The Google Penguin update launched on April 24, 2012 and although it was almost 5 months ago, it doesn’t mean sites aren’t still feeling the effects of the update. Google Penguin was designed to punish websites and webpage that have been spamming Google to climb to the top of the search engine. The spam we’re talking about is mostly black-hat SEO techniques, such as “keyword stuffing” or “cloaking” which violate Google’s guidelines.
If you’ve noticed a drop in your ranking or traffic, it’s very possible that you were affected by Penguin. The good news about being hit by Google Penguin is that you can recover.
Here are some things you should do to recover from Penguin:
Back Off on Your Website Optimization
If you’re big on keyword usage and emphasis throughout your website, you may want to review and make sure you haven’t overused keywords. Also, make sure your inter-page linking structure isn’t overkill. The search engines definitely take note of over-optimized websites.
Identify “Bad Areas” of Your Website
This is a great opportunity to go through your website and look for ways to improve.
Vary the Anchor Text on Your Links
Mix it up. If you’re using the same anchor text for backlinks on a variety of sites, change it up. Use the full url in some instances, as Google takes note.
Stop Using Low Quality Directories
If you have been using low quality link directories, or “easy to add yourself” directories, stop. They aren’t helping.
Get Rid of Bad Links
Remove all links on your website that aren’t relevant to you or your content.
Limit Your Ads
Ads can be seen as spam to Google and they are quickly trying to figure out a way to filter these types of websites.
Focus on Navigation
Your website should be easy to navigate through and users should be able to bounce from page to page without any trouble.
It could be that you didn’t do anything wrong and the websites that have links to your website are the bad guys! Either way, this is a great opportunity to review your website and clean up your links. Google is looking for websites that follow the rules, are easy to navigate through and are filled with quality content.