Since the day Google’s Penguin Update was rolled out, many webmasters and SEO professionals have experienced damages in their websites. Although the damage experienced wasn’t similar to the magnitude caused by the first algorithm change called the Panda Update, it still caused widespread damage and destruction in a number of websites in its wake.
If your website was hit hard by Google’s Penguin Update, it is of paramount importance that you try and get back in the search engine rankings as fast as possible. Although recovering from this algorithm change and shift is never easy said and done, there is always something you can do to prevent further Google Penguin smackdown and recover your momentum in the search engine ranking race.
This article will share some tips and advices to those who are struggling to know what they can do to recover from and prevent a Penguin Update injury.
What is the Penguin Update?
For those who are unfamiliar, the Penguin Update was officially launched and rolled out on April 24, 2012. Penguin is just a name for an advanced algorithm that will affect search engine searches (and since its launch, it has certainly made changes and damages).
The Penguin update made use of search engine optimization (SEO) techniques and applied them to webmaster standards via Google. This algorithm change was designed to stop spam websites from ranking in search engine results pages (SERPs). It will penalize and prevent spammy websites from influencing search engine ranking and accuracy. Although there are several reasons why a website is considered as spam, the primary reason is the low-quality links on the website and low-quality links linking back to it.
Today, the Penguin Update is fully live and rolled out across all Google’s different data centers. It has been successful in achieving what it was designed for. However, as much as the Penguin Update’s objective was to secure the accuracy of search engine results and freeing the SERPs from spammy sites, the drastic changes in the landscape of SEO has made a big impact to many white hat SEO practitioners and their websites.
Do you have a Penguin problem?
In order to successfully recover from the damage of the Penguin Update or even prevent further damages, you need to know first if you have been affected by this algorithm update.
In Kristina Weis’ Google’s Penguin Update: Prevention and Recovery, she shared some circumstances which can lead you to encounter a Penguin problem. You could have a Penguin problem if:
- You have observed that the number of visitors to your website from Google search results or your Google search engine ranking plunged on the day the Penguin Update was rolled out (April 24th) or during the two refresh dates of the update (May 25th or October 5th).
- The anchor text for links directing to your website are mostly perfect keywords. A “natural link profile must contain a number of links with anchor texts like your business name, website URL, and “click here.” On the other hand, a “unnatural link profile will mostly have inbound links with inappropriate anchor texts. Linking on these keyword terms will be strange and unusual.
- Your home page and blog posts don’t have as many inbound links compared to your product or service page. People will likely link more to your home page or remarkable content than any ‘salesy’ page.
- You have very few links from websites in the industry or niche you are in.
- From every page of many websites, you have links pointing to your site and they all have keywords as anchor texts. Typically, this practice of sitewide links is considered legitimate. However, if these links are keyword-rich, websites doing such a practice can get in trouble.
How Can You Recover From or Prevent A Penguin Setback?
Recovering from the hard hits from the Penguin Update will take time and effort. Although it is difficult to recover right away, you can still do some damage control and maintenance in order to overcome any Penguin setback you may experience. Understanding how the Penguin Update treats the different links on a website can help you to improve your website ranking in search engine result pages.
Now, if your website was already hit by the Penguin, here are some measures you can do to straighten your website’s records.
- Avoid Bad Links. If your website has a lot of inbound and outbound links coming from and going to low-quality websites, there is a big chance that your website will be considered as SPAMMY. If you can, you need to guest post on blogs and websites which provide high quality content. If links coming to your sites are from spam websites, you must request the respective ‘spam’ websites to remove links from your site. Additionally, spend time to deleting links pointing to low-quality websites.
- Build up more high-quality links to and from your website. It is very important that you have links to and from your website from related sites. If you are featuring web development and IT articles on your website and your links are flowing to sites on personality development, your website will be penalized by Google. It is high time to check your links and determine whether they are relevant to you. Those that are irrelevant should be removed. You need to make sure at least 20% of the links flowing to and from your site are from related websites.
- Avoid using the same keywords as anchor texts on many websites. If you do use the same keywords over and over again as anchors text in websites, Google (with its Penguin Update) will consider it as spam. Therefore, you need to make use of various keywords at various locations or websites.
- Focus on your audience, not always on the SEO aspects. You need to remember that search engine optimization is done to attract relevant audience or web users. SEO should not overtake the convenience and needs of users. Don’t only plan for SEO, but plan your SEO with your audience in mind.
- User-friendly content and keep the number of ads to limited. Your website content must cater to what your audience need and want. If you crowd your websites with unnecessary advertisement beyond the reasonable limit, you will likely be punished by the Penguin.
- Focus on better navigation for your users. Navigation from one page to another should be smooth and free from distraction.
How Do You Know You’ve Recovered?
If you have made some changes to get you back on the good side of Google, you need to wait until the Penguin Update make a refresh to see if you have indeed recovered. After the refresh, you can check your Google Analytics to see if there is a boost in your organic Google search traffic.
