Google Panda Algorithm Update And What It Means To Bloggers and Freelance Writers

What Is The Impact of Google Panda Update On Blogging and Internet Marketers?

If you’re an internet marketer or blogger, chances are that you would have heard about the recent Google panda slaps on content publishing websites and blogs. That is what is termed the ‘Google Panda update’ or “Farmer update’.

What is the Google Panda update about? Google regards websites that do not host original, unique contents as ‘content farms’ and considers them bad business for searchers since their contents are usually irrelevant for the search results they show up on.  The purpose of the Google panda algorithm update was to reward relevant and original content providers and in return punish low quality, duplicate contents providers.

As you know, Google is the king of the search engines, being responsible for sending over 70% of traffic to websites or blogs with authentic contents for search queries.

Not too long ago Google did a massive sanitation exercise aimed at giving it’s own ‘customers’ (searchers) the best possible search outputs and experience. They named that exercise ‘the panda update” aka “farmer update”. This caused many websites to lose their top ranking search results positions (to high quality content sites).

Most hit by the Google panda update are thearticle directories and websites / blogs with low quality and duplicate contents. A reduction in Google traffic meant that they experienced a significant drop in their AdSense earnings – because ad clicks dropped.

However, article submission sites are not the only ones hit by the Google farmer update; many websites and blogs also felt the impact of the recent Google algorithm update. On the other hand, websites and blogs with top notch, useful and relevant contents report increase in search engine traffic, while others are getting lower search traffic, causing them to do a spring cleaning of their contents to provide better value to their readers, and to ultimately gain back Google confidence.

Why Article Submission Sites Were The Most Hit in the Google Panda Update And How It Affects You

Do you use article submission sites to build backlinks, generate traffic or build your list? If so, chances are that some of your previously submitted articles may have dropped in rankings or may be soon removed from the article directories (that is if they have not yet been removed).

Article submission sites attract lots of traffic from the search engine, hence the reason why bloggers and internet marketers use them to get quality backlinks, drive traffic (and sales) to their own website.  Article submission sites get majority of their traffic from Google search engine and they generate income from Google AdSense, due to the visitors clicking the ads. That means, they are likely to get more clicks (make more money) when they have higher search traffic. Of course these article sites do get lots of search traffic because of the vast volume of contents (aka ‘content farms’ dubbed by Google) in diverse subjects, on those article submission sites.

Why is the Google panda police after article submission sites?

Article sites are merely aggregators of contents and because they have built up authority over time, your article on a an article directory may sometimes out-rank the same content posted on the original author’s website or blog. Google considers this as ‘not fair’.  Hence, the need to turn the tables to appropriately reward authors of original content creators, most of whom are bloggers and internet marketers.

Does Google hate contents, websites, blogs, and article submission directories?

No. In fact, Google drools over quality contents BUT hates low-quality articles and duplicated/ mass submitted articles. Most of these kinds of articles are found in article submission sites – the reason why they were most hit by the Google panda update. If you continue to put up quality contents on your own blog or website, you’ll definitely be rewarded with higher rankings and more search traffic, according to Google’s guidelines.

Google Panda hates thin articles or posts, spun articles, copied stolen articles, misleading and irrelevant contents, non-comprehensive articles, keyword stuffed articles and more (others will be shared in the follow-up post).

What Measures Are Bloggers and Article Directories Currently Taking to Regain their High Google Ranking, following Panda Update?

So far, some of the top article submission sites have changed (tightened) their article acceptance and approval policies to ensure that only high quality contents are hosted on their sites. Some of the other measures taken to bounce back after the Google panda update include:

• Increase in length of articles approved. Sites like Buzzle and Suite101 previously had higher word count
• Reduction in number of links in resource box. Buzzle’s updated article approval guideline states that it will not accept any link in an article ; HubPagages (a web 2.0 site) has reduced number of outbound links acceptable per domain, to 2 and had to email authors to make adjustments to their submissions. A smart thing to do would be for you to go check out the health of your articles at the directories where they were submitted, as well as see what the new guidelines are.
• Deletion of Low Quality Posts: Ezinearticles, on it’s blog says that it plans to withdraw ‘thing and spammy’ articles. That means that some bloggers and internet marketers may get reduced backlink count

Those are just some of the changes at the article submission sites and how it affects you, as a blogger or internet marketer. In the follow-up post, we’ll be looking at a more detailed changes in the guidelines of the article submission sites. So stay tuned to this channel.

Google Panda Update: Should You Worry About It Now Or Any Time Soon?

According to Google, Panda update is an on-going thing. Google is concerned about making sure that every searcher (their customer) gets the best experience = good quality content. Post-panda, it’s a no-no to over-optimize your contents, talking about on-page SEO.

So, should you worry about Google Panda or any future algorithm change? Maybe, maybe not. That depends on whether you want to spend a whole lot of every day hustling for traffic or whether you want hands-free traffic, so you can focus on other parts of your business.

The Google panda police is after websites with duplicate, irrelevant contents – they simply want to reward contents that are useful to their searchers (customers). You do not have to worry about panda if you are already delivering good valuable contents. Here’s it from Google’s mouth: “…focus on developing high-quality content rather than trying to optimize for any particular Google algorithm“.

Affiliate Marketing though article marketing which relies on linking review pages and affiliate product pages will see some decline as most article sites have put stringent measures on third party links where they are allowed. This is one of the areas where a couple of freelance writers and internet marketers are voicing concerns on.

Link building through article marketing: While trying to regain their rankings, many article sites removed the links of several articles previously submitted. To be on the safe side, read the guidelines of any article submission site to be sure how many links they accept and whether you are allowed to link in the post body. Some sites emailed users to adjust the number of links on their articles within a specified number of days, or the articles will be deleted. So, be sure to check your old articles and make them compliant, if need be.

• For a complete, step by step guide on effective post-panda on-page Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and the things you should do to get your site loved by Google, I recommend you can read “Feeding the Panda” (aff link).

How To Know If Your Website or Blog Is Affected By Google Panda

In the mean time, if you have noticed a significant drop in rankings and search traffic at your blog and want to follow this

• SEOMoz’s post on how to determine if your blog is affected by the Google Farmer Update
• A Guide to assess your blog for panda impact and steps to gain your traffic back

Conclusion and Next Steps

Google Panda update is beneficial for both readers and blog writers and article marketers who toil to write great contents but had hitherto been ‘robbed’ of good search engine rankings by content aggregators and content scrapers and AdSense bloggers (with thin irrelevant contents and sometimes high traffic, keyword stuffed titles not matching the content body).

Now what if you’re already hit by the Google panda update or you want to know what really matters to Google with regards to contents, so that you can ensure that your website or blog is panda-proof, now or in the future?

Those are some of the topics we’ll be looking at in the next post in this series. If you would like to be in the know when the update to this post is posted, you can subscribe for blog updates in any of the 2 ways below:

• Subscribe Free to Get Notified of update to this post PLUS every new post right in your inbox

That’s it, on Google panda algorithm update and what it means to bloggers and internet marketers. Take action and stay panda-safe.

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Stella