Yes, Google has made another algorithm change, the Panda Update. This change has had more significant impact on how websites rank in search results than many of their previous updates, and as usual, many sites have seen significant losses in positioning. The Panda update has largely focussed on content, and the quality of that content. The aspects of content Google has really cracked down on are duplicate content, and quality measures such as how well content is written. Forums across the web including some very large websites have had very significant drops in traffic due to this . So what are some things we can do to ensure this doesn’t happen to you:
- Write unique, useful and relevant information-rich content.
- Check your grammar and spelling.
- Make use of your blog if you have one and update it regularly. Keep your articles topical and of real interest to your users.
- Ensure your targeted keywords are placed properly throughout the content, in a way that is appealing to a real person, and not just focussed on stuffing your page with keywords to please the search engines.
While Google has certainly come under a lot of fire for this recent update, the thing that is really important to think about here is that as the largest search engine in the world, they also need to stay on top, which means continually improving the results they provide to those using Google. That means serving up quality websites that Google users will really benefit from, and that really comes back to quality content, and quality websites., But with an ever changing web, this shows the importance of looking at other ways such as social media to diversify your web marketing efforts so that should such an update by Google affect your website, you have other avenues to rely upon while you get your Google rankings back up.
