by
Rachel Cummins
| May 17, 2011
Over the past month, there has been a lot of speculation about the recent Google Panda update amongst marketers. But to cut through the chatter and get to the important stuff, we thought we would round up the main points for you – and share what we think you should learn from it...
Optimising sites to appeal to the Google algorithm
At the heart of Google’s search facility is something called an algorithm, which is a type of formula, and Google’s way of deciding what ranks where for search terms. It is a way of deciding what is high quality and what is not, and for a good few years now it has been commonly agreed that it is mainly based on two things: quality content on the website, and incoming links from other high quality websites (that act as a vote of confidence for that site). Content is easy to build and therefore you can positively influence your listing in this respect; however it is more difficult to acquire incoming links to your site from other great sites, so this has been more of a challenge for website marketers. In the effort for great backlinks, our advice has always been concentrate on content, and that way people will link to your site organically. But businesses have not always chosen the high quality content route in their mission for incoming links, instead choosing quick but poor quality methods that won them links back in a matter of minutes...
Panda update penalised sites with backlinks from content farms
Every now and then Google tweak and update their algorithm so it remains relevant to the way that people are creating websites, and correctly reflects which websites are worth their salt and which are not. In the recent Panda update, Google shifted lots of results around to reflect the new algorithm which appeared to concentrate on the quality of the sites where links were coming from. In doing so a lot of sites were penalised for having backlinks from things called ‘content farms’, which are low quality websites that contain poor quality, so called ‘articles’ (often sparse and poorly written paragraphs of text submitted by site owners themselves) which contain backlinks to people’s sites. They exist purely for people to post links to their sites to help them shift up the rankings and are of no worth as articles in their own right.
Unfortunately article submission to content farms has been a low grade technique employed by many SEO companies (who told their clients that this was a valid way of creating links). Many businesses relied on such methods, which for a while yielded results, but have since been punished severely as a result by losing any rankings they had.
Social media activity is now part of the Google algorithm
Also noted by industry professionals was the fact that now, social media activity is being indexed by Google, and insiders have confirmed that social media activity is now a factor in the Google algorithm. This shift marks Google’s acknowledgement that people now have other ways of finding websites asides from search engines – and that way is social media. This addition to the algorithm is Google’s way of keeping relevant and should indicate to you as a marketer that you should be using social media as a channel for people to interact with your website.
Build great content, get involved with social media, and think of other routes to your site
1. Build content that adds value, not just to get rankings
Always ask these questions when creating content: does the content stand up on its own? Is it useful, purposeful, well written and valuable to the audience? If the answer is yes then great. If content is being created just for SEO purposes then it shouldn’t exist. It has to add value to the reader in other ways too.
2. Use social media as a communications channel - and to grow your search presence
Google has recognised activity and mentions in social media as a barometer of a site’s quality and popularity. This is not to be sniffed at! If you aren’t already active in social media, start to think about a social media strategy that would work for your business. Which channels or utilities do your customers use? How can you connect with them using social media? Now we know Google are recognising this as part of their algorithm, you have another reason to get involved.
3. Recognise other routes to your site rather than just relying on Google search
People no longer rely 100% on Google search to find great websites. Think about your audience and how they operate; are there other ways to send people to your site? Social media is one way, but what about online advertising, campaigns, events, or direct marketing? Even it is very important to understand what Google is looking for to rank you well, it is unhealthy to rely too much on them, and a good idea to invest energy and money into other ways of generating traffic to your site.