On August 1, 2018, Google rolled out a major update. They classified it as a core broad algorithm update with no intent to target a specific vertical however, the search community saw that affected sites are in the health and medical industry thus calling it the Medic Update.

What is a “Core Broad Algorithm Update”?

Here’s what Google has to say about the broad core algorithm update:

“Each day, Google usually releases one or more changes designed to improve our results. Some are focused around specific improvements. Some are broad changes. Last week, we released a broad core algorithm update. We do these routinely several times per year….”

Yes, this is a very vague explanation but that’s how Google operates when it comes to their search algorithm. The key takeaways from this statement about broad core algorithm updates are:

• Not focused on specific improvements
• Designed to improve results

Then what exactly is the Medic Update about?

Let’s start by looking at what Google has said about this update:

Google has confirmed that an update was rolled out on August 1, 2018, referencing a statement they released on March 2018:

“As with any update, some sites may note drops or gains. There’s nothing wrong with pages that may now perform less well. Instead, it’s that changes to our systems are benefiting pages that were previously under-rewarded….”

“…There’s no “fix” for pages that may perform less well other than to remain focused on building great content. Over time, it may be that your content may rise relative to other pages.”

Google’s Danny Sullivan, has also said that this update is global.

When you think of search engines, the first thing that immediately comes to mind is Google. It is synonymous with the internet, and the word itself has become a verb.

Today, instead of people saying “search for local businesses,” they say “Google local businesses.” The search engine king has dominated the World Wide Web, ruling over all that is accessible over the Internet. As the reigning monarch of search engines, Google has created a set of guidelines for every webmaster to follow — or else suffer the consequences of a penalty.

What is a Google penalty?

Over the last two decades, Google has been working hard to refine its core. Its algorithm began detecting and eliminating poor content, while elevating quality pages to the top of search engine results.

In 2012, Google rolled out one of its major algorithm changes — the Penguin update. According to Search Engine Land, the update flagged sites that “deemed to be spamming its search results.” It hit more than 1 in 10 search results overnight, wiping a few websites out of search entirely. It also blasted poor-quality content off the radar, forcing search engine optimizers to be more careful and strategic with their content marketing schemes.

Since then, Google was steadfast in releasing algorithm changes that continue to challenge the online marketing industry.

Why should you care?

Statistics show that 71 percent of small businesses have a website, with 73 percent being mobile-friendly or responsive. Additionally, a staggering 92 percent of small businesses without sites claim that they will have one by the end of 2018. These numbers prove just how significant an online presence is in the marketing industry.

If you are a small business owner, you already know the importance of developing a website. It is the online storefront of your business — an incredibly useful tool that, when done correctly, reaches beyond the local market and magnifies traffic and sales.

In aspiration of beating hundreds and thousands of online competitors, you begin investing in digital marketing strategies that catapult you on Google’s coveted first page — where every business owner wants to be. However, meeting Google’s guidelines play a crucial role in favor of your website. The main objective of Google is to give its users access to relevant, accurate, and unique information. That is why it continuously modifies its algorithms so that each website gets the exposure it rightfully deserves.

However, your primary concern is you can be penalized. If you use “illegal” or Black Hat SEO tactics to top search engine page results (SERPs), you risk getting Google penalties that impact your business. With that said, it is crucial for every SEO professional to evolve, adapt, and remain alert for Google’s plans. If not, your website may obtain a penalty that heavily impacts its traffic, sales, and overall visibility.

How do you recognize a Google penalty?

From Google’s point of view, any website that attempts to manipulate the search results is not only harming Google, but also its users, too. Google penalties are either automatic or manual. While manual penalties involve a warning, automatic penalties just happen. So, how do you know if you had been automatically penalized? Here are some clues, according to KissMetrics:

• Poor ranks.

  Is your website failing to rank even for your own brand name? How about when you use your primary keywords?

• Slipping into the back pages.

  Did your web page suddenly appear on the second or third page when it was initially in the top five of the SERPs?

• Not on Google cached results.

  Was your entire website removed from Google’s cached search results overnight?

• Cannot be found:

  Does running a site search (site:yourdomain.com keyword) show your website?

• Wrong listing

  . When you find your Google listing, was it for your homepage or another page on your site? (It should be your homepage).

If you run a few tests and notice one or more of these factors, the chances are that a penalty has affected your site.

How do you recover from a Google penalty?

The first step to recovering from a penalty is to know the cause. You must analyze your website’s links and identify all the ones that are causing your rankings to drop.

Depending on the cause of penalty, solutions may vary. But here are some of the quick fixes you can try:

• Remove bad backlinks.

  Poor-quality backlinks can hurt your rankings in many ways, which is why it’s important to get rid of them. If you don’t know where to start, read this article about How to Spring Clean Your Bad Backlinks.

• Use Google’s Disavow Tool.

  There is a way to ask Google to disregard troublesome links that are harming your website. Just keep in mind that the Google Disavow Tool is an advanced feature that must be used with caution.

In cases when the domain is tarnished, there is very little you can do to salvage or rehabilitate your website.

Can I submit a consideration request?

Once you successfully clean your backlinks, you can submit a reconsideration request. You must provide accurate information regarding the cleanup process, which should include one or more of the following:

• 
  

  An excel file of all the bad links your removed

   

• 
  

  Details of your malware cleanup activities

   

• 
  

  A list of spam comments that you deleted on your website

   

• 
  

  A thorough explanation of how will prevent the same issue from recurring

   

After submitting your request, you should receive confirmation from Google. If you had correctly diagnosed and resolve the cause, you should get another notification saying that the penalty has been lifted.

Takeaway  

Google acts much like a legislator in the digital world. Its penalties serve as rules and regulation to maintain order, as well as implement fair punishment or praise to websites residing in its community. Without proper guidelines, tactics like Black Hat SEO will continue to reign, and search engine users (which include YOU), will not get the results they seek when using Google.

Are you in need SEO services?

Just because your rank is dropping does not automatically mean that you are dealing with a Google penalty. Remember that your competition is getting tougher by the day, and like you, they are doing their best to climb the ranks of Google. You may think that you have a Google penalty, when in fact, you just need to improve your search engine optimization methods. This is where PrimeView comes in. For effective SEO strategies, call us at 480-970-4688 or complete our online form.

So you set out to create an SEO strategy with the hope of boosting your rankings which will hopefully result in increased traffic, higher conversions, more leads, and business growth. As far as you’re concerned, you’re employing only the best and acceptable practices. However, you still experienced a drop in rankings.

Initially, it’s normal to get worried. But it’s important to act fast and figure what caused that ranking drop and address it from there. Typically, negative ranking changes happen for several reasons. Some can be dealt with on your end, while others are just way beyond your control.

Let’s look at 10 reasons why websites experience ranking changes and the ways on how to deal with them.

1. Links

Links leading to your domain can affect your rankings in several ways.

First, if you have an influx of new links leading to your website, you can experience a temporary drop in rankings. This usually happens when you had issues in the past regarding unnatural links.

Meanwhile, lost links can also contribute to a ranking change. This happens when there are links going to your website that has been removed or may be temporarily unavailable.

Low quality links pointing to your website is a bane of SEO, and you want to avoid them at all cost if you want to maintain good rankings. If you have a lot of poor and irrelevant links leading to your website, search engines can view that as spamming and your website can be penalized or worst, get de-indexed. If you fell victim to link buying schemes or manipulative linking practices, it’s recommended to do a link clean-up.

Track links actively and continue building up high quality links to your domain. You can do this through creating quality content that’s share-worthy, substantial, and relevant. You can also market your content and brand through participating in different platforms to share your insights and expertise.

2. Search engine penalties

Search engines can also penalize websites if they violate the practices recommended for SEO, which are ultimately geared towards improving user experience on the web.

When Google rolled out the Panda algorithm, a lot of websites suffered a huge drop in rankings because of thin and low-quality content. Meanwhile, websites who employed spammy linking techniques were greatly affected when the Penguin algorithm update rolled out.

If you have been penalized, don’t fret. It may feel like doom and gloom has set upon your website, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t recover. What you need to do is to re-assess your website, revamp your strategy, remove low quality content and links,  adhere to recommended practices moving forward, and always monitor the performance of your website.

3. Search engine changes and tests

There are cases when search engines implement changes or conducts trials, and it may affect your rankings. There’s not much you can do about these instances as they are not within your control. If you’re employing best SEO practices, you wouldn’t have to worry so much and you can expect your rankings to be back up in a few days. 

4. Slow page speed

Page speed plays a crucial role in user experience, and ultimately in your rankings. It wouldn’t matter if your website has the most comprehensive design and content if it will not load fast enough. So check your servers, and make sure that they are efficient in giving your visitors a fluid way of navigating your website. Likewise, use tools that can help track your website’s page speed and determine what elements are slowing down your pages.

5. On-page problems

Sometimes, issues within your pages cause your rankings to take a plunge. It could be due to poor internal linking and optimization of your website, incorrect robots.txt file, incorrect canonical tags, absence of index tags, slow page speed, or worst, due to a hacking incident. This further reiterates the importance of conducting website maintenance and regular monitoring of on-site elements so that you can spot errors and address them before they can affect rankings.

6. Competition

If you used to be on the first spot and you suddenly dropped one to two notches, it could be that your competitor outperformed you. While it’s important to always keep your website well-maintained and strategies in-line with acceptable marketing methods, you also need to monitor your competitors if you want to stay on top. Be aware of their recent actions so that you can stay one step ahead and devise new strategies before they do.

7. Website modifications

A decrease in rankings can also be caused by changes made on your website like a new design or updates in the code, layout, plug-ins, and other components. Make sure that all key persons involved in your internet marketing efforts are in the loop with these changes, so that you can avoid any implication on other areas of SEO and on your placement on the SERPs.

8. Changes in user behavior

User behavior is one of the reasons why SEO is dynamic and ever-changing. If your strategies are not connected with how users behave, you can experience a drop in rankings.

There are cases when the way users input queries changes, which happens when they demand for fresher results. This occurs when a particular subject becomes trending. As a result, news and more up to date pieces about the topic dominate the top of the SERPs and evergreen content are pushed down. Since that is the case, it pays to be abreast in your industry, so that you’re always in the forefront of delivering quality and up to date content to your target audience.

9. Changes in click-through rates

If your click-through rate has dropped, it could be the reason why your rankings experienced a decline. Remember that Google is all about user experience and generating results that they think is the most relevant to search queries. If you proved that your CTR is to blame for the drop in your rankings, you can work on improving your listing on the SERPs.

10. Poor content

Even if it sounds like a cliché, content is king when it comes to SEO. Poor content can drive your rankings down or worst, take you out of the SERPs altogether. Devote time in developing quality posts that your target audience would be compelled to share and cite as source. If you master the art of content marketing, traffic, links, good reputation, and high rankings will follow suit.

What’s Up with Google

Google Search senior vice president Amit Singhal informs us via Re/Code that Google gets over 100 billion searches a month. In addition to that, he mentioned that more than 50% of those searches come from mobile devices. The figures do not include searches made over devices with screens that are bigger than 6 inches like the tablets.

With innovations like voice recognition as well as features added like Google Now, the search engine box is just a peak of the iceberg. Singhal explains that the user environments as well as the device capabilities dictate how people search today, which could be either by keying in a box like most use to do, or by talking directly to the smartphone device to retrieve the information needed.

Singhal adds that search is basically how people interact with computing. Computing or performing the operation required by the user exists in a 4-to-6-inch device. It may exist in a desktop, and it may exist on a 1-inch round device.

In this Code/Mobile conference held at the Ritz-Carlton in Half Moon Bay, California, which was held in October last year, Singhal also mentions that Google has already indexed over 100 billion links within apps as searchable. Moreover, to make the search load faster and give create an increased user satisfaction, Amit express that the company introduced Accelerated Mobile Pages, which develops web pages efficiently as well as easily to enable a quicker loading time for information needed to be retrieved.

Google and its Algorithm

Since 2001 Google has indexed billions of web pages. In fact, according to Statistic Brain – Google had 30,000,000,000,000 pages indexed in 2014, and continues to crawl through more than 20 billion pages a day on the constantly growing World Wide Web. To do this magnitude of work, Mr. Google use algorithms now known as the Hummingbird. Page Rank after Larry Page, one of the founders of Google, a patented algorithm, is one of the more than 200 elements that go into the Hummingbird algorithm, which is a part of the attempt of the Google search engine to make search insightful, provide information from various media, as well as super smart. These amazing data, has been made even more insightful through an article by William Harris via Elumynt, and indicating that given this figure, Google has the lowest indexing growth rate, that is around 8.7%, 4,000,000,000/ 46,000,000,000 = 0.08695652 in 2011 and 2012.

This might not mean much to an average Google user. But to every search engine marketer, figures such as these, and everything Google and page rank related figures say it all.

The “maths that computers use to decide stuff” facilitates ranked pages based on their significance, identifies errors in spelling, presents alternatives to words, predicts auto-complete queries, and does unified searches using images, audio and video as well as voice.

The algorithm also tries to delve into the deeper meaning of the words searched for and interprets it in its most natural form, then recognizes words with similar meanings to include in the retrieved pages containing the searched term or key word. This system allows search engine such as Google to provide the necessary information embedded all over the web and present them based on factors such as significance or relevance, most visited page, and so on, to an anticipating Google user.

Panda, Phantom, RankBrain: What Do These Have to Do with SEO?

Like many innovations, Google rolls out updates as an enhancement to the current algorithms, basically for a better or more appropriate information retrieval system. As such, updates to some of the existing elements of the Hummingbird algorithm codenamed Panda, RankBrain, and Penguin were rolled out last year.

Reported algorithm updates (coined as Panthom updates by Glenn Gabe, a digital marketing veteran and owner of G Squared Interactive) also created a buzz in Feb 5, early May, April 29,2015, Sept 2 and 9, as well as in November 19, 2015.

Panda was first introduced in February 2011. With this search engine update, the ability to look at a site’s quality overall was brought back to Google’s indexing capability. Thus, if a site seemed to be really thin pages with very thin or little content, perhaps duplicates a parent or sister site, or basically a syndicated content from another site/s, signal the Panda to disregard your page or website link, thereby decreasing possible clickers or visitors to the page or site. Panda 4.2 rolled out in July 18, 2015.

Another part of the algorithm known as RankBrain, was announced in October 2015, and is apparently the 3rd most important signal in terms of relevance, according to a Google senior research scientist Greg Corrado. Reports claim that RankBrain appears to be able to score a page depending on its relevance for a given topic, as well as based on the term’s co-occurrence with other topics or sub-topics. It is reported to be using artificial intelligence to filter results.

Google Search United

The conglomeration of these elements in the core algorithm that is Hummingbird, enables Google to provide a better user search experience. These includes:

• Panda, Penguin and Payday that are designed to fight spam;
• Pigeon, which is designed to improve local results;
• Top Heavy, which is designed to demote ad-heavy pages;
• Mobile Friendly, which is designed to reward mobile-friendly pages;
• Pirate, which is designed to fight copyright infringement; and now,
• RankBrain, as one of the “hundreds” of signals that go into Google’s algorithm that defines what results will appear on a Google search page and where they are ordered or ranked.

All of these contribute to how search results are being served whenever you click on or call for Google’s assistance for information.

Google Now, SEO Next, then what?

To be apt with internet trends, including the algorithms set by search engines like Google, publishers who rely on search, whether organic or otherwise, employ search engine tactics or also known as search engine optimization techniques. These are most of the time about making small modifications to part of a specific website. When taken separately, the modifications would seem like incremental upgrades. However, when merged with other optimizations, a sizable impact on a page or website’s user experience as well as performance in organic search results will be evident.

As RKG Chief Knowledge Officer Adam Audette incites, “The days of SEO being a game outsmarting algorithms are over. Today content strategy and valuable, sustainable strategies are essential, not just tricks and links,” search engine marketers need to do more than just providing link baits or farm links to lure a would be customer or reader to a website.

As the internet is becoming smarter, perhaps even better than humans, if I may say, SEO experts need not only rely on links outside of their site, rather they also need to provide quality content for intended users not to think twice whether to click or not to click on your link, even if it would not get the #1 ranking on Google’s indexed page based on the search terms provided. After all content is and always will be king.

A few days ago, we received an email from Google saying that Googlebot was unable to access CSS and JS files on some of our client’s websites. Of course it caught our attention, Google noted that this issue can result in suboptimal rankings!

via GIPHY

So, what did we do? We simply followed Google’s instructions.

First, you need to identify the blocked resources.

To do this, you must log into your Google Webmaster Dashboard and use the “Fetch as Google” tool under Crawl and Fetch and Render your URL..

After a few minutes, you will be able to access the results page that will show you a list of blocked resources.

After identifying the blocked resources, you should unblock them in your robots.txt

We found out that the blocked resources in our client’s site are located in the following folders :

/wp-content/
/wp-includes/
/fonts/

Take note that there are many ways to do this. In our client’s case, we unblocked the resources by removing the restrictions in their robots.txt. This is how their robots.txt looks now :

User-agent : *
Disallow: /wp-admin/

If you are using a CDN like we do, you’re going to have to use a custom robots.txt set up to unblock the resources from your CDN.

Login to your MaxCDN account
Click on Manage beside your site’s URL then choose SEO

Click on all check boxes and enter your custom robots.txt

The final step is to check if the resources are now unblocked. To do this, just repeat the first step.

If your result still comes back as “Partial”, you may be using blocked resources from other sites.

Don’t worry, Google won’t penalize you because those resources are no longer in the webmaster’s hands.

The Year That Was: 2013 and Google Algorithms

January – Google started the year (January 24, 2013) with a 24th Panda refresh. Google’s Panda, which was launched in February 2011, was created to reinforce the importance of quality website content in achieving high rankings in Google search results. According to Google the refresh affected 1.2% of English queries but did not specify as to how exactly it’s going to affect the searches. A Googler on Twitter posted this link as a background on the said refresh, which basically talks about helping users find high-quality sites and lowering the rankings of those with poor content.

March – After a one month hiatus, Google rolls out a 25th Panda refresh, which again reiterates the increasing necessity of quality content. In a business perspective, it is important for entrepreneurs and online marketing firms to distance themselves from back using automated backlinking tools. Not only is it essential for to be fresh, original and original, but it is also great to create them on a regular basis.

Google also penalized a major link network called SAPE Links, which resulted in a tremendous downgrade in terms of rankings. This applies also to websites that are connected or are clients of this link network. Google have continuously warned businesses that use paid links that they can get penalized for doing so.

It was also during this month that Google announced their plan to integrate the Panda algorithm to their overall algorithm updates. This means that the refreshes will be applied real-time as opposed to being updated manually, and will be not be as noticeable to website owners and SEO companies as it will be gradually rolled out instead.

May – After another one-month break from updates, Google gives webmasters with a one-two punch by releasing the Phantom and Penguin 2.0 update. Branded by some as Panteguin, and affected websites that had questionable link profiles that have too many paid links. What makes Penguin 2.0 much complex and destructive to those with unnatural links is that Penguin 1.0 only considers the homepage links, while the 2.0 goes deeper into the site and checks any, if not all, pages.

It is heavily link-focused, while Phantom was more concerned about content and resembled the Panda algorithm more than Penguin. Those that were affected had similar issues, which ranged from having affiliate content, duplicate content, and low-quality content. Some also relied on heavy cross-linking with the exact anchor text. What’s interesting is that Panda also targeted websites with the aforementioned characteristics.

June – Webmasters and SEO companies prepare for the Panda Dance, which meant that updates will be pushed out monthly, but in a span of ten days or so. The term Panda dance stems from the old Google Dance, wherein the search engine results “danced” around monthly whenever Google came out with the changes in their algorithm.

August – This marks the release of the Hummingbird update, which is a major algorithmic shift in over a decade. It focused on making the searches friendly to conversational queries, as opposed to the traditional keyword search where users type in key phrases to find information that they need.

September – To make things even more aligned with the Hummingbird update, Google takes out any data that is still available in their Google Analytics. Anyone who tries to access those data would only be greeted with “not provided.”

October – Penguin update 2.1 hits the dancefloor by targeting a wide spectrum of websites. The most helpful solution to coping with the update was to remove any unnatural links and for those that cannot be manually disposed of had to be disavowed.

November – While there isn’t any formal announcement on an algorithm update, The Moz Blog did report in a post about experiencing a temperature spike on November 14 in their Mozcast which usually signifies an update. Key observations include the fact that (1) the said spike was a one-day change and that (2) those who usually get penalized are small, low quality sites whose rankings in SERPs are replaced by big brands that benefit from the update.

December – Yet again, Google denies a December 17 algorithm update despite the obvious changes shown in the various tracking tools online. There were some signs of serious changes in Google search results as shown by MozCast, SERP Metrics, Algoroo, SERPs.com, and more. Thankfully, there isn’t much buzz in discussion areas or any complaints about abrupt decrease in site traffic or shifts in ranking.

Perhaps the most defined changes for this month is the series of link networks (and smaller websites connected to them) that have gone down because of Google, including Anglo Rank and Backlinks.com. Businesses who have paid links need to either get rid of these bad links or keep a list of where you store or place them, so you can disavow them when needed.

The Round-Up: Was Google’s Algorithm Updates in 2013 Good or Bad for Businesses?

While 2012 seemed to have so much collateral damage on the part of websites, there seemed to be a continuation of Google’s fixes in 2013, but to a much lesser extent. They laid out the rules and applied them, and websites with poor content and paid links took a direct hit. In hindsight, Google is not making enemies of millions of businesses with online websites. In fact, their algorithms are just stressing out that websites need to focus on regularly creating unique, fresh content as well as to avoid using paid link services to retain or improve rankings on SERPs.

In terms of the Hummingbird Update, the use of natural language is in line with pushing their latest technologies forward. So businesses who want their sites to rank need to consult with SEO experts to find out the best web marketing strategies they need to take to keep up with the new update. This means less focus on keyword data and more time spent on looking at conversions and traffic.

If you are to observe Google’s way of doing things, it really does seem that they aren’t pushing out all these changes and updates to punish and hurt websites. Instead, they are doing their best to refine and improve the whole search process.

The SEO world is in topsy-turvy again when Google recently sent out tons of new link warnings to websites. This is what the email says:

“Dear site owner or webmaster of….We’ve detected that some of your site’s pages may be using techniques that are outside Google’s Webmaster Guidelines. Specifically, look for possibly artificial or unnatural links pointing to your site that could be intended to manipulate PageRank. Examples of unnatural linking could include buying links to pass PageRank or participating in link schemes. We encourage you to make changes to your site so that it meets our quality guidelines. Once you’ve made these changes, please submit your site for reconsideration in Google’s search results. If you find unnatural links to your site that you are unable to control or remove, please provide the details in your reconsideration request. If you have any questions about how to resolve this issue, please see our Webmaster Help Forum for support.