Site hit by penguin update

[duongo]

Hi there
Hoping to get some expert advice. My site has been hit by the penguin update. Traffic has reduced and a lot of my SERPS have gone down the pages significantly.

I just not sure what i need to do to rectify things. I'm no SEO expert, i've never employed anyone to do any link building. I've always used content by writing articles, submitting them to ezinearticles, although most of my articles are posted in the site.

I'm desparate to get my traffic back and need someone to 'clean-up' the site.

 

[funkykitsch]

Hi there
Hoping to get some expert advice. My site has been hit by the penguin update. Traffic has reduced and a lot of my SERPS have gone down the pages significantly.

I just not sure what i need to do to rectify things. I'm no SEO expert, i've never employed anyone to do any link building. I've always used content by writing articles, submitting them to ezinearticles, although most of my articles are posted in the site.

I'm desparate to get my traffic back and need someone to 'clean-up' the site.

sounds like your duplicating content and that could be the problem. Also maybe google doesn't like these these links from these article sites...who knows anymore and in the future. I would just try to create original content on your own site - that's a natural thing to do isn't it - do natural things is the answer.

 

[duongo]

The majority if the articles on my site are original, the ones posted into article directories different.

 

[funkykitsch]

The majority if the articles on my site are original, the ones posted into article directories different.

well obviously you've been using an article writer to mix up the articles, but these sites like articlebase etc. are bigger than yours and may have got indexed before yours did...also unless you spin it to about 20% then it's likely to be still the same to a large degree.

 

[Deleted member 27344]

Why not just write clean, original content?
That's the 'magic secret' that simply works.

 

[funkykitsch]

Why not just write clean, original content?
That's the 'magic secret' that simply works.

wow does that actually work now - and can you give me proof of your websites

 

[Matt121]

Be careful if you post content to different sites that have the exact same copy as your original. Even if you're still the author, Google may still flag this as duplicate content.

 

[fisicx]

Are you sure it was penguin and not just Google reindexing and deciding your competitors offered a better answer?

Google giveth and google taketh - it's a free service so you really shouldn't complain.

But you can start all over by creating quality content on different sites. Forget article submission, you need links from the sites google likes. Guest blogging seems to be popular at the moment, probably won't last forever but it's start. And them there is that good old stalwart: advertising.

 

[aidan1980]

Hi there
Hoping to get some expert advice. My site has been hit by the penguin update. Traffic has reduced and a lot of my SERPS have gone down the pages significantly.

I just not sure what i need to do to rectify things. I'm no SEO expert, i've never employed anyone to do any link building. I've always used content by writing articles, submitting them to ezinearticles, although most of my articles are posted in the site.

I'm desparate to get my traffic back and need someone to 'clean-up' the site.

You need to go back through your stats first and see what the exact date was that your traffic dropped off. If you haven't put the same article on the site as you have on article directories then don't worry, all them saying duplicate content can bore off. you probably had no benefit in them in the first place anyway. First get the exact dates and then we can start looking for a solution

 

[mobyme]

Are you sure it was penguin and not just Google reindexing and deciding your competitors offered a better answer?

Google giveth and google taketh - it's a free service so you really shouldn't complain.

But you can start all over by creating quality content on different sites. Forget article submission, you need links from the sites google likes. Guest blogging seems to be popular at the moment, probably won't last forever but it's start. And them there is that good old stalwart: advertising.

You know your trouble? You talk too much sense.

 

[mobyme]

You need to go back through your stats first and see what the exact date was that your traffic dropped off. If you haven't put the same article on the site as you have on article directories then don't worry, all them saying duplicate content can bore off. you probably had no benefit in them in the first place anyway. First get the exact dates and then we can start looking for a solution

And it's catching.

 

[aidan1980]

And it's catching.

Edit - Just seen what you were referring to, sorry

 

[funkykitsch]

Edit - Just seen what you were referring to, sorry

can someone pm with the joke because i don't get it?

 

[webgeek]

If you think you were bitten by a Penguin, was it the big April culling?

If so, then you would have gotten a webmaster tools notice about April 14 and somewhere around April 28 your rankings and traffic would have went south, bigtime.

If you have NO webmaster tools notification about an un-natural links penalty then the odds of you being a Penguin victim are astronomically low.

Given the number of article directories that had their PageRank set to '0' or de-indexed, it's more likely that you've had the legs pulled out from under you. Those sites are no longer there to prop you up and now you're down.

It's usually pretty easy to see if you're hitting a penalty. Throw a small kitchen sink at it (build some high quality authority links in a short period of time). If you're stuck and don't budge, then it's confirmation. If you make a nice jump upward, then rinse, lather, repeat, with the link building.

 

[Websitehandyman]

Google are enough to give Penguins a bad name

Remember when we all enjoyed a free internet, now everything seems filtered though Google it's like have a big thumb on your head. Google are the new mill owners, new mine owners of our generation.

 

[funkykitsch]

If you think you were bitten by a Penguin, was it the big April culling?

If so, then you would have gotten a webmaster tools notice about April 14 and somewhere around April 28 your rankings and traffic would have went south, bigtime.

If you have NO webmaster tools notification about an un-natural links penalty then the odds of you being a Penguin victim are astronomically low.

Given the number of article directories that had their PageRank set to '0' or de-indexed, it's more likely that you've had the legs pulled out from under you. Those sites are no longer there to prop you up and now you're down.

It's usually pretty easy to see if you're hitting a penalty. Throw a small kitchen sink at it (build some high quality authority links in a short period of time). If you're stuck and don't budge, then it's confirmation. If you make a nice jump upward, then rinse, lather, repeat, with the link building.

build some high quality authority links - and how do you do that exactly and what do you consider to be a high authority link? Also why the hell should anyone have to get links to your site - it's just nonsense, it's totally artificial to build links to your sites - the only reason to have links to your sites from a logical stand point is to get traffic from that site - if your particualr link is relevant to the page that it is on - or is just interesting full stop to anybody. I think google need to change there algorithm personally, too much weight to off page stuff that is largely irrelevant.

 

[fisicx]

Remember when we all enjoyed a free internet, now everything seems filtered though Google it's like have a big thumb on your head. Google are the new mill owners, new mine owners of our generation.

People has become so used to the service that they have forgotten that it's free and subject to Google's secret rules.

If people don't like it then go do something else.

 

[aidan1980]

can someone pm with the joke because i don't get it?

The poster was saying someone was speaking sense and then said I was as well but I hadn't seen his previous post.
Penguin has been ran twice on 2 specific dates, so you have to first check if the fall in rankings and traffic is specific to either of those dates. if it is then we can look at getting out of penguin, if the dates are different we need to forget penguin and look to find what has caused the drop

 

[aidan1980]

If you have NO webmaster tools notification about an un-natural links penalty then the odds of you being a Penguin victim are astronomically low.

actually not true, plenty of sites have been caught in the filter without a link notification

 

[webgeek]

@funkykitsch

A high authority link?

You could use the domain authority / page authority measure from SEOMoz. You could use the Page Rank from Google. You could use the current rankings for related terms, or traffic for related terms (as found on Ahrefs.com). You could use a combination of these.

If you're unsure how to go about building high authority / quality links, then I'd advise hiring someone who does. Otherwise you're going to waste a lot of time and money in learning the industry.

Links for traffic is a great axiom, but Penguin isn't a traffic penalty, it's a SERP's penalty. Google controls rankings not traffic (directly). Traffic is often a natural consequence of rankings (where SERPs are concerned), though can be unrelated (like social networks).

Given the fact that you find it nonsense, then there's really no point in learning the industry, hiring someone, or threadjacking this particular thread which was designed to help the OP to possibly identify their search ranking penalty situation and recover from it.

*waves Jedi hand* This is not the thread you're looking for...

 

[webgeek]

actually not true, plenty of sites have been caught in the filter without a link notification

An astronomically low number got un-natural links penalty and no notification.

Other people are victims of their pumper sites being de-indexed and PR stripped, Panda, Fresh, Farmer or other updates impacting them.

Yes, the un-natural links penalty rolled out with Penguin, so some equate Penguin as un-natural links plus low link quality and link anchor issues, while others (like Barry at SEO Roundtable) say they're different beasts.

Bottom line: 1.5mil plus got hit with un-natural links notice in WMT and dropped like stones. There were not another 1+mil who dropped without warning.

 

[aidan1980]

An astronomically low number got un-natural links penalty and no notification.

Other people are victims of their pumper sites being de-indexed and PR stripped, Panda, Fresh, Farmer or other updates impacting them.

Yes, the un-natural links penalty rolled out with Penguin, so some equate Penguin as un-natural links plus low link quality and link anchor issues, while others (like Barry at SEO Roundtable) say they're different beasts.

Bottom line: 1.5mil plus got hit with un-natural links notice in WMT and dropped like stones. There were not another 1+mil who dropped without warning.

I tend to think the unnatural links warning is seperate to penguin although closely associated with it. I may be wrong but Im sure Cutts said something similar a while back, and I may be really wrong with that comment

 

[funkykitsch]

@funkykitsch

A high authority link?

You could use the domain authority / page authority measure from SEOMoz. You could use the Page Rank from Google. You could use the current rankings for related terms, or traffic for related terms (as found on Ahrefs.com). You could use a combination of these.

If you're unsure how to go about building high authority / quality links, then I'd advise hiring someone who does. Otherwise you're going to waste a lot of time and money in learning the industry.

Links for traffic is a great axiom, but Penguin isn't a traffic penalty, it's a SERP's penalty. Google controls rankings not traffic (directly). Traffic is often a natural consequence of rankings (where SERPs are concerned), though can be unrelated (like social networks).

Given the fact that you find it nonsense, then there's really no point in learning the industry, hiring someone, or threadjacking this particular thread which was designed to help the OP to possibly identify their search ranking penalty situation and recover from it.

*waves Jedi hand* This is not the thread you're looking for...

i think you've missed my point - i don't disagree with what you are saying - BUT what i am saying is it's extremely difficult to get a link from a PR5 website when you are PR0. Paying for links is considered a no-no, unless you know different. So my point is when you say quickly get some links on some PR5 sites - it isn't easy for anybody unless you want to pay out a lot of cash.

What i'm saying is - the whole thing is nonsense - there shouldn't be an SEO industry the way it is - the only thing i think there should be is basic adwords information that tells people that 1600 people are searching for xyz term per month and only 200 people are searching for this - so write your article / product page for the 1600 and not the 200...that's it in terms of SEO IMHO. Instead we have a preposterous situation where we had all these article sites spring up a few years back with people using article writers to spin articles - total nonsense but it worked for a while so people did it and SEO firms charged hundreds to write 5 unique spun articles etc. etc. People then got onto likes and stuff like that - another load of rubbish where companies would give you something free for instance if you liked them - even when they hadn't used their service yet - totally artificial. You can also go to website such as microworkers and pay people a few cents to like you or add a comment to your website etc. etc. you have to make videos of your products and services as well as that seems to produce results. All these ridiculous industries have sprung up from google messing about with there algorithm.

So what i am saying it is all nonsense that people are made to jump through hoops instead of content being king - that's what google are trying to get to - but they can't, too many things which can be adulterated are in the algorithm for my liking - they should get back to basics.

 

[webgeek]

Take the content is king mentality (which I endorse), prepare some killer unique content and guest post it. Some incredibly high traffic and authority sites will accept guest posts from anyone capable of generating content that's good enough. Great writers and insights will get you those links, if you try...

 

[CrLucch]

This whole business of Internet marketing, SEO, and stuff are really changing in a lot of ways. As much as we hate it when Google suddenly change its mind on how to rank websites, we can only do so much to abide by their rules. A lot of websites that were hit by the recent updates, didn't think things would go this way so they got a plethora of robot-generated links and crappy contents only to realize they have been hit by big G. IMO, what every website owner should try to focus on is to make their sites "update proof" by optimizing their sites for their users rather than just for the search engines.

 

[number42]

Here here! provide unique quality up to date content and these updates aren't an issue.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[funkykitsch]

Take the content is king mentality (which I endorse), prepare some killer unique content and guest post it. Some incredibly high traffic and authority sites will accept guest posts from anyone capable of generating content that's good enough. Great writers and insights will get you those links, if you try...

do you have a list of sites that take guest writers that aren't article sites?

 

[Annoying Donkey]

So my point is when you say quickly get some links on some PR5 sites - it isn't easy for anybody unless you want to pay out a lot of cash.

Who said life was easy?

If you think you have a better algorithm then hire some programmers and build a search engine that beats G. G became the top search engine because their algorithm gave better results. Just because people figured out how to game it, doesn't mean that it's fundamentally bad.

The postal system was a good idea until someone invented direct marketing (this mornings post was a large bundle of junk plus one letter!)

If you want to rank your site you have to learn how to or pay someone for their skills. A good ranking can make you rich, why do you think that should be effort free?

A quick search on youtube will get you started on guest blogging...

 

[webgeek]

About the only part of SEO that is secret sauce is:
1) Where do you get your expensive writers for cheap prices
2) Where do you get your sites that publish authority links for cheap prices

I would suggest either myblogguest or searching for your niche + guest post or niche + guest posting type of phrases.

While I'm happy to give away the rationale and methodology of 99% of what we do, I don't share my contact list, sorry about that.

 

[Annoying Donkey]

And back to OP's post, I don't think that looks like a penguin... I suspect that your drop is a side effect of other sites being dropped/deindexed or whatever... (basically what Webgeek says)

 

[fisicx]

do you have a list of sites that take guest writers that aren't article sites?

You can't just guest post anywhere. you have to go searching for relevant blogs. This is why SEO can cost lots of time and/or money. It may be that suitable blogs for you to guest post on are as rare as hen's teeth: it could take you weeks to find one that is beneficial.

 

[SEO Lady]

In life you get what you pay for.

Time is money, saving time and money by spinning articles and generating low level links are logically not as weighty as good old fashioned hard work and good time spent doing something properly.

If it was that easy we'd all be doing it.

 

[funkykitsch]

Who said life was easy?

webgeek said it was easy....
he quoted...Throw a small kitchen sink at it (build some high quality authority links in a short period of time).

I personally don't think it is easy...i would say it is closr to bordering on the impossible to get say 3 links from a pr5 website when you are a new website.

 

[webgeek]

I find drawing a coca cola bottle impossible, am tone deaf and 1/2 colour blind. There's a lot of things difficult for me that are a dawdle for you.

 

[SEO Lady]

dawdle

*Doddle

(Sorry, Grammar Police alert)

 

[SEO Lady]

3 links from a pr5 website

.. and who says PR is not relevant? Who says PR is relevant?

There is more to SEO than backlinks. There is more to backlinks than page rank.

 

[webgeek]

So it's not actually a leisurely stroll?

Add grammatically challenged to the list of "what's hard than building quality links"

 

[Annoying Donkey]

I personally don't think it is easy...i would say it is closr to bordering on the impossible to get say 3 links from a pr5 website when you are a new website.

Hey, if most of the SEO type dudes on here can do it, then it can't be that difficult...!

 

[funkykitsch]

.. and who says PR is not relevant? Who says PR is relevant?

There is more to SEO than backlinks. There is more to backlinks than page rank.

it used to be important - personally i don't think it's important - i don't even have a google toolbar anymore to show me that little green bar (i presume it's still green)!

just out of interest is that furniture site yours and have you done any SEO on it?

 

[funkykitsch]

Hey, if most of the SEO type dudes on here can do it, then it can't be that difficult...!

if it was so easy to do - i don't understand why seo people don't just create loads of websites and makes zillions from adsense or sell the website to someone who has a product to match the website...it seems bonkers to me to bother yourself trying to convince clients that you can get them to number 1 slot in big G. if you could get number one slot for phrases like "mobile phones", "shoes" or whatever then you are made - why waste your time getting clients - they would come to you if you could do this.