Google Panda 4.2 Information

Google’s last official Panda refresh Panda 4.1 which was on September 25th in 2014. When Google roll out an algorithm update it is a new chance for some website and a problem for others with new penalties.

Chameleon rank number one in Google for “Google Penalty Advice” and we see a lot of the problems that arise from an update like Panda.

Google Panda is a technical refresh and not an update, which mean Google have tweaked the way Panda works so all the historical information about the Panda is very important.

The Panda algorithm update is designed by Google to push lower quality or thin content sites lower in the search results and as a result promoting quality sites higher within the search. So this means your website needs to be of a good high quality content and unique. This is a great update as this stops the lazy people being able to cheat the system and all the hard working people are going to gain from this.

Google Algorithm Updates (Panda)

  • Panda 1.0, February. 24, 2011
  • Panda 2.0, April 11, 2011
  • Panda 2.0 Update, May 10, 2011
  • Panda 2.0 Update, June 16, 2011
  • Panda 2.0 Update, July 23, 2011
  • Panda 2.0 Update, August. 12, 2011
  • Panda 2.0 Update, September. 28, 2011
  • Panda 3.0, November. 18, 2011
  • Panda 3.0 Update, January. 18, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, February. 27, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, March 23, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, April 19, 2012
  • Penguin, April 24, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, April 27, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, June 9, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, June 25, 2012
  • Link Warnings, July 19, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, July 24, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, August. 20, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, September. 18, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, September. 27, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, October. 19, 2011
  • Panda 3.0 Update, November. 5, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, November. 21, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, December. 21, 2012
  • Panda 3.0 Update, January. 22, 2013
  • Panda 3.0 Update, March 14, 2013
  • Penguin 2.0, May 22, 2013 (Google confirmed & announced)
  • Panda Recovery July 18, 2013 (Google confirmed & announced)
  • Hummingbird, August 20, 2013 (Google confirmed & announced)
  • Penguin 2.1, October 4, 2013
  • Payday Loan 2.0 — May 16, 2014
  • Panda 4.0 , May 19, 2014 (Google confirmed & announced)
  • Payday Loan 3.0,  June 12, 2014
  • Pigeon, July 24, 2014 (Local SEO Improvements)
  • Panda 4.1, September. 23, 2014 (Google confirmed & announced)
  • Penguin 3.0, October 17, 2014 (Google confirmed & announced)
  • Pirate 2.0, October 21, 2014 (Update to combat software and digital media piracy)
  • Pigeon Expands (UK, Canada, Australia), December 22, 2014
  • Speculated Update, February 4, 2015 (Google did not officially confirm an update)
  • Mobile Update “Mobilegeddon”, April 22, 2015
  • Google Quality Update, May 3, 2015
  • Panda 4.2, July 17, 2015 (Google confirmed & announced)

Google are always working on the Algorithm and different areas of Google are working on different aspects of Google Search. The updates above show that your website need to be kept up-to-date with the latest Google Algorithm changes in order to achieve success.

If your website has done everything right and then suddenly you see local enquirers drop, this might be due to the local changes when Pigeon was rolled out. Google Pigeon was an algorithm update that has been developed to provide search results for localised search terms to be more accurate and useful so if your website doesn’t have the required information available for Google to find to help the search engine identify the location that your business is in then you will drop.

Our Advice to continued success with all the changes is to ensure you have an SEO company working with you. This way your website is being checked and tweaked to make sure that it is delivering the correct information and grows within the Google Search Engine.

Google Mobile Algorithm Change – April 21st 2015

So today is the big day that Google roll out their Mobile Algorithm Change. Tuesday April 21st 2015 will have caused many webmasters with old sites to consider upgrading to a new website. Back in 2013 Google made a mobile ranking algorithm change, the first roll out of its kind. This latest change is a much larger update to the way Google look at websites and what is checked.

You can read more here:- http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/finding-more-mobile-friendly-search.html

Has this effected your website?  If it has let us know as there are some quick steps we can carry out to get a medium term resolution.

When is Google releasing the mobile-friendly algorithm update?

Tuesday April 21st 2015 is the day that Google has scheduled according to their updates.

If a site is not mobile friendly will desktop rankings drop?

No according to the information we have.

Does the mobile change include tablet search results?

No according to the information, the update will effect mobile’s only.

Can you check your website is Mobile Friendly to Google’s guidelines.

Yes, here https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/

Google Mobile-friendly search results

Google have announced today that they are changing their algorithm to detect browsers and devices to display search results relevant to the browser the user is operating.

What does this Google Mobile-friendly Change mean to non-technical people?

It means if you have a website that is not optimised for mobile devices then you will not achieve high rankings in Google search results.

When will Google Roll Out This Change

Google have said that this change will be taking place on the of 21st April 2015. This means it is now time to contact a web design company to learn what is required.

Testing to see if  your website is ready

You can test your website now using the Mobile-Friendly Test.

Finding more mobile-friendly search results

Web Design Company To Convert Your Website To Be Mobile Friendly

If you need help, please get in touch with Chameleon on 0121 663 0456 or email us to let us know your domain name. We’ll provide a quick check to see what is required, it might be a simple process to make your website mobile friendly.

Google’s Getting Started Useful Links

SituationGuidance
Find out if your website is mobile-friendlyTake Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test
3rd party software to make a website mobile-friendlyIf you have a website that uses third-party software (or if you want to create a new site), see Customize your website software for mobile users
Make a site mobile-friendly and dive into the technical detailsReview the Getting Started section on Web Fundamentals, our resource for web developersRead our Mobile SEO guide for an overview of the implementation process
Work with someone to make my site mobile-friendlyReview Google’s advice for working with a developer

Penguin 3.0 Update Information

It is still too early to tell what the full effects of the latest Google Penguin 3.0 update are, but it is clear from conversations with SEO consultants in the UK and US that use we share information with that this update has effected the SEO companies that offer poor services that are designed to be cheap and also companies that have not taken notice of the changes being rolled out in the last 6 months.

Our Penguin 3.0 Update Information

From what we are understanding negative SEO is now clearly a problem and Matt Cutt’s has said that this roll out took longer to be released due to the negative SEO problem. It is also clear that Google are being clear that the Google Disavow Tool should be used and from what we have seen and heard the negative feelings towards this being a witch hunt are now being cleared up and the actual result is Google are providing a solution to negative SEO.

Using the Google Disavow Tool

If your website has dropped in the last 12 months and you have not known what to do, contact Chameleon for a backlink report and to understand how to use the Google Disavow Tool to inform Google that the bad backlinks that are pointing to your website are not as a result of actual SEO and rather a competitor doing this negative SEO activity to harm your rankings.

Once you have your list of bad links then go here:- https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/disavow-links-main

For more information about this tool there is a Google help page:- https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/2648487?hl=en

If you get stuck please ask a Chameleon SEO Consultant who can help.

Penguin 3.0 Information

Google-Penguin-Update-LOne of the first things we have noticed is that competitors sites we monitor that have dropped since the update have a high number of exact match anchor text and we believe that this makes the domain profile to now be in what is called an “Exact Match Optimisation Penalty”.

On further investigation it is clear that anchor text percentages are playing an important role in the new algorithm and duplicate linking content may now be being picked up causing a ranking penalty.

Forum profiles are a clear negative and this is something that is clear in the majority of updates over the last two years.

Building links from social media sites is not seeming to be adding any benefits and sites that are hitting YouTube as a way to gain links are being effected by the latest update. The same can be said for social bookmarks and constantly posting on social sites to link back to the money site.

Also sites that are creating new content everyday that is simply padding a site in size and not adding any real value to the Internet or user is also now a worthless exercise.

What Should We Be Doing Post Penguin 3.0

If your website has dropped since the Penguin 3.0 update then simply trying to add lots of new links and content will not help your website to rank again. You need to STOP and look at what it is you are doing online and why Google do not like it.

Ask yourself a question “does this content add value to a user” and if it doesn’t then do not do it. The Internet was growing a ridiculous rate before Google changed the goal posts and now a lot of SEO companies have had to revaluate their processes. Millions of website’s were being registered and worthless content being added to pages using automated systems making Google’s job much more difficult and this simply had to stop and it is for this very reason that Google did so many changes over the last couple of years and as result this unneeded growth has slowed down.

So going forward your SEO techniques should be adding value to the Internet:-

  • Make sure your website is Google Friendly
  • Ensure you have everything laid out correctly following the coding guidelines Google recommend
  • Block search engine spiders from trawling everything on your site – make the Google spiders job easier and quicker
  • Ensure your content is being delivered on your site in a way that the target audience needs it to be and search engine spiders can identify what is it correctly
  • Create video’s explaining what it is your website is doing and why
  • Use Social media to inform people about your website and the products and services making it easier to find things
  • Ensure you are mobile ready and think about the information you are using, is this mobile friendly?
  • Check your hosting, is it quick enough for your website requirements?
  • Does your website need the code optimising to ensure it loads fast
  • Use the available tools to cache your website
  • Clean up your link profile using the Google DISAVOW tool
  • If you have over optimised anchor text using keywords pointing to your domain change them to be the domain name or brand name
  • Look at the number of words on your pages, if you have a very small amount then your keywords are probably far too heavy and thus over optimised

To summarise, we are not going to pretend that if you do all the above your website will rank in the latest Google Algorithm and go to number one but it is a very good starting point.

If you need help then get in touch with a Chameleon SEO Consultant.

SEO Consultant Advice

Google Panda Update On September 5th 2014

On Friday 5th September 2014 Google carried out another Panda refresh. This has had webmasters and SEO consultants in a spin complaining about yet more traffic loses.

We are happy to report that Chameleon clients have gained from the loses and grown in rankings thanks to the white label SEO services we provide following Google guidelines.

Google Algorithm Update Panda Penguin 2013Following some of the communications made in reference to this update the user JohnMu (a.k.a John Mueller) commented on the Google Webmaster forumI’d recommend making sure your website has unique, compelling, and high-quality content of its own — not just content from other websites.”

It seems that SEO companies are still not understanding that there is no easy and quick way to rank a website. Hard work and effort pays off.

These links contain information that might be useful.