GPWA Times Magazine - Issue 26 - October 2013

The different warning messages Below are the five main types of warning message you are likely to get as an affiliate. • Pure spam • User-generated spam • Unnatural links from your site • Unnatural links to your site • Thin content that has little or no added value There are variations of these; for example “unnatural links to your site” can have a variety of severities. But the worst case scenario is a “pure spam” warning; realis- tically, you should just start again. The rest of the warnings can be dealt with relatively easily. Spammy comments (us- er-generated spam) can be deleted and unnatural links from the site are again easy to control. When it comes to unnatural links to your site and thin content warnings, there is a bit more work to be done. Low-value content is pretty self-explanatory. The difficulty really comes from unnatural links, and how you should deal with these depends on how many bad links you’ve got. What was the Penguin 2.0 update? It’s important to state that Penguin 2.0 and previous updates are not penalties, they are algorithm updates. Penguin 2.0 and its predecessors were simply a way of reanalyzing data to improve the quality of search engine results for users. The warn- ing messages as outlined above, however, are “true penalties.” If you saw a downturn in rankings and traffic after Penguin 2.0 rolled out at the end of May you have likely been impacted by the algorithm change, and have an al- gorithmic filter. Like the original Penguin update of April 2012, the latest changes are designed for downgrading poor-quality, “spammy” links, but have a broader target. In particular the update seems to have negatively impacted sites with high ratios of “money term” anchor texts (e.g., casino bonus, poker freeroll) – so nothing new there then. Is it Penguin, or something else? We’ve outlined what an algorithmic filter is in relation to Penguin 2.0, but previ- ous updates could also have impacted your site in the same way. As Google rolls out minor updates to major algorithmic changes on a regular basis you could be affected at any point, not just around a major update. But if you have been negatively affected outside of a major update you may have been hit by a manual penalty. In this in- stance your site has been analyzed by an engineer on Google’s Webspam team and they have smacked your site with a penal- ty for certain keywords, or a whole host of keywords. In such instances you will likely see your site pushed down rankings by a set amount – say 10 places. If you have incurred a manual penalty you will likely receive a message in your Google Webmaster Tools account inform- ing you of the fact. At this stage it is also worth considering a few other questions: • If it is analgorithmic penalty, which update were you affected by? You can’t cure something if you don’t know what it was caused by. • Have you been affected by mul- tiple updates? The older the website, the greater the chance you have mul- tiple penalties to worry about. • Do you have link devaluation? If your rankings suddenly fell without warning then they may simply have been devalued, rather than having been penalty based. • What type of penalty do you have? Is it a sitewide, anchor-text or page-lev- el penalty? So you’ve dug around a little bit, and you’re starting to understand what has happened to your site. But what’s next? How can you be certain as to what type of penalty your site has received? Analytics are your friend Analytics will give you an idea of whether your traffic has been impacted for specific terms. You’ll probably have a good idea of what your non-brand commercial key- words are, so take a look at those first. Set up a couple of keyword filters look- ing at exact-match and phrase-based searches around these terms for new visitor traffic. Use these filters to com- pare traffic after the perceived change in rankings with traffic from previous peri- ods or years. This analysis will help you understand which keywords are affected and whether phrases that stem from these keywords have also been impacted. Ask Google If you have not received a message high- lighting that a manual spam action has been taken against you, and you’re un- certain what type of penalty you have, it’s time to ask the only “person” who really knows: Google. Submit a reconsideration request via your Google Webmaster Tools account for the site that has been impacted, simply asking if a manual spam action has been taken on the site, and wait for the reply. When it does finally ping through (it could take a few weeks) you’ll have your answer and will know whether you have a manual or algorithmic penalty. Time to get busy The vast majority of penalties seen by agencies are link-related. Most people with Panda problems have already dealt with them, so it is now time to roll your sleeves up and embark on a process of link removal. “You must play doctor to your domain, diagnosing the problem before prescribing treatment. . . . And perhaps more like a vet, you need to know when to put the site down.” 31 Saving a sinking ship: How to identify and survive a Google penalty