Penguin alert

[Windy]

On 24th April Google unleashed their Penguin update on an unsuspecting world. I have already commented elsewhere on the effect it has had on my main site, but I thought it worth a thread of its own here.

The main thrust of the algorithm change seems to have been to penalise those who have tried to "game" the ranking system by using underhand SEO tactics by using irrelevant inbound links and keyword stuffing. In iteelf that seems like a worth objective. Nobody likes black-hat SEO do they?

In the process it seems to have had a hugely detrimental effect on a some of us who followed what we thought was reasonable advice on SEO and tried to strengthen our rankings using what we thought were legitimate means.

Things like writing articles, linking from forum signatures here and on other relevant sites, using Image Alt tags to contain keywords, optimising page content for certain keywords, using domain names that included keywords.

My main search "Lake District Lodge" used to be high page 1. The fall-off in hits from position 3 to position 4 is massive. Imagine what happens to hits when the only page linked to is a fairly irrelevant page about the top 20 lake district attractions and it is down on page 5. That's right - zero hits. My visits from search used be 150% of my visits from links. Since April 24th they are 25% of them. You can probably see why I am not happy!

In trying to fathom WHY I got hit I have come across various bits of advice and have subsequently

* deleted any articles I wrote (although I can't do anything about the small number of sites that carry copies of them)

* De-SEO'd my front page a little by removing some key word references in case it was seen as too dense. (But what IS to dense?)

*unfortunately it seems that exact matches in domain names are also penalised rather than favoured by the penguin now but I can't change that.

As KC said in the other thread we are flying blind and guessing here so it is very frustrating. I might actually be harming myself still further! For every piece of advice there seems to be a contradictory opinion somewhere else. I'm going to sit tight now and hope that what I have done combined with the tweaks Google will probably make due to the volume of complaints will result in a re-evaluation of my site.

Anyway it might be worth checking your own web stats to see if you too have been a victim of the Penguin after April 24th. If you have been hit wrongly there is a form you can submit here

https://docs.google.com/a/google.com/sp ... MQ&ndplr=1

There is definitely a lesson here for those of us trying to go it alone without using major listing sites - if you rely too much on Google you can get badly burned and you may have no way to work out exactly why.

Bing and Yahoo still show my site Page 1, but nobody uses them do they

Some more useful information here :

http://www.micrositemasters.com/blog/pe ... -to-do-so/

[kendalcottages]

It's a pity there isn't better competition out there for Google. Bing actually seems OK to me quite often, but it's going to take a momentous balls-up on the part of Google for people to make the shift in any significant numbers.

There are others out there like Blekko and DuckDuckGo that aren't doing too bad a job too, but who's heard of them? Next to nobody.

Google seem to be putting all their focus on to Google+ and letting their search results go down the pan but, because there's no credible competition and they have such a dominant position when it comes to search, they seem to be getting away with it... up to now.

[la vache!]

I read the link you posted, Windy, but confess it went right over my head. I was discussing the Penguin update with someone else much more clued up on things than me and they sent me these links to it which I found easier to understand.
http://www.webpronews.com/seo-dos-and-d ... ls-2012-03


http://www.webpronews.com/google-pengui ... ds-2012-05

http://static.googleusercontent.com/ext ... -guide.pdf

i have to say that my site doesn't seem to have been affected but then I have very few links to and from my website and am an SEO novice.
If content is going to be important in the future rather than keyword stuffing or links, isn't that a good thing for smaller, independent websites whose webmasters aren't necessarily SEO wizards?

[Hells Bells]

Looks likes my visits are down, but hard to judge if that is the result of it being the off-season or anything more sinister.

[la vache!]

Looks likes my visits are down, but hard to judge if that is the result of it being the off-season or anything more sinister.

Is Google trying to catch the SEO cheats a sinister move?

[Hells Bells]

No LV, sorry that wasn't really what I meant, but it does appear to be if some of us are badly affected.

[Thomas BC]

Helen, we are only going to be badly affected if we are trying to pull the wool over Google's eyes. One of the biggest problems through successive iterations of Google's algorithms is that people have been reading secondary articles rather than reading the guidelines from Google - the Google pdf listed by LV is a brilliant document and is all anyone needs.

Reading the direct quotes from Google staff cited on the WebProNews articles it is quite clear, if we follow those guidelines and produce a quality website with good content, without obsessing about getting to the top or trying to pull a fast one on Google we are going to be OK.

I rather like this bit from Vanessa Fox, previous head of Google's Webmaster Centre

“As far as sites that will see a positive from this, I think it will likely be both small sites (B&B in Napa that titles their home page ‘home’ vs. an affiliate site that sells wine gift baskets) and large brands (sites that use a lot of Flash),”

Listing Sites eat your heart out!

[Windy]

Is Google trying to catch the SEO cheats a sinister move?

No of course not and if that's what they were to achieve without destroying sites that are like mine then that would be fine.

I am not an SEO cheat but my site has all but disappeared from Google's rankings.

How would you define an SEO cheat anyway? Anyone who did any SEO would be on that continuum somewhere wouldn't they?

[Hells Bells]

Thanks for the clarification Thomas. However, it does appear that some innocent parties will be caught up in it.

[Thomas BC]

... it does appear that some innocent parties will be caught up in it.

If you read what Google has to say, Google ... not the scaremongering SEO 'companies' (who just want to take your money off you), that is simply not true.

Reading their comments, watching their YouTube clips, and having recently contacted them about an SEO issue (you wait an age for a reply, but it is very instructive), I do not believe that having links from a discussion forum for example, however many there are, is going to mean your site is penalised in search results. I think we can safely assume, given Google can now detect things like three way linking set up to try and get over the reciprocal link issue, that Google can tell the difference between a Discussion Forum and a Link Farm. The latter you will be penalised for.

[Windy]

Thomas, I am at a loss to know what SEO cheating I am apparently doing.

I do link between my own websites(edit in one direction to my main sites) but only one (my main site was) hit by the Penguin update and that's hardly a link farm is it?

[Thomas BC]

John, I never called you an "SEO cheat" - I have not even looked at your website in months, perhaps even years! I haven't a clue what your SEO entails. I was commenting on Helen's use of the word 'sinister', which LV rightly picked up.

If indeed your website is no longer performing on search engines there is obviously something wrong (and it does not even have to be SEO related).* I very much doubt it is because you have lots of links from LMH - there would be a lot of LMHers effected if that were the case.

If you can not work it out I would approach Google (which I assume you have done given your advice above). I have a site that I thought was being penalised for SEO in January - I convinced myself of it (no, I worked myself up into a state about it!). But, when I did what you suggest above, I got an email reply (about three weeks later!!) telling me what the problem was. It had nothing to do with SEO at all.

*Have you asked other people to do the same search for you? I am sure you are aware that no two person's search results are the same.

[Windy]

Well you certainly inferred it when you said to Helen

If you read what Google has to say, Google ... not the scaremongering SEO 'companies' (who just want to take your money off you), that is simply not true.

I am a bit raw about this Thomas but OK I accept it wasn't a direct personal attack

Yes I have contacted G$$gle and I have made some de-SEOing changes to my site like removing some keywords from my Titles etc (but many many sites that have not been hit were more evidently SEO heavy than mine ever were.)

I think if you read the volume of comments to Matt Cutts you will find ample evidence of sites (including reputable charities) that most of us would not regard as SEO cheats who have been hit by Penguin and who just can't understand why.

Google advice is to provide plentiful and relevant content. Please take a very brief look at www . lakedistrictholidaylodges. co. uk and tell me where you think I am going wrong in expecting that to rank for "lake district lodge" - It used to be page 1 average position 3. Now it has simply disappeared.

I gauge my rankings when signed out of Google completely.

Out of interest who did you contact at Google?

[FelicityA]

*Have you asked other people to do the same search for you?

I just tried a search putting "lake district holiday cottage" into google and indeed there was no sign of Windy on the first four pages (I didn't look any further than that). I found it weird that the website which just had lakes holiday cottage in its url came up again and again but absolutely no sign of my specific lake district search, producing Windy's site. I think I would definitely ask Google what is going on.

Off now to put in some specific searches for mine to see if I have disappeared as I have recently set up my site and put in a huge amount of links to help my guest's (or guests-to-be) plan their holiday in relation to events in the area so they can click through direct to each site/event. Perhaps this is now a BAD idea!? I was also planning to blog. Perhaps this is also a BAD idea.

PS I was writing this as Windy was posting so I see you have already contacted Google, Windy. Oh dear......

[Thomas BC]

Out of interest who did you contact at Google?

I filled in the form via the Webmasters whatever page. It took just under 3 weeks to get a response. You will just have to be patient on that one - as I am sure they have many of those requests now.

I sympathise entirely - I would probably be feeling the same if I was in your position. My comment was directed at only the use of the word "sinister" - it was not directly nor indirectly aimed at you - and I do not see the inference, but appreciate you might have felt that.