If you’re a webmaster or blogger that has been hit by Google’s Penguin update, then you should continue reading.
The Penguin Update was launched by the big G to take care of websites that had been clogging its results with spammy pages. Most of the websites caught by the update were guilty of artificially inflating their rankings by using shady tactics that violate Google’s guidelines.
If you are impacted by this update, you obviously want to know how you can recover from it. Even if you haven’t been hit by it, you should take proper measures to safeguard your site from the dreaded Penguin’s peck.
Here are a few tips on making sure your website nurse itself back up and recover from the impact of the update:
#1: De-optimize Your Site: Over-optimization is something you should stay away from. Because Google is keen on penalizing sites that have done too much SEO.
#2: Indulge in Quality Link Building: This one goes without saying – you have to start getting more high quality links to your website. No second thoughts on that. It’s one of the best ways to send a green signal towards Google.
#3: Go for Natural Anchor Text: No matter how hard you try to fake it, Google somehow figures out that you’re not natural. Using the same anchor text for every other incoming link to your site is not a good idea. You should try to keep it as natural as you can.
#4: Say Bye-Bye to Links in Blogrolls: Removing links from blogrolls is a step that you should take right away. Why? Because even though these links are technically not spammy, they might get you penalized. And you don’t want to take any chances.
#5: Stop Using Exact Match Domain Names: Yes, the exact match domain names used to be hot way to get your website ranked for that particular keyword phrase. But not anymore – it’s much, much harder now to convince the Penguin that your site is not spammy. The solution is to focus on brandable domain names.
#6: Add Google+ Sharing: If you’re trying to make a good impression on Google then you should enable Google+ sharing on your website. It makes your site look more authentic and approachable.
#7: Look Into Problem Areas: Go through your website and see what you can fix. Try to make it as genuine as possible. Remove any bad content or links that look spammy. The more you work on the problem areas, the better.
#8: Create Better Content: Making your site more valuable for your visitors in terms of content is really important post Penguin. It not only makes your site more real and useful, but also attracts natural links from relevant websites, giving you an edge over the competition.
#9: Stop Taking Short Cuts: It’s about time you think long term for your website in terms of ranking. You have to understand that it takes time to reach the top, and you have to put in real efforts to reach there. There’s no magic pill.
How are you coping with the Penguin Update? Do you have any tips to share with us? Do comment below and let us know!
Here’s a great interview on PMI-TV about Google Penguin
