The Google Penguin update has landed. Question is – how did it affect your rankings? While Google is thrilled to toot its own horn over its newest tool in fighting spam, there are many folks who are asking whether this was truly the answer to the problem. It seems that small business owners are the ones who are seeing the biggest fallout from the changes implemented by the newest Google algorithm. While some are left trying to figure out how to get back up in the ranks, others are left asking if Penguin truly helped to address the issues surrounding Negative SEO tactics.
When asked whether the main goal of Penguin was achieved, Matt Cutts – Google’s head web spam fighter – answered with a sure and quick Yes. As far as the Big G is concerned, the Penguin update has addressed several issues that have been considered ongoing as far as spammy links go.
There are however several issues that have come to light immediately following the rollout. Take Viagra for example – the legitimate site was knocked out of the ranks while other spam sites touting the product were left alone. So much for staying power! Other issues included scraped sites being pushed back in the ranks while those that scraped them were propelled higher. Most disturbing though to some was the fact that empty sites were suddenly ranking very high on the searches.
So, why the buggy issues following Penguin if things were so peachy? According to Google, the issues were a preexisting condition. Trouble is, if that were the case then why did the Penguin release trigger a change? Why not before? There is a huge possibility that Google is simply shooing away naysayers in hopes that everyone will accept Penguin as inevitability. As long as many big businesses are not being hurt, then who really has a leg to stand on? This is where small businesses must take the time and make a stand. If you feel that your site was unfairly affected, then contact Google and have them look into it.
Does Penguin’s release guarantee that spam sites and links will get the boot? Certainly some will however others are bound to get through. There is no perfect means of preventing spam from all sources. The hope is that a good deal of them will get suppressed.
Did your site get hit by the Penguin rollout? If so, then what can you do to get back to where you were previously ranking? If you go by what Google is saying, then your site should naturally crawl its way back up the ranks as long as you are on the up and up. In all practicality however there is probably much more to it. In fact, when you take a closer look at some of the main sites that have been hit you will start to see a trend. Bad linking practices have played a huge roll – link farms and freebie site themes are at the forefront in fact.
In our next post we will take a look at what you can do to get yourself clear of some of these pitfalls. We will also dig a little deeper to see what role Penguin will play in the future of small business sites looking to rank.