The end of 2024 was a crazy time SEO-wise with Google pushing multiple major updates at the end of the year (and throughout the holiday shopping season). First, we had the November 2024 core update, which rolled out on November 11th and took over three weeks to complete. Then we had one week off before the December 2024 core update rolled out on December 12th and took six days to complete. Then immediately following the completion of the December core update, Google rolled out the final major update of the year, which was the December 2024 spam update. The spam update rolled out on December 19th, took seven days to complete, and ran through Christmas Day completing on December 26th (although it probably ended earlier in my opinion).
Spam updates are always interesting to analyze since they fall outside of Google’s broad core updates and target sites violating Google’s spam policies. So, when Google determines loopholes that aren’t being caught by its core ranking system, it can push separate spam updates to tackle those issues. Spam updates typically don’t have broad impact, but some definitely can. For example, the December 2022 link spam update impacted many sites and caused serious drops across those sites.
Here is an example of a drop from the Google 2022 link spam update. The site dropped heavily based on SpamBrain neutralizing unnatural links. I’ll cover more about link spam updates soon.
The December 2024 spam update definitely caused a lot of volatility. Below, I’ll cover some important points about the spam update, while including five blinded case studies. Note, my point is NOT to out specific sites or companies, which is why the cases are blinded. Instead, I want to cover the issues I’m seeing across those sites that could have caused the drop from the spam update.
Google’s Spam Policies: A Good Starting Point.
If you’ve been impacted by the December 2024 spam update, and you’re confused why, then definitely review Google’s spam policies to determine the specific policies you might be violating. Also, it’s important to note that link spam updates are typically announced as such, so the December spam update was not link-based.
Based on what I’m seeing, scaled content abuse, doorway pages, and other content-related spam policies were at play. I know some of the sites impacted do have sketchy links as well, but I don’t believe the December 2024 spam update targeted unnatural links.
Recovery From Spam Updates:
First, spam updates are not manual actions. They are algorithm updates targeting sites that are violating Google’s spam policies. For sites impacted by spam updates, Google has explained that you can see improvements over time if you stop spamming and then let Google’s systems see those improvements over a series of months (or more). I have seen sites recover to an extent after being impacted by previous spam updates, but it’s important to understand that a site will obviously not recover for spam that was ranking. But other content across the site that dropped in rankings could recover over time.
Also, link spam updates are different on that front. Google’s SpamBrain is essentially neutralizing links when a link spam update rolls out. So, if spammy links were helping a site, and that site was impacted by a link spam update, then the links have been neutralized (you can think of them as gone). So there’s no way to recover other than to earn strong links over time (the right way). But again, the December 2024 spam update was not a link spam update, and it definitely seemed more focused on spam policies related to content.
Reversals from recent broad core updates:
I also wanted to quickly cover some interesting cases that underscore the complexity of Google’s ranking systems (and how different systems can counterbalance each other). There are several examples of sites surging with the November or December broad core updates that were hit by the December spam update and reversed course and dropped back down. So Google’s core systems were “missing” the spam violations and rewarding the sites in question. But when the spam update rolled out, those sites completely reversed course and dropped. So once again, spamming will work until it doesn’t.
Here are some examples of that happening:
Not All Spam Caught…
Another interesting note was that some sites containing spam actually surged when the spam update rolled out. Yes, you read that correctly. I don’t envy Google on that front. It’s constantly fighting a battle against spam and this just goes to show how it could be a game of whack-a-mole.
Will the surges last for those sites? Probably not. I’m sure Google systems will catch up at some point, but it’s always interesting when you see spam surge during a spam update. :)
December Spam Update Case Studies: Five examples of sites negatively impacted.
Case 1: Doorway Pages Galore (with a side of thin content).
The first site I’ll cover contained a ton of doorway pages. That’s when the same content is published at many urls across the site, but those pages are optimized for different keywords. In addition, those pages didn’t even contain much content at all. There was barely any content on those pages, and they definitely did not meet or exceed user expectations based on query. So the site had a combination of doorway pages and thin content.
The site dropped in search visibility pretty heavily when the December spam update rolled out (although it still does rank for many queries). And a number of the urls impacted were ranking in AI overviews before the spam update, and some still rank in AI overviews. Since this is an algorithmic adjustment, that’s definitely possible.
For example, here is a site query showing doorways for a specific area of the site. 509 urls were returned. Most are showing the same thin content, just optimized for different queries:
Case 2: Scaled Content Abuse: PAA Mining and Veering Out of Your Lane.
The next example looked like a case of overloading content with every possible piece of information available about that topic. There were many examples of content that contained so much information about the topic, it was like 25 posts in one. It’s almost like they mined every single People Also Ask (PAA) and included each as a heading. I felt like they wanted to provide every bit of information about a topic, which made each post completely overwhelming.
In addition, it was odd to see a number of posts with anonymous authors. And this was a site where expertise definitely mattered. There were hundreds of posts by anonymous authors. Just an interesting observation.
And beyond that, there were a number of examples of content that seemed out of their lane. I’ve covered the importance of ‘staying in your lane’ many times, and it’s easy to start publishing content outside of your lane when it ranks. The problem is that you are sending very strange signals to Google (and users) about the focus of the site. In addition, if you expand beyond your lane, then it’s easy to write about topics that might not be a core competence of yours (which can impact content quality, user happiness, and more). And remember, Google’s Navboost system is measuring 13 months of user interaction signals (so it definitely can understand unhappy users over time…)
So, from a spam update standpoint, there were several issues with the site from my point of view. Here is an example of a page overloaded with content.
And like I said above it was like every PAA became a heading on the page…
Case 3: Scaling To Oblivion.
The next case I’ll cover was pretty wild to see. The site dropped heavily with the spam update and digging into the drop revealed the bottom of the iceberg, so to speak. A section of the site, which was somewhat hidden from the core part of the site, contained close to 5M urls. Yes, 5M. Also, this was an example of a site surging with the November core update, only to reverse course when the December spam update rolled out.
But here’s the rub. That section with millions of urls actually increased with the spam update (and was increasing prior to the spam update.) The other part of the site with more traditional content, dropped heavily. So did the millions of urls added to the site cause the spam update hit, while other parts of the site were negatively impacted algorithmically? Or was the problem the other parts of the site with traditional content? It was a weird case for sure. I would have to dig in much further to learn more.
For example, here is the section of the site with millions of urls indexed:
And here is the section with more traditional content:
When testing the core content for probability of AI, it’s coming back with a high probability it was AI generated. So, that could be a reason for the spam update hit (scaling AI-generated content). But it’s hard to overlook nearly 5M urls added to the site that definitely cover a different intent… And of course, it could be both issues working together to cause the drop.
In addition, and like I mentioned earlier, this was an example of a site surging with the November core update and reversing course with the December spam update. Again, that can happen as Google’s systems counterbalance each other.
Case 4: More Scaled Content Abuse.
The fourth case I’ll cover revealed more scaled content abuse, which looked like pages that were stitched together from various pieces of content. They didn’t make much sense when going through the content, to be honest. I guess they were trying to cast a wide net and trying to rank for queries tangentially related to the topics they focus on.
The site dropped pretty heavily with the spam update, but it’s another example of a site surging with the November core update, only to drop back down when the spam update rolled out.
While reviewing some of the most egregious content, I kept saying to myself that there’s no way a human actually created this… The user experience was brutal as well (having to dig through many ads to even get to the content). Note, that wouldn’t be the cause of getting hit by a spam update, but it’s worth mentioning that the overall user experience was terrible on the site, in addition to publishing pages that seemed to be programmatically stitched together. That’s not a good combination, to say the least.
Case 5: More Doorway Pages and AI Content.
The final case I’ll cover revealed many doorway pages optimized for every type of query they wanted to rank for. The number is in the range of 140-160K urls. And the urls were heavily programmatic based on what the site focused on in those sections. Also, there were only about 18K urls ranking for queries in the top 100 listings in Google out of the 140-160K doorways, which is a red flag. That’s only 12% of pages indexed in the problematic directory ranking in the top 100 listings…
First, here’s the drop when the spam update rolled out:
And here are the number of pages ranking in the top 100 listings of Google before the spam update rolled out (again, only 12% of what is indexed):
In addition, each of those pages contained text crammed into the bottom of the page with a very high probability of AI-generated content. For every page I tested, the content crammed at the bottom yielded 100% probability that it was AI-generated. There’s not much more to cover about this case. Tons of doorway pages mixed with AI-generated content. And boom, the site saw a big drop with the December spam update.
Summary: It works until it doesn’t. Be careful with how you choose to scale…
The end of 2024 was crazy with three major updates rolling out in a short period of time. And the December spam update ran through Christmas Day before completing on December 26th. If you have been negatively impacted by the December spam update, and you’re confused about why, I would start by reviewing Google’s spam policies. Then I would objectively review your site to identify where you might be violating those policies. And when you identify the culprit(s), I would work hard to clean up the site, and make sure the site is not spamming anymore.
Regarding recovery, Google will need to see significant improvement over time before you might see recovery. And “recovery” is a relative term since the sites impacted by a spam update were… spamming. But if you have seen drops across core queries beyond what the spam was ranking for, then you could possibly see gains over time as Google sees improvement. Good luck.
GG