A guide to avoiding Google Penalties
Now, Google has grown to become the world’s most used search engine with more than 1 billion active users. This article intends to provide you with some insight into Google’s ways of punishing websites and tips to avoid becoming one.
Google continues to drive innovation with an impressive array of updates and releases throughout the year – some great, some good, and some not so great.
Let’s face it, nobody likes being punished by Google – even if it is for a day or two!
What is Penguin?
Penguin is part of Google’s overall algorithm and is designed to help reduce the search engine ranking of sites that are deemed to be spamming Google.
Google claims it looks at access patterns, anchor text distribution, and keyword stuffing techniques amongst other things. It must be noted, however, that Penguin is a very technical, and as such, a difficult SEO algorithm to nail down.
Penguin is an ongoing update that will be continually evaluated over time.
What is Panda?
Panda is a Google update that was first introduced in 2011 and is now a part of the core algorithm of Google.
Panda wants to be fed good quality content that is of a user-friendly quality. It prevents low-quality content from appearing in search results easily.
What can you do?
In light of the upcoming Penguin update, I have received many emails from website owners seeking advice on how to avoid being penalized by Google.
Here are some aspects of your regional business website you should pay particular attention to before the new update is released.
1. Do not spin content
This includes copying and pasting content from Wikipedia or another website without providing the appropriate credit where it is due. Spun/copied content will appear to be unique but it is not original and can easily be picked up by Google’s algorithms
2. Do not try to manipulate search engines through black hat SEO techniques –
These include SEO practices such as link farms, hidden text, keywords stuffing etc. These techniques are detectable by Google – if you implement them on your website you’re just asking to be penalized
3. Ensure you use keywords in your content wisely
If they are not relevant to the topic of the page, it will make it very difficult for Google to determine what your website is about and whether or not it should be listed on the results pages for those keywords. Also, beware of overusing the keyword strategy.
4. Keep an eye out for any changes to your rankings
If you notice a sudden drop off in your rankings, it may be a sign that the Penguin update has been implemented Google’s index and you could face penalties as a result
3. Make your description clear
Include the location, intent, and areas of business in your description so that it becomes easier for your customers to figure out if you are offering products/services in their area.
4. Generate as much original content as possible
And once you have a list of relevant locally searched keywords, make the best use of those in your content and do it yourself. Do not copy and paste frequently. Avoid plagiarism in the same.
5. Do not use too heavy ads
This affects user experience due to difficulty in navigating and finding content because of overuse of ads throughout your content.
How much content should I have per page?
There’s also a lot of confusion around how much content you should have on a page when doing SEO, but there are actually some specific guidelines for this that you can use to get better results from Google.
On most websites, it’s good practice to keep each web page as concise as possible. A web page that has too much content is generally seen as not relevant by Google and this could result in your website dropping in the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages).
The best advice for this is to keep your website’s pages between 250-500 words, with the most important keywords you are targeting for that page in the first 100 words.
This length of content is seen as enough by Google to determine whether or not your web page is relevant for searches relating to those keywords without sending users down a “rabbit hole” where they have to wade through hundreds of words just to find a few key facts about what you actually do.
What is the ideal word count for a blog post?
In terms of blog posts, it is good practice to keep each post between 400-700 words as this will be enough content for users looking at your web page to determine whether or not your blog post is relevant to them.
The best practice here is to use the first 400 words of your blog post to explain what you do, who you are, and why users should be interested in reading more (including linking back to the main page on your site with a “read more” tag at the bottom).
Above all, do not try to make your blog posts too long – there is no need to write 2,000 words when 400 will suffice (unless your topic specifically warrants it).
Once you have published the blog post, make sure you publish a “read more” into that post linking back to the key information on the main website. This helps Google determine what your web page is about and whether or not it should be included in the SERPs for related keywords.
What additional content can I include on a website?
When writing a web page, you have to take into account 3 separate sections – the introduction, middle paragraph, and conclusion. These three sections are known as the “Inverted Pyramid” style of writing and have been the standard for journalism and media reports since the 19th century. The inverted pyramid style was originally created to allow a newspaper to be laid out just by folding a paper down the middle – because it meant editors would only need to include content from the “top” section of the page. This is why blog posts, news articles, and even web pages tend to follow the inverted pyramid style of writing.
The above tips and tricks are sure to save you from the wrath of Google and avoid being penalized for malpractices or naive errors while trying to improve your rankings and traffic volume.