What Google Algorithm Updates Means for SEO

Keeping track of all Google’s Algorithm updates can feel like visiting a zoo where they’re always moving the penguin exhibit. Even the most experienced SEO master can get a little lost. Here’s a roadmap to a few of the biggest updates in recent year – plus tips on how to adjust your route accordingly.

The Evolution of Google’s Search Algorithm

500-600 times google changes its search algorithm each year.

3 Major Updates

·         Panda/Farmer

·         Penguin

·         Hummingbird

Panda/Farmer

Panda/Farmer has debuted on Feb 23, 2011. Latest version called only “Panda”.

Scope of the Change

·         Targeted content farms and pages with high ad-to-content ratios.

·         Impacted up to 12% of search result.

·         Why the Name? Named after a google engineer who was key to update, Navneet Panda.

Penguin

Scope of the Change

·         Adjusted for spam factors, such as keyword stuffing.

·         About 3.1% of queries in English were affected.

·         Why the Name? Some speculate it’s named after the Batman super villain.

Hummingbirds

Scope of the Change

·         A ”brand new engine “though it still integrates pieces of old algorithms

·         Impacts 90% of search.

·         Why the Name? Because it’s “precise and fast”.

TIPS TO AVOID SERP EXILE

·         Avoid unnatural links, which are targeted by penguin 2.1 (Oct 4, 2013).

·         Clean up your link aggressively.

·         CLICK HERE Avoid exact match anchor links.

·         Follow Me Blog links without no-follow tag can imply you’re gaming links.

·         Clean up spammy directories even old ones.

The roll-out of Hummingbird doesn’t impact SEO substantially, according to Google and many on the ground. Search results still reward high-quality, original content, perhaps more than even before.

Google Latest Update The Crow Files For Mapping Distance

After Panda, Penguins and Hummingbirds, google has a new animal friend is Crow.

But as not like past associations with the animal world, this update is not about SEO or algorithms and today it is new search trick that adds distance calculation to Google’s OneBox feature. That OneBox- is where google often presents immediate answers  to search queries rather than just presenting links relevant to the query. As in simple One Box can now answer how far it is between two remote locations. It does the measurement “as the crow flies”

For instance, It also works when we asked about two remote cities like Mumbai and Toronto.

Google also says the new One Box works with “far-flung locales, beyond what you can drive or walk.” Certainly, if you ask how far it is between, say, Kashmir and Kanyakumari, you don’t get the “as the crow flies” answers — you get a OneBox with the distance measured by driving mileage (and the directions from point A to point B).

Google presents this as a search feature you can use with voice search on Google’s search app (both iOSand Android). It also works on Google desktop search, which is where I did the screenshot(s) above.