Google Panda Algorithm Now Rolling Automatically? Ever since Google released the Panda update in February, it has been known that Google carefully and manually pushed out updates to it on cycles that were often months apart. Back in May, Matt Cutts said that is how they did it for now. Much like the Google bomb algorithm. I am starting to believe that over the past couple weeks that Google has begun to either push the Panda updates out more aggressively on a manual basis or has set it to roam free on it's own - in the wild. Yes, I think that Panda is now a rolling update.
I can be totally wrong, but based on reading the various threads in multiple forums, it seems like Panda is updating almost daily. Skim towards the last 30 or so posts in this WebmasterWorld thread. Anyway, I do not have confirmation from Google on this, nor do I think I would get one. For more of our stories on Panda, see our Google Panda category. Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld. Webmasters Finally Trusted Google PageRank Less. Toolbar PageRank Update Fix: Google.com Returns To PageRank 10. Three weeks ago, Google conducted a toolbar PageRank update that caught the eyes of most webmasters and SEOs more so than a normal toolbar PR update.
Why? Well, because Google's own PageRank on Google.com was lowered to PR9. Well, today, Google pushed out a PageRank update to fix the problem and Google is back at a PR 10. The thing is, this update was not related to Google's own PR dropping a point. So why the urgent update? Instead it was because, I believe, Twitter's PR was a PR 0 and Google didn't want people to think that Google downgraded Twitter's PageRank manually because of contract deals breaking between the two. Google sent me a statement minutes ago explaining why Twitter.com's PR was a 0 this morning: Recently Twitter has been making various changes to its robots.txt file and HTTP status codes. So Twitter is back at a PR 9: That is also why I have been getting hundreds of comments, emails, tweets about there being a PageRank after 8am (EDT) today. 7962462. Why Google Panda Is More A Ranking Factor Than Algorithm Update. With Google Panda Update 2.2 upon us, it’s worth revisiting what exactly Panda is and isn’t.
Panda is a new ranking factor. Panda is not an entirely new overall ranking algorithm that’s employed by Google. The difference is important for anyone hit by Panda and hoping to recover from it. Google’s Ranking Algorithm & Updates Let’s start with search engine optimization 101. Like any recipe, the ranking algorithm contains many ingredients. Google is constantly tweaking its ranking algorithm, making little changes that might not be noticed by many people.
From time-to-time, Google does a massive overhaul of its ranking algorithm. Index & Algorithm Updates Confusingly, the term “updates” also gets used for things that are not actual algorithm updates. This influx of new content caused ranking changes that could take days to settle down, hence the nickname of the “Google Dance.” Instead, Panda — like PageRank — is a value that feeds into the overall Google algorithm. Calculating Ranking Factors. Tweets Influencing Google's Ranking More? We know both Google and Bing use social signals for rankings, even more so today from when I posted that article. In fact, some are worried it plays so much of a role that expert content will be effected negatively by the growth of social. It’s Panda Update 2.1, Not Panda 3.0, Google Says. There have been rumblings that Google has unveiled another huge algorithm change being dubbed “Panda 3.0″ in some quarters. Officially, Google says it’s not so. Only a minor update, “far smaller” than Panda 2, has happened.
Changes have been spotted by some sharp-eyed SEOs over the past few days, and Google agrees that there were some tweaks made. But as I said, the company says this impacts far fewer rankings than in the past. Let’s recap: Panda 1.0: Launched on February 24, this targeted “shallow” or “thin” content and impacted about 12% of the rankings in the United States. Panda 2.0: Launched on April 11, this incorporated Google “blocking” data and impacted about 2% of searches in the US.
Panda 2.1: Google won’t release the percentage of queries impacted but says this is far less than in the other updates. It’s important to remember that Google is always making changes to its search algorithm. Still, I’ve no doubt we’ll be hearing people continue to talk Panda for months. How Facebook Enables The Google Social “Scraping” It’s Upset About. I wrote a very long examination of the issues that Facebook employed a PR firm to publicize, about how Facebook feels Google may be violating privacy with its Google Social Search product.
Here’s a shorter look, especially from the angle of how Facebook itself has enabled Google to do what Facebook is now complaining about. Facebook said this about Google, in its statement from my original article: We wanted third parties to verify that people did not approve of the collection and use of information from their accounts on Facebook and other services for inclusion in Google Social Circles—just as Facebook did not approve of use or collection for this purpose. Facebook has since said it should have handled the issue in a more “transparent” manner, and is no longer working with the firm of Burson-Marsteller, but Facebook hasn’t refuted the allegations that the firm was trying to get out. Got it? Google is “scraping” up this information from Facebook.
No Choice: Facebook Shares Your Name & Sex. Google Panda Algorithm Is Manually Pushed. Google's Penalties For Link Schemes Aren't Always So Obvious. Google has gone on record time and time again that link schemes with the intent of manipulating Google's search results is against their terms of service and will thus take action against web sites both algorithmically and manually. I figured we'd post about it one more time, because Googler Wysz made a nice comment on why those penalties might not always be so clear. He made the comment in a Google Webmaster Help thread being used to out link schemers. He said: Thanks for the reports of these link schemes.
We have someone from the spam team looking into this. Got that? He goes on to explain that once a site is penalized there are ways to repent. Step 1: Fix the problem. Oh, and if you are one of those that report paid links, then it might be a good thread for you to check out and post in. Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help. Cyclic Redirects Can Cause Issues In Google. Google Image Sorting By Subject Now Available. Google added a new sorting option for Google Images that lets you sort the images by subject. So if you are looking for pictures on a topic but want to know subjects for those pictures, you can use Google Images.
For example, if you want to create a presentation on SEO and want to know what subjects the presentation might have, you can try to search Google Images by subject sorting for [seo] and Google will recommend subject. They aren't perfect but hey! Google said: Sorting by subject uses algorithms that identify relationships among images found on the web and presents those images in visual groups, expanding on the technology developed for Google Similar Images and Google Image Swirl. Here is a video: Keep in mind, it doesn't always work and forces you to sort by relevance when subjects cannot be determined. For more sorting options, see google.com/landing/imagesorting/. Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld. Google Blocked Sites & Why Making A Good First Impression Matters. We all know there have been a ton of updates to Google as of late. Many of these updates will affect search engine optimization as we know it.
In particular, Google is now displaying an option to block results from certain websites. While websites will only be blocked when a user is logged into a Google account, this new development still carries potential implications that should be considered by website owners. First, let’s evaluate a few scenarios that may cause a user to block results from a website. I will offer the following possibilities: Website delivers poor contentWebsite is ranking for a search query which is far from the website’s themeThe web page has a title and/or description that rubs the user the wrong wayThe user visits the website’s page and bounces back to the results page quickly All of these points have a similar theme.
So you may be asking yourself, “Why does this matter?” Google originally stated that they were not using blocking data to tweak the algorithm. New York Times: Yes, Google’s Panda Update Hit NYT-Owned About.com. The New York Times Company has confirmed recent reports that its About.com property was one of the sites that suffered traffic declines in the wake of Google’s recent Panda/Farmer algorithm change. Speaking during its recent earnings call, CEO Janet Robinson said that About.com “experienced a moderately negative impact on page views from the algorithm changes Google implemented in the quarter.” About.com was included on several third-party reports listing sites that were hurt by Google’s changes, but the general consensus was that many other sites had been hurt worse.
The second link in that sentence includes this chart showing About.com’s decline in the SearchMetrics’ “Organic Performance Index” after the first Panda rollout. During the earnings call, Robinson said About.com also saw a 10% decline in advertising revenues in the first quarter, “mainly due to a decrease in cost-per-click advertising.” (tip to Forbes blog) GigaPan Time Machine" by Carnegie Mellon University. About WordNet -?WordNet - About WordNet. An Undocumented Google Search Operator: AROUND(x) + More Cool Bing and Exalead Operators. Wednesday, 8th December 2010 An Undocumented Google Search Operator: AROUND(x) + More Cool Bing and Exalead Operators Google Operating System points to a blog post from October by Googler Daniel Russell about an undocumented search operator, "around (x).
" He adds that it's been available for the past five to six years and librarians have been asked him about it. Interesting. Mr. . [ "Jerry Brown" AROUND(9) "tea party" ] will find you a bunch of hits illustrating the relationship between Jerry Brown (running for governor of California) and the Tea Party. Btw, Bing has a very robust set of advanced search operators that include near:(x) and norelax:(x). Near: is something that info pros have wanted for many years since AltaVista offered it. Ordering is considered in ranking. Exalead also offers a near operator, they call it NEXT (the default is 15 words in either directions but NEXT(x) is also possible). They also offer many other operators that are worth knowing about. Views: 6577. Once Again: Should Google Be Allowed To Send Itself Traffic? This fall, Google made its links to its millions of Place pages even more prominent on the first search results page, pushing sites such as TripAdvisor.com farther down the page for searches on “Berlin hotels,” for instance.
Place pages for businesses give basic information such as location and hours as well as a summary of user-generated reviews from sites like Citysearch and Yelp. Carter Maslan, a Google product management director, acknowledged “a little bit” of tension between Google and local-information sites. But he said the changes are meant to improve users’ experience by getting them more information about businesses faster, and to provide links to review sites. Upset over lost traffic To some degree this is about publishers “settled expectations” and changes in the Google algorithm disrupting them: “we’re getting less traffic than we used to.” As the WSJ piece points out Bing operates in a way that is similar, often referring traffic to its own sites. Google Analytics Data Skewed Because Of Instant Previews.
There are confirmed reports that Google Instant Previews may be skewing your web analytics data. It appears that in some cases Google will conduct an on-demand fetch of your page to dynamically create an Instant Preview. The on-demand fetch happens when a searcher places his mouse over the search result on Google and the image preview comes up. Some analytics tools, including Google Analytics, may consider that a visit, because Google Instant Preview is actually visiting the page in real-time to get that on-demand Instant Preview. There are several complaints about this issue in the Google Help forums. Google’s John Mueller replied saying they are working on fixing this from showing up in Google Analytics. There is no estimated time for when this may be resolved. Postscript: The Google Analytics blog posted an update saying they fixed the issue at about 6:30 pm (EST). Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | Google: Analytics | Google: Instant | Top News.
Google’s Second Major Quality Score Reporting Bug In 3 Weeks. All Google AdWords advertisers know the importance of having a good quality score on Google. A poor quality score can result in your cost per click prices to soar, virtually knocking you out of the auction space and competing during the holiday shopping season. That is why tracking and monitoring your ad’s quality score in the AdWords console is a top priority for many advertisers. So when you see your quality score drop suddenly, you worry. 3 weeks ago, I reported at the Search Engine Roundtable on an AdWords quality score bug that impacted the AdWords reports. This morning, I reported on yet another bug that appears to be impacting some advertisers. It is understood that what is being described here is what appears to be a similar but separate issue that folks started seeing on Friday evening, November 19th.
If your quality score dropped, please do not panic, it might be a reporting glitch. Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | Top News. Google’s Search Share Continues To Inch Higher, comScore Says. Google inched slightly higher in search engine market share during October, according to the The October report is the second one since comScore began separating out what it calls “explicit core search,” a measurement that takes into account the automatic display of search results in Google Instant Search. ComScore gives Google a 66.3% market share in its explicit core search report, up two-tenths-of-a-percent over September. ComScore reports that Google saw a little more than 11 billion core searches in October, a 4% increase over September.
Yahoo saw a 2% increase in search quantity, while Bing jumped by 7% during October. Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: comScore | Stats: Popularity. Study Asks, Can You Trust Google’s Personalized Search Results? 3 Ways Google Could Adjust The Revenue Dials. Google’s “Gold Standard” Search Results Take Big Hit In New York Times Story. Google Recipe Search Cooks Up Next Gen of Search | Epicenter Google Content Farm Update Support Groups.
Google's Content Farm Algorithm Released: Who's Hit Most? Does Google Index & Rank Based Off Of Title & Alt Attributes? Confirmed: Google Image Search Updating Index Faster. Demand: Google Changes Have Produced “No Material Impact” Yet. Google On How Site Command Results Are Ranked. Google Testing New SSSerps? Google, Searching & Search Engines. Google Lets You Dumb Down Your Search Results With “Reading Level” Filter. Why Google Needs The Manipulative Web. The Connection Between Facebook Citations & Google Place Pages. 7827052. 0060294155. Google Contextual Discovery. Google Content Spams Themselves With Google Translate. A Lesson From the Indexing of Google Translate: Blocking Search Results From Search Results. Is Google Changing Quality Score Rules Again?