Penguin update synopsis

[dazc]

The only time I've ever had a new site jump around the results was when I put affiliate links on it a couple of weeks after creating it. It was all over the place. I removed the site-wide aff links and the homepage aff links and it settled within a couple of weeks. .

Which may have happened anway...

From this thread so far it has been mentioned that certain links are not passing the value they once did - whether they be spammy anchor text links, paid directory links, reciprocals, manipulative internals and so on...
I don't think it makes any odds what your site does or does not do - if you are not getting natural links then you're going to suffer the death of a thousand penquins.

 

[Blossom]

Which may have happened anway...

I don't think so. I added them back and it dropped and then started jumping again. Of course, it is just one example and it wasn't in any niche I've worked in at any other point so it's impossible to say for sure. Just never had it happen with any other site.

Have changed my sitewide aff link to nofollow, so will update on if it makes a difference.

I seem to have accidentally sent this post off on a tangent so I will shut up now :grin:

 

[chippyb]

Someone posted this on twitter last night
http://www.micrositemasters.com/blo...need-to-act-smarter-and-5-easy-ways-to-do-so/

Worth a read, makes sense about links being for url and not money keyword.

 

[peter_w]

Just did a 301 on a smaller, penalised site. Working so far.

I still don't know why Google haven't done anything about this. This "bug" has existed for at least 3 years.

 

[philiporchard]

Someone posted this on twitter last night
http://www.micrositemasters.com/blo...need-to-act-smarter-and-5-easy-ways-to-do-so/

Worth a read, makes sense about links being for url and not money keyword.

Took some time an digestion, but a good read and makes sound sense.

 

[dazc]

Define natural links?

A link that you didn't ask for, pay for or give yourself. I'm including +plus sharing and maybe twitter to an extent?.

If so, what about a viral campaign that generates thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands or maybe even millions of inbound links in a short space of time via twitter, facebook, forums, blogs, etc. Will this be deemed as spam by Google?

I'm certain there is some allowance for newsworthy content and link velocity.

How does Google define, reward and/or penalise one or the other (viral or automated)?

Now if I knew the answer to that one...

My initial thoughts were that they were out devalue the really spammy stuff and got it badly wrong. But having read some of the comments on here and looking at things objectively, which is never easy, I think they are out to totally devalue link manipulation to the point where it just has zero effect.

How close they are to achieving this remains to seen but it looks like they've made a big dent in it? As someone earlier pointed out - it can look like you've been penalized when, in fact, all that's happened is some of the links that were helping you just aren't anymore.

 

[dazc]

I still don't know why Google haven't done anything about this. This "bug" has existed for at least 3 years.

I did that with a Panda victim - sure it worked until they let the bear out of the cage again. It took 6 months to get the new site to rank for anything after that.
I guess the bug is there to stop you 301'ing all your cr*p at someone else and getting a benefit for it?

 

[peter_w]

I did that with a Panda victim - sure it worked until they let the bear out of the cage again. It took 6 months to get the new site to rank for anything after that.
I guess the bug is there to stop you 301'ing all your cr*p at someone else and getting a benefit for it?

Surely it would be better just not to pass ANY value (either positive or negative) through a penalised domain? That way you can neither benefit by getting a penalised site ranking again within days by 301ing it to another domain... and you also can't pass the penalty to a competitor.

Not that I'm really complaining, I'm just surprised that Google haven't clamped down on it. I've seen chains of up to four 301's work for penalised domains.

 

[dazc]

Surely it would be better just not to pass ANY value (either positive or negative) through a penalised domain? That way you can neither benefit by getting a penalised site ranking again within days by 301ing it to another domain... and you also can't pass the penalty to a competitor.

Not that I'm really complaining, I'm just surprised that Google haven't clamped down on it. I've seen chains of up to four 301's work for penalised domains.

There are legitimate reasons for doing a 301 so I guess it's biased towards the idea that most webmasters are not doing it manipulate rankings?

 

[dazc]

And how could any kind of algorithm decipher whether a link was either asked for, paid for or given to yourself (if you are conscious of leaving a footprint)?

I don't know for sure but if you have all the data of every link on the web you'd be able to do some fairly sophisticated analysis on this?

Automated link profiles generated in this manor and the places in which they are generated is not too different from a genuine viral campaign, which is what prompted me to ask the question in the first place.

Dunno - a viral campaign by its nature will have no certain outcome so it's going to be tough to prove or dis-prove?

Google cannot (shouldn't) continue to take inbound links as a metric for authority - at least not negatively anyway, because this will eventually destroy Google - wouldn't it?

I don't know what the alternative is really. What do you suggest?

 

[Ashton]

Bit of a generalisation, not everyone has been affected/penalised by this.

Good point, my mistake. I'll change that to nearly everyone grey/black hat in the affiliate sector!

 

[peter_w]

There are legitimate reasons for doing a 301 so I guess it's biased towards the idea that most webmasters are not doing it manipulate rankings?

I'm not saying do it for every 301. But Google knows what they have penalised (either algorithmically or manually) and could thus reduce the impact of 301ing those specifically.

 

[Aegean]

And how could any kind of algorithm decipher whether a link was either asked for, paid for or given to yourself (if you are conscious of leaving a footprint)?

It is a good question, but in my mind thats what a mathematical algorithm is all about. Not only that but it isn't one single formula, its a complex set of formulae that are designed to follow another external set of rules.

You could cut out a great majority of links by a number of predetermined and subsequently scored factors.

 

[dazc]

But an algorithm that has the ability to penalise a website/business based on the type/amount of inbound link profile clearly would never work because of the nature of negative SEO...

It seems that ranking factors can now be based on (amongst many other factors):

1. your internal link profile
2. your inbound link profile
3. the quality of the links inbound to your site
4. the quality of the inbound link profile(s) from the websites linking into your site
5. the external links on your site
6. the quality of the sites you are externally linking to.

As far as I know a huge amount of bad links will only hurt you if you don't have any good links or any history.
The rest of your list seems like a fair assessment. If you [not you personally] have suffered a loss in rankings then it is very likely that the poor quality links that we all go and get because they give you a slight advantage no longer have any value. I don't think it's any more complicated than that and all that is needed to recover is to get good links instead?
Easier said than done if you're just out to make money from search traffic but not impossible.

 

[scooter]

If you [not you personally] have suffered a loss in rankings then it is very likely that the poor quality links that we all go and get because they give you a slight advantage no longer have any value.

Maybe they do have value. Maybe that value is -1
So maybe now you are penalised for having said links?

If they were treated as neutral and have a zero value to google, then surely all of the big sites that have gone overnight would still be up there (or near) as they would still have a reasonable amount of "good" links?

I think, as Doug states, if you targetted a site and pummeled it with crap links you will have a negative effect on that sites ranking. Not good.


Payday loans was a good reference to use. It is now filled with nobodys
http://www.google.co.uk/#hl=en&gs_n....,cf.osb&fp=1dce7cc5f68d83de&biw=1152&bih=781



So how do you protect yourself from being a victim of a competitors malice?

Will the penalised sites always be penalised due to the quality of the links in place? Will it mean that they will never have a chance of being at or near the top due to this?

Maybe we will now see the people who paid for links contacting the same people and paying to now have them removed



.

 

[dazc]

So how do you protect yourself from being a victim of a competitors malice?

I don't think you have to worry about that any more than you did before. Is anyone going to link to a payday loan site without some incentive to do so? Maybe that's why the results are all-over the place as all those links are now zero worth?

 

[philiporchard]

Penguin Impact Graph

A graph to show the impact of the Penguin Update for a 18 geo websites.

 

[v1seo]

Sorry, not read every post so this may have already been mentioned

From the tests I have carried out the penalties tend to be more phrase related than page or site related.

I have a site that was ranked in top 10 for SEO and was top 3 for SEO Services.

I deliberatly set a few hundred thousand links at it using those 2 phrases as the anchor and within a fortnight it bombed out of the top 100 even though it still ranks for loads of other phrases.

I cant post links yet but just search for "Too Many Links With Same Anchor" to read about what I did.

 

[dougs]

yes it has

But thanks for spamming the forum

Doug

 

[v1seo]

But thanks for spamming the forum

Doug

Thanks for the nice friendly welcome

Is everyone like this here?