Another Google Algorithm Update ~ Advertising For Success

We knew that Google had made a minor change to their algorithm at the end of January. We were told it was to penalize content farms and websites that recycle content. Somehow, Google neglected to tell us about the Panda Update, a major update to their main ranking algorithm.

So how does this new algorithm distinguish good sites from bad? Comparing sites known for original content with sites that contain duplicate, low-quality or irrelevant content. Google also had help from external testers who reviewed a number of sites.

Some site owners have complained of a sudden drop in their positioning and loss of traffic up to 40 percent within 24 hours of the new algorithm implementation.

This update will reduce the ranking of sites that do not contain useful content, so here is a checklist of what your site must include:

Original content
Authoritative information
Added value
Significant user engagement with links and social sharing
Valuable content across the entire site

If you think your site meets the guidelines above and has been penalized unfairly, Google has started a thread in their webmaster discussion forum where you can provide them with more details on your specific situation. However . . .

Note that as this is an algorithmic change we are unable to make manual exceptions, but in cases of high quality content we can pass the examples along to the engineers who will look at them as they work on future iterations and improvements to the algorithm.