algorithm-updates

March 2016 Google Algorithm Updates – Was it Panda, More Quality Updates, or Something Else?

They say March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. Well for SEOs, it’s slightly different this year. March came in like lion and went out like a bigger lion. There were three distinct dates where I saw significant movement from an algorithm update standpoint (starting on 3/3, then more on … Read more

Analysis and Findings From the November 19, 2015 Google Algorithm Update (Including Its Connection With Phantom 2)

A funny thing happened as I was finishing my last blog post about Google’s unconfirmed algorithm updates in 2015. I was getting ready to publish the post and the algo Richter scale in my office started to move – and move quickly. So I held off on publishing the post and waited for more data … Read more

Google’s Unconfirmed Algorithm Updates in 2015 and Their Connection to Panda and Phantom (Including the 11/19/15 Update)

2015 has been an incredibly interesting year from a Google algorithm update standpoint. Although there weren’t many confirmed updates like previous years, it was still a relatively volatile year algo-wise. We had the mobile-friendly algorithm released in April of 2015, Phantom 2 confirmed in early May, and then Panda 4.2 in July. Although those are … Read more

Analysis and Findings From The September 2015 Google Algorithm Updates (9/2 and 9/16): Panda 4.2 Tremors, Manual Updates, The Methode Philosophy, and More

In my last post, I explained what I have seen during the extended rollout of Panda 4.2. I ended up analyzing over seven weeks of Panda data, since P4.2 is going through an extended rollout. And yes, it’s still rolling out now. More about that soon. Overall, it had been very quiet leading up to … Read more

Panda 4.2 Analysis and Findings 7 Weeks Into The Extended Rollout – A Giant Ball of Bamboo Confusion

Note: I reached out to Google last week to learn more about the current rollout of Panda 4.2, when it would be completed, and other interesting questions I had based on my analysis. But I haven’t heard anything back directly related to those questions. I will update this post if I receive more information about … Read more

Phantom Tremors Continue As SEOs Wait For Panda – Latest Tremor on 7/14/15

As many of you know, Phantom 2 began rolling out on April 29, 2015, just days after the mobile-friendly update was released. Phantom 2 was a big update that Google initially denied. During my analysis of the update, I saw a lot of movement across sites dealing with content quality problems. It was clear from … Read more

Phantanda – Why The SEO Nuclear Option Is Important For Sites Hit By Phantom 2 and Panda

Panda can be devastating. We all know that’s the case and it’s been documented to the nth degree since February of 2011. And now we have Phantom (AKA “The Quality Update”), which was a change to Google’s core ranking algorithm regarding how it assesses “quality”. Between the two, you can clearly see that Google is … Read more

More Findings From Google’s Phantom 2 Update (“The Quality Update”) – Panda Overlap, Long-Term Approach, URL Tinkering, and More

  {Update November 2015: Google rolled out a significant algorithm update on November 19, 2015 that had a strong connection to Phantom 2 from May 2015. Many sites that were impacted during Phantom 2 in May were also impacted on November 19 during Phantom 3. And a number of companies working to rectify problems saw recovery … Read more

Phantom 2 – Analyzing The Google Update That Started On April 29, 2015

{Update November 2015: Google rolled out a significant algorithm update on November 19, 2015 that had a strong connection to Phantom 2 from May 2015. Many sites that were impacted during Phantom 2 in May were also impacted on November 19 during Phantom 3. And a number of companies working to rectify problems saw recovery and … Read more

Now We Have Liftoff: The First Examples of Google’s Mobile Friendly Algorithm In Action

4/21/15 was a date marked down in every SEO’s calendar with a giant red star next to it. That’s the day Google planned to roll out its mobile-friendly algorithm. They preannounced the update, which is rare, and Google explained it would have a significant impact on the smartphone search results. But then 4/21 arrived and … Read more

Insidious Thin Content on Large-Scale Websites and Its Impact on Google Panda

If you’ve read some of my case studies in the past, then you know Panda can be a real pain the neck for large-scale websites. For example, publishers, ecommerce retailers, directories, and other websites that often have tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or millions of pages indexed. When sites grow that large, with many … Read more