wheels", you would expect 100% ecommerce sites that sell the wheels, right?

Search G for "bicycle wheels" and you'll see:

#1 - ecommerce site
#2 - wikipedia entry for "bicycle wheel"
#3 - ecommerce site
#4 - ecommerce site
#5 - A book at Amazon ("The Bicycle Wheel")
#6 - ecommerce site
#7 - ecommerce site for bicycle parts in general (the ranking page has nothing to do wih the wheels though)
#8 - ecommerce page selling bicycle wheel stands -- not bicycle wheels
#9 - ecommerce site
#10 - page out of 1995 (literally) that has articles about bicycle wheels

Very poor results indeed.

Do a search for viagra. Two hacked sites and two sites with nothing about viagra on page one.

[gearmonkey]

I don't think you have anything to worry about as long as you post high quality and unique content. Blog networks that use only the highest quality hand written content are flourishing right now.

And round and round we go.

[rosesmark]

But Google doesn't tell the working style.I mean which is effective for improving keyword ranking. Google already said that we judge the off page optimization not you so, how we judge our off page strategies is working good

[lovboa]

Originally Posted by mrultra

Do a search for viagra. Two hacked sites and two sites with nothing about viagra on page one.

Lol

Northern Kentucky University on the first page.
Spammers are powerful! Sheesh!

[jonathanleger]

Do a search for viagra. Two hacked sites and two sites with nothing about viagra on page one.

Yeah, I read about that on a thread at TrafficPlanet.com. That's just pathetic. It's like AltaVista just before it died.

Hopefully the next few days will sort out some of the most egregious mistakes.

[nik0]

Damn Google got me good this time while I kind of survived the other updates (only 1 little drop before but that had purely to do with the deindexing of blog networks) my >50k exact keywords went from top3 to top 50 this night. Although this costs me around 200 euro/month I've already heard much worse stories of mid-sized companies being hurt by this.

As I check the rankings for my site more then anything I have a pretty good picture of the first page printed in my head and it looks a lot different, only #1 and #2 remained stable and they have only very few links (although nr1 is a massive PR6 authority site) and nr2 is there since the beginning of the internet it seems with a few dozen legit links.

[FamousOnYoutube]

Got lost of words when I saw 3 of my 10 websites losing rankings. From page 1 to page 11. I don't what to say but work hard again to take these sites back to their previous position. Sigh.

[mrmatt]

Some jacked up results that is for sure. Irrelevant. Lots of local businesses not showing up for local searches and irrelevant sites in their place. Sad.

Just checked all my clients sites. All doing well and are still in top positions. Seeing some weird stuff show up that I have never seen before. Angies List being one of those.

Yellow page and directory results are back in full force.

[AllproJJ]

This is gonna be an interesting ride for everyone to say the least. I guess we just sit back, see where we land in the coming days and go from there.

[troybh]

My all original content 150 page authority site just took a nosedive. Did some BMR for 5 months but stopped this 1 year ago. ?????? Survived all the previous pandas so not too happy now.

[pukimama]

How are they gonna target spin text too ?

[jonathanleger]

Another lousy example:

Keywords: "cheap purses"

Check these page one results:

High Quality Replica Bags - USA UK Canada Australia Europe UAE

Book Now

Shuffletown | Joe Henry

Two of the three show titles that don't match the actual page titles (the last two), and the two pages have NOTHING to do with the query.

[high_plains_drifter]

Great update . I wonder why i saw a massive increase in my serps this morning . also all of my competition must have been pushed down
As my pic below shows. this is all you will be doing unless you change your outlook on Seo completely

[martyJames]

Yes, quite a few of my sites hit too - im currently building my own blog network (hope google isnt reading this!) so hopefully will be immune in the future - time will tell.

The thing that i find amusing is that googles catchphrase of 'displaying the most relevent results' etc and its mission to return quality content and sites in its search results is sooo way off the mark. SEO is always going to dominate the search results - we just change when google does... Interesting times!

[awarum]

Originally Posted by jonathanleger

Another lousy example:

Keywords: "cheap purses"

Check these page one results:

High Quality Replica Bags - USA UK Canada Australia Europe UAE

Book Now

Shuffletown | Joe Henry

Two of the three show titles that don't match the actual page titles (the last two), and the two pages have NOTHING to do with the query.

My only guess is Google is giving crappy content sites high ranking and hopefully force other sites to spend money on PPC. Force people to spend money on PPC instead of SEO. If you are actively building links, you obviously have the money to spend, so give that money to Google.

Maybe Google should just start charging people for top 20 position in Google.

[josephseeley]

Originally Posted by jonathanleger

Another lousy example:

Keywords: "cheap purses"

Check these page one results:

High Quality Replica Bags - USA UK Canada Australia Europe UAE

Google Translation: These handbags are so cheap even their image links have broken already!

Book Now

Google Translation: Prices from only $325.91/night ... not really what I'd call "cheap", but it is a relative term. When you make $60billion on ad revenue ...

Shuffletown | Joe Henry

Google Translation: You may have to "purse" your lips to sing some notes. You get the lyrics for free, which is pretty cheap! I don't see a problem here!

[msu]

It's a bit early to know the permanent effect on our sites. It always takes a few days - maybe more - for these updates to settle in. Strap in and hold tight.

[yukon]

Originally Posted by pukimama

How are they gonna target spin text too ?

It's impossible to target spun text.

The example that Google gave was unrelated spun text. In other words, the lack of relevancy between the hyperlink & the on-page text is a red flag.

This is all the more reason to stay laser focused on content/links like I've been saying for a long time (Silos).


Example:

In 1896, Benz designed and patented the first internal-combustion flat engine, called boxermotor pork chop recipe. During the last years of the nineteenth century, Benz was the largest automobile company in the world with 572 units produced in 1899 and applesauce, because of its size, Benz & Cie., became a joint-stock company.

[Bryan V]

*Strapping in!*

Originally Posted by awarum

My only guess is Google is giving crappy content sites high ranking and hopefully force other sites to spend money on PPC. Force people to spend money on PPC instead of SEO. If you are actively building links, you obviously have the money to spend, so give that money to Google.

Maybe Google should just start charging people for top 20 position in Google.

If there really are too many useless results showing, they're going to make changes, not wait for PPC money to roll in. Without relevant results, there's no one around to look at search PPC.

Just let it ride for now

[Becker13]

My new strategy that I just implemented is holding up really well, saw most of my sites go up ironically

[reyyui]

Originally Posted by Becker13

My new strategy that I just implemented is holding up really well, saw most of my sites go up ironically

Promote your signature???

[terryd]

Originally Posted by reyyui

Promote your signature???

I agree, pretty pathetic....

[awarum]

Originally Posted by reyyui

Promote your signature???

I was thinking the same thing.

[mbmehmet]

Omg. I don't even understand this C&AP. I lost 5 of my sites last year March, I left them till march this year and a reconsideration request got them back in index after rehauling all sites from scratch. This morning.....nada, zilch, all rankings gone. Ok, google I get the f****** HINT. lol Can't believe those guys, they make no sense at all.

[Bryan V]

Originally Posted by reyyui

Promote your signature???

LOL^

But yeah.. it's a bit early to be buying/selling any guides about this.

[josephseeley]

I'm already selling my "how to unoptimize your website with one keystroke" e-book ...

[boxoun]

All my fresh sites that I have sitting in the que have finally shown up in the serps! No backlinks and no content is king! lol.

[UMS]

Here's another example of poor results

quality backlinks

2nd result is a blank Wordpress site that was created on 18th April.

[Dellco]

Amazing. Google has really outdone themselves this time. This is the worst results I have ever seen in a long time. I would say at least 80% of the SERPs look like a tsunami just rolled over. My good sites all tanked as well.

It appears they are doing these updates just for the sake of it. There could even be nefarious reasons for them doing so and nothing at all to do with improving the internet. Absolutely horrendous.

I think a lot of hitherto Google fanboys got hit this time. Time to wake up and smell the coffee!

[Instantfruit]

MY sites have been punished!!

I`m pretty new to this, survived the last panda updates (thrived even!)

Has google messed up here? Are they likely to "undo" some of whats just been done, or do people think this is it now and we have to try to understand whats been done and optimise accordingly?

[carrotdogs]

I have seen an increase in my serps when checking through my rankings today. A lot of the competition ahead of my site were EMD's, which are now ranking below my site for most keywords. Still early, so I will keep an eye on it before coming to a conclusion.

[Captain_Morgan]

so what does this mean, emd's dont have any value's at all cus its to do with keyword stuffing?

what exactly is keyword stuffing so an article of 500 words with 2% keyword density is keyword stuffing??

[boxoun]

There is no way this update will stick. They are ranking irrelevant tag pages of mine lol.

[mrehan]

I do use spun articles for backlinking. After todays' update, my 2 spun articels on 2 web 2.0 properties are ranking on page 1 for the keyword that my site (with good unique content) was ranking for before the update today. The links on the Web2.0 properties are pointing to my website/page. If this is what google wants then they are actually promoting spun articles.

[attorneydavid]

A site a follow that ranks for competitive legal terms using exclusively off topic blog comments is gone. So I'm assuming anchor text not related to page = bad.

[krishan1982]

Google slap day by day My site ranking go down Page 1 to Page 3
i m make good back link Low obl but google slap once again every time panda update google changes my ranking

[arasca]

i have the same problem, my keywords has been dropped from page one to page 8 and so on, don't know what to do now, adding more unique content and optimizing onsite seo to see if its going to help, after that will do some backlinking

[martyJames]

Lets bypass google and launch the 'Warrior Search Engine" - all warriors who invest are guaranteed page one rankings. Matt Cutts blog will NOT be indexed!

[krishan1982]

Originally Posted by martyJames

Lets bypass google and launch the 'Warrior Search Engine" - all warriors who invest are guaranteed page one rankings. Matt Cutts blog will NOT be indexed!

Hmmm wait for good search engine

[Steadyon]

I have just checked one of my test sites that has ranked on page 1 for the last 3 years.

It only has about 6 pages of good quality original content.

But it was a keyword rich domain (exact match) and had useful stuff for a visitor.

To get it on to page 1 I set up about 20 web 2.0 properties mainly with 1 or two pages of content. These had a mix of spun and slightly rewritten stuff.

Then over a few month time period I sent out a few Article Marketing Robot blasts and used these to link back to the web 2.0 sites.

These links contained some keyword phrases but I definitely made an effort to mix up the anchor text and even had many plain "click here" type links.

Some of the web properties were randonly linked together and in no way was it a simple link wheel. I did my best to disguise things.

The result today?

My site was hammered from the front page today. It is now ranking at 200 or so instead of 3 or 4.

So clearly google's algorithm has cleverly figured this out and taken action.

A sad day for the little guys...

Sam


P.S. - As mentioned in another thread one of our money sites was chewed up and spat out by panda. No "blackhat" or anything like I mentioned above was done and it also suffered very heavily.

It could be time to get a white-collar job and join the masses again and go and owrk for a Big Brand :-(

[Maraun]

I think a viable long-term way forward is to make sites with link bait on them.

Link bait can be anything that makes users link to your site. Content lockers for downloads that only unlock after twitter post or facebook share, funny pictures and anything else that people would share on their own.

[BigNorm]

Well one thing seems certain, as far as I can tell, EMD's will get you penalized with this update. All my EMD sites are gone. The upside, my internal pages my begin to rank better. Silo structured sites definitely make alot better sense now in light of the new update.

[sanlee]

i think google's on weed today.

[martyJames]

i notice that the main KW i was rankin high for has disappeared completely from the index BUT all the wordpress tags are still ranking??

Re the soon to be created 'Warrior Search Engine" , when you search for 'google' it will return:

Your search - google - did not match any documents.

[bcruan]

Ha, google has really done some prople over with this. Wikipedia is ranking in position number 5 for insurance in the UK! My emd has dropped from first to 7th, although it has been replaced by a one page, small articel emd.

I think a big focus is on spun content as mentioned and link relevance more than ever.

[river99]

This update is totally SUCK!

Rank #1 for "make money online" keyword

make

[Bryan V]

Originally Posted by BigNorm

Well one thing seems certain, as far as I can tell, EMD's will get you penalized with this update.

Tons of brand name EMDs have not budged. They aren't punished for simply being an EMD.

There are weak ones ranking well too, but their placements are questionable.

[terryd]

Originally Posted by Bryan V

Tons of brand name EMDs have not budged. They aren't punished for simply being an EMD.

There are weak ones ranking well too, but their placements are questionable.

Agreed, it's not just a EMD algo change. I've got some that have stuck while others have been pushed to oblivion....

[nik0]

Most sites that are struck have 2 things in common:

1: Bad backlink profile
2: Affiliate or Adsense site

Most sites from offline clients have not been affected by this update. Read again : most

It seemed Google really focused on the combination of these 2 things this time. Personally I just changed all my packages to a more natural way of building links, if even social signals will hurt sites then I'm clueless as well.

Personally I think the best solution right now is to wait and to see if they do a rollback cause the examples people came up with are just ridiculous, tag pages that start to rank very well, an empty shell for "make money online" and more of that crap.

In case the rollback doesn't bring back our rankings I think it's smart to buy new domains and copy the content to them to start with a clean sheet and only build solid links and use manually made web2.0's or other links as a buffer for the lower quality links, I am even thinking about building in a 2nd tier buffer but I'm not sure how much juice will be lost doing it in such way. I know I'm just gonna purchase a new domain cause I don't think I'll get back easily. My site is just a few pages but ranked in the top 4 for 2 keywords with >50k exact searches.