Incoming Google Penguin Update “Jarring & Jolting”
Taking the stage at SES San Francisco, Google’s head of webspam Matt Cutts announced that Penguin 2.0 is on it’s way, describing the update as a “jarring and jolting” update that webmasters “don’t want”.
Likening the Penguin-refining process to the same ones used by Google during the Panda updates, Cutts warned that it’s still early days for Penguin and that future updates will incorporate new ranking signals and have greater impact than previous Penguin hits. He didn’t let too much more out of the bag, but Matt Cutts isn’t one known for hyperbole.
So what might some of these SEO changes be?
At this point it’s anyones guess. Regardless of what you’ve read, Penguin has always been about diminishing the effectiveness of ranking signals that rewarded webspam-oriented SEO while improving trust signals through better linkspam and poor content detection.
We expect the scope of Penguin to remain relatively the same: targeting links even further and possibly going after some of the just-as-spammy techniques that have popped up since the first Penguin update. If you’re still trying to make your links ‘appear’ natural, then you’re probably going to get hit by Penguin again.
So what are some SEO link building strategies that work?
Building serious, robust and Penguin-proof links is all about providing users with value.
As we see in this week’s show, Mozo’s strategy of providing websites with an embeddable widget that comes with an attached link has paid dividends for them, allowing them to break into the first page for many highly-competitive credit card SERPs. Word of warning if you do pursue widgets, make sure you’re following Google’s advice on anchor text to avoid a Penguin hit.
Their use of awards that link back to their site is also another one that’s working for them, allowing them to build trustworthy, one-way links while also giving the linking website kudos and a social trust signal to prospective buyers.
As for us, we’re a big fan of guest blogging. The publisher gets a great piece of content, we generate more exposure and in most cases the article will often contain a link back to our site that helps us build our backlink portfolio.
What should we do to prepare for the Penguins?
- Stop buying backlinks
- Stop trying to make links ‘appear’ real
- Remove any paid links
- Clean up any noise you’re making in the index
- Fix crawl errors on your site
- Start building genuine, trustworthy links from reputable websites
Band aid your site with the six steps above and rather than playing catchup when the next Penguin update rolls around you’ll be reaping the benefits of higher, more stable rankings. But get cracking now before it’s too late!
What do you think Google’s cooking up for us? What would you like to see fixed? Leave us a comment below!
Jim’s been here for a while, you know who he is.
