Penguine 2.0 Confusion
-
I am getting seriously confused over our rankings and am hoping someone can give me a bit of clarity.
When Penguin 2.0 hit last week we saw a drop of between 2 – 6 places on seven out of a set of around a dozen key phrases I monitor. We had been in the number 1 / 2 position for the majority of them over the last year – 18 months, and this drop has reduced our traffic by around 30 – 35%.
I have looked at our back link profile - http://www.opensiteexplorer.org/links?site=www.wombatwebdesign.com%2F, and I don’t think it is that bad. Being a web design company the vast majority, 80% of the links are from the footer of client sites. We have a small, 5% number of links from comments; a similar amount of dead links and the rest are made up of the usual, profile, directory and article links.
I was wondering if the way we link from client sites could be an issue, we link twice, once with the anchor text (Web Design Cumbria) and the second link is our company branding (Wombat Web Design, with the title tag – Web Design Cumbria). Could this be causing a problem?
If anyone could point me in the right direction I would be most grateful.
Thanks
Fraser
-
I am even more confused, we removed 90% of the anchor text links and we have just dropped again. Does anyone have any ideas what we are doing wrong?
Thanks
Fraser
-
I know! 24 hours does not seem about right with SEO and marketing!.
I would also look at this resource on how to balance anchor text. http://moz.com/blog/anchor-text-distribution-avoiding-over-optimization.
Good luck!!
-
Thanks for your help, I have had a look at our linking anchor text and it is some what keyword-rich. We are going to remove the majority of the keyword-rich links and just leave them with our branding to see if that makes a difference. I have always been careful with our link building, so I am fairly confident that not the issue, if things don't pick up I will look to either turn some of them to no-follow or have them only on the home page.
Content is defiantly the way to go, if only there were more hours in the day!
Thanks again.
Fraser
-
Footer links like that can end up hurting you. I have a web design and client site like you, but I do not put my link on all client sites. Nor do I use anchor text heavy links. Try building out some more links through guest blogging or promotional opportunities. This can help to balance out your link profile to seem less spammy
-
The links from your clients' sites could definitely be a problem, especially if you are using keyword-rich anchor text. Consider just using your brand name for the footer links, as that is relatively safe. Or consider just getting one or two links from your client sites from their homepage or "about" page.
-
I would nofollow your links.They're probably dragging you down because they're not natural.
This video is on topic from Matt Cutts himself http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chuhSmwsL7s -
Did you look at your anchor text profiles for each word you´ve been degraded?. Ive seen that Penguin has good taste for overoptimization, especially on anchor text and low quality links.
I found this posts very helpful to overturned some Penguin attacks last year: Google Penguin AntiSpam. Another resource on strategies to combat the little penguin is right here.
You could also wait it out, maybe its not penguin, it just some SERP fluctuation. Good luck, hope the best!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Will Google penalize 2 sites for targeting "like" keyword phrases?
I own (2) different websites, one an HTML site that has been live for 20 years and a ecommerce site that has been live for 7 years. We sell custom printed (branded) tents for use at trade shows and other indoor and outdoor events. While our ecomm site targets "trade show" tents our HTML site targets "event" tents. I believe that the keyword phrases are dissimilar enough that targeting "trade show tents" on one site and "event tents" on the other should not cause Google to penalize one or the other or both sites for having similar content. The content is different on both sites. I'm wondering if anyone has experience with, or opinions on, my thoughts... either way. Thanks,
Algorithm Updates | | terry_tradeshowstuff
Terry Hepola0 -
What is your hypothesis why Panda/Penguin recoveries happen over months after an algorithm update rather than over night?
We have experienced many scenarios were ranking recoveries from clear Panda and Penguin penalties on our sites don't necessarily happen with the launch of a Panda/Penguin update but instead trickle back in over weeks and months after a confirmed algo update. A good example is shown in the image which shows a panda recovery for a high volume keyword. What is your theory why these ranking recoveries happen over weeks vs instantly? qCWliLF
Algorithm Updates | | italiansoc0 -
Penguin Refresh - any ideas when?
Has anyone heard when a Penguin algo refresh might be happening? I used LinkRisk and identified about 1,000 toxic links (not put up by me) and disavowed them. Then my rankings tanked a bit. (yes, I know they must have been helping me.) But I think we are probably under a Penguin algo penalty since 2012. Earned some good links, and disavowed some bad links. So I'm hopeful that a Penguin algo update will give us a traffic boost.
Algorithm Updates | | yatesandcojewelers0 -
Panda 4.0 Suggestions
My site was hit pretty negatively by Panda 4.0 and I am at a loss for the best way to address it. I have read like every article that I can and I know there is some duplicate manufacturer product descriptions but I don't hear many other ecoms complaining about Panda so I figure it must be something else. Also, the pages that seem most negatively affected are category and product list pages. Any help or suggestions would be much appreciated. Thanks! http://bit.ly/1plgOzM
Algorithm Updates | | Gordian0 -
Penguin Strategy Idea
Hello, So while I sit and wait for Penguin to hopefully ease up on my site, would it be smart to create a new site and then forward the old penguin hit site to it after the dust clears and any issues are better? I have heard some people say you never recover from an algo penalty? While others say to wait it out. So just curious what you think? Would you ditch a site that is not super followed or popular? in the attempt to create a site with no bad backlinks and start fresh? Thank you for your thoughts
Algorithm Updates | | Berner0 -
Rankings Gone? Have I been effected by the Panda/Penguin Update(s)?
Our site www.alphameasure.com has been online since 2005 and currently has a page rank of 4. The site has always ranked on page one or two of Google for our primary keywords (Employee Satisfaction Survey, Employee Engagement Survey, Employee Surveys). I'm not sure exactly when it happened, but now our site is nowhere to be found. I'm thinking our ranking dropped somewhere in mid to late January? We did use an SEO company in the spring of 2012 that went on a link building campaign for us. They added about 450 inbound links over a three month period. Other than that - nothing has really change on the site. We're getting ready to release a new version of our software that was being re-written during all of 2012, so the timing of losing our rankings is just awful. Any help or ideas is greatly appreciated? Thanks in advance,
Algorithm Updates | | EngagedMetrics
Josh0 -
More youtube results from the past 2 days
Hi, Did anyone see changes in their serps? There are more youtube videos appearing in the organic results?
Algorithm Updates | | Indexxess0 -
Rankings moving in every 2 days.
Hi, I am seeing strange behavior of Google for my rankings. I have a very competitive keyword (I can't disclose because of NDA) but for example keyword like "Cameras" on google.co.uk , it stayed on #4 spot for years, we have been practising all good SEO techniques for this. From last couple of weeks, it goes to 9 then stays there for 2 days, then come back to 4 for 2 days, then go back to 9 & then after 2 days come back to 4 & it is keep moving like that... at the time of this post, this one is on 9. Our site have been on top for very competitive kws even like word "Camera" we are 2 which is stable... None of our other kws ranks are changed but only word "Cameras" is affected. I am not sure how & why this is happening, I have been following SEOMoz from long time & hope can find solution here. Note : Keywords used here are not actual, but carry equal importance Please let me know.
Algorithm Updates | | spopli0