Google’s Panda Update Continues to Aim Against Low Quality Content

It was reported last week that Google began rolling out a new Panda update which will finish updating throughout this week. Panda is a Google algorithm update that aims to lower the rank of “low quality sites” or “thin sites” and grants higher search rankings for more quality websites. According to Search Engine Journal, Google has found additional signals to help Panda find low quality content. Webmaster Analyst Pierre Far share in a Google+ post that the new update will “result in a greater diversity of high quality, small and medium-sized sites ranking higher, which is nice.”

What This Means for Your Website

The new update is said to only affect 3-5% of total search queries. The impact of Panda on websites will be mixed. For websites that have been penalized in the past by Panda, the update means the damage will be undone for you if you have corrected your site’s issues. For those who have not seen an impact from Google Panda, you may or may not see a sudden traffic drop or rise in rankings within the next several days, depending on the content of your site. Overall, the update is meant to be good, giving websites, no matter what size, a chance to rank well if they provide good quality content to users.

The Signs of Good Quality Content

So, for businesses, the solution is, of course, to rank well in search rankings by providing good quality content. We’re seeing this as a growing factor for ranking well in Google search results. However, what counts as a good quality website? Businesses can ensure that their website is in Google good-quality state by following these guidelines:

Make site pages, blog posts, and landing pages for users, not search engines. This means:

• Provide real answers to real people’s questions
• Make content approachable and entertaining for readers
• Share stories, information that get shared in a dinner conversation
• Properly credit links, quotes, and media

Don’t deceive users or cut corners with “black hat” tricks such as buying links, plagiarizing content, and keyword stuffing should be avoided at all times.

Think of ways to make your website more valuable and engaging. Focus on the single most important thing or unique selling point that makes your business and website different from the rest

This is Google’s 27th update to the Panda algorithm, which suggests that Google tries to update Panda on a quarterly schedule. It’s important to understand that Google releases these updates for a reason: to provide value for users. When users type in questions of queries, they expect for Google to provide the right answers. Cookie cutter websites without any true value or original content will result in a frustrating user experience, something Google wants to avoid. In providing good quality content, not only will businesses gain the trust of Google, resulting in higher search rankings, they will be able to attain a greater level or trust from customers and build better long-term ROI.