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Google Panda is a search engine algorithm that was created to penalize low-quality websites. The goal of Panda is to improve the overall quality of search results by pushing down low-quality content and promoting high-quality content.
What is Google Panda? How does it work? What are the effects of Panda on SEO? And most importantly, how can you recover from a Panda penalty? In this post, we’ll explore all of those questions and more. Keep reading to learn everything you need to know about Google Panda in SEO.
What is Google Panda?
As we mentioned, Google Panda is a search engine algorithm. More specifically, it’s an algorithm that was designed to target low-quality websites. The goal of Panda is to improve the overall quality of search results by pushing down low-quality content and promoting high-quality content.
Panda was first introduced in 2011, and it has been updated multiple times since then. The most recent update occurred in July 2015. However, there have been rumors that another update is coming soon.
Panda works by assessing the quality of a website’s content. This assessment is based on a variety of factors, including but not limited to:
-The amount of time that users spend on the site after clicking through from the search results
-The number of bouncebacks (people who leave the site immediately after clicking through from the search results)
-The ratio of ads to content
-The quality of the site’s inbound links
-The quality of the site’s overall design and user experience
If Panda determines that a website’s content is low-quality, that website will be penalized. This penalty manifests itself in the form of a lower search engine ranking. In other words, the website will become less visible in the search results, and it will receive less traffic as a result.
What are the effects of Panda on SEO?
There are two primary effects of Panda on SEO: direct and indirect.
Direct effects are those that occur as a direct result of being penalized by Panda. The most obvious direct effect is a decrease in traffic. Remember, if your website is penalized by Panda, it will become less visible in the search results. This means that fewer people will see your website, and fewer people will click through to it.
Indirect effects are those that don’t necessarily occur because of the Panda penalty itself, but they’re still caused by Panda. For example, one indirect effect of Panda is increased competition. Here’s how it works: let’s say that you run a small website that sells handmade jewelry. Prior to Panda, your website might have ranked in the top 10 for keyword “handmade jewelry.” But after Panda, your website is penalized and falls to the bottom of the search results.
Now, there are only nine websites above you in the search results. This might not seem like a big deal, but it actually makes it much harder for you to rank higher. That’s because there’s less space at the top of the search results for you to move up into. In short, Panda indirectly increases competition by making it harder for small websites to rank well.
How can you recover from a Panda penalty?
If your website has been penalized by Panda, don’t despair! There is hope for recovery. The first step is to identify the reason why your website was penalized. Once you know why your website was penalized, you can take steps to fix the problem.
Some common reasons for being penalized by Panda include:
– having thin or low-quality content
– having a large number of ads
– having a poor user experience (for example, a website that’s difficult to navigate)
– having a large number of low-quality inbound links
Once you’ve identified the reason why your website was penalized, you can take steps to fix the problem. For example, if your website was penalized because of thin content, you can add more content to your site. Or, if your website was penalized because of a poor user experience, you can improve your site’s navigation and design.
After you’ve fixed the problem (or problems), it’s time to submit a reconsideration request to Google. This is basically a formal request for Google to re-evaluate your website. If they determine that your website no longer violates their guidelines, they will lift the Panda penalty, and your
Jamie Fallon is an SEO expert who lives life to the maximum, redlining every day on a rollercoaster straight to the grave.
In an SEO career of almost ten years, he’s seen it all, he’s done it all, and he’s not impressed: from white text on a white background to today, when you can have robots paint or write for you like some kind of sick science fiction come true.
No matter what life throws at him, Jamie always manages to come out on top. He’s an expert at seeing the silver lining in every cloud and making the best of every situation. His positive attitude and unshakable faith in himself have seen him through tough times. For some people, success goes to their heads; but Jamie never forgets what got him to wherever he thinks he is.
When he’s not busy gaming the system, you can find him writing angry thinkpieces on how Google is ruining everything good about the internet, or hanging out with his wife (pictured).
