When Will The Next Google Penguin Update Take Place

Google has been quite active lately, introducing new algorithms and other minor updates. These updates dictate how well your website performs and how much traffic you get from the search engine. Now Google doesn't want webmasters finding a comfort zone for themselves, because if they do, they will trick Google and effect the quality of results returned on the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages). To achieve this, Google introduces lots and lots of updates, both major and minor, to counter web-spam. So it might be kinda hard to keep up with them. But blogging is all about flowing along with the wave currents, or with the trends, if you will. So it is very important for webmasters to understand the nature of these updates.

In this post, we will talk about what these updates are all about, and how frequently Google brings updates. We will also talk about some of the flaws in the latest updates, so you know what kind of stuff you should be on the lookout for.

A brief update history

Google was launched in March 1998. In internet terms, that's pretty long ago, considering that the world wide web was invented just 8 or 9 years before Google was born. I can't imagine how internet users survived before Google! We sure as hell can't live without it now :P. Anyways, at that time, Google was just a simple keyword based search engine, and it returned pages that had the most number of user query keywords in them.

The very first update from Google was the Google Toolbar for browsers, and the Toolbar PageRank (TBPR) in 2000. This was when Google started ranking pages intelligently, and the concept of PageRank came into being.

in 2002, Google launched its first official update, code-named the 'Boston' update. Google started monthly indexing of webpages, the so-called Google Dance.

2003 was a pretty busy year for Google. The Boston algorithm was updated, and a new algo was introduced, called the Florida update. This was much like the recent Panda update, and left many websites devastated. The Fritz update ended the monthly Google Dance and now, pages were being indexed on a daily basis.

The Austin update was the major algo in 2004, and it continued Google's crackdown on low quality, black hat SEO websites. Apart from that, Google began investing, and raised its market share.

By the start of 2005, Google emerged as a major search engine, and its share prices doubled. This is when it continued its efforts for fighting against spam by bringing many updates, such as the Bourbon, Allegra, Jagger, and Big Daddy updates. The "nofollow" attribute was introduced around this time as well, and Google started XML Sitemap submission. Google continued working on these updates in 2006 by Supplemental updates. This went on in 2007 as well, although Google started Video, News, and other searches.

2008 wasn't much constructive either, with no algorithm update from Google. However, Google introduced the Caffeine update, which was a major algorithm and infrastructure update. This update was perfected in 2010, and a new update was introduced in May, infamously known as the 'May Day' update. It impacted a lot of webmasters around the globe.

In 2011, most of you will remember, Google unleashed the Panda update, which was a major algorithmic update and impacted lots of websites. Google also introduced the +1 button around that time. Google continued to update the Panda in 2012, and more than a dozen Panda updates have been rolled out to this day. The most recent update from Google was the Penguin update, which was again a major algorithm update.

How frequently does Google bring updates?

Well, judging from Google's update history, Google now brings a major algorithm update each year. But it introduces hundreds of smaller minor updates. Take the Penguin, for example. It has only been here for like two weeks, But in that time, Google has introduced more than 50 minor changes and updates. The total count for last year was around 500-600. So, yeah. Google is busy as a bee these days.

Google also updates its previous algorithms now. The Panda 3.6 was released just after Penguin was rolled out. And the indexing is now done every minute. Google also updates the PR of websites every 3-4 months. The latest PR update was in the start of May 2012, so we can expect the next update to take place in August 2012. So fasten your seat belts, and start working on recovering from the Panda or Penguin updates.

What are these updates all about?

Like I have talked earlier, Google introduces these updates to fight against web-spam. The idea is to bump up quality content on search results, and push down the ruthless and black-hat SEO websites that use spam and unethical SEO tactics as a shortcut to gain the best rankings. So the priority is given to quality and original content, and duplicate and spam content is being pushed down. Of course, Search Engine Optimizers know how to duck and dodge these updates, which is why Google is constantly updating to stop them from finding their comfort zone.

There can be another possible implication from all this ruthless updating and stuff from Google. We now are getting the feeling that Google is trying to monopolize the market for itself. Of course, it already has a monopoly of sorts. But it only has around 2/3rd (64%) share in the industry, and it wants more than that. By introducing all these updates, it wants webmasters to follow its own rules. In short, it is trying to bring the game to its own home turf. Other search engines are presented by a problem here. They either can copy the idea, and make Google look like the big guy who is also their mentor, or they can just ignore the changes and be taken by the tide that is Google. Now of course, Google takes a gamble with such big updates, because it doesn't make webmasters happy. But considering that Google is the biggest in the industry, it can take risks. Smaller engines can only look in awe.

Some problems with Google's algorithms

Now it also seems, that Google isn't entirely aware of what's happening with these updates. There are some loopholes that some webmasters know exactly how to exploit. And Google isn't aware of that. Otherwise, it would never allow such thing s to happen. Let me give you an example.

Type into your browser address bar, www.something.com. You'll find just one word on the entire site; "something". Yeah. That's right! But there's more. If you check the PR of that website, you will find that it's at PR 5! Consider this blog you are on right now. It is at PR 4. See the problem? Previously, this website came out on top of SERPs when you searched for the word "something". Thankfully though, that's been fixed by the Panda and Penguin updates. But the PR remains the same.

Google is also returning irrelevant search results since the Penguin update. Search for "Panda Recovery" on Google, and it will show you Pandora Recovery instead. Weird, huh? There's a lot more anomalies of this kind, and WPMU has written a detailed article on this.

What's happening here? Well, I'm not really sure. But looks like there are some flaws in Google's algorithms, which the veteran black-hat SEOs are striving to exploit. Hopefully, this will fixed in the next algo update from Google, because this gives black hatters an unfair advantage over people like us who write original and quality content.

Google Penguin Update: Don’t Forget About Duplicate Content

There has been a ton of speculation regarding Google’s Penguin update. Few know exactly what the update specifically does, and how it works with Google’s other signals exactly. Google always plays its hand close to its chest.

“While we can’t divulge specific signals because we don’t want to give people a way to game our search results and worsen the experience for users, our advice for webmasters is to focus on creating high quality sites that create a good user experience and employ white hat SEO methods instead of engaging in aggressive webspam tactics,” Google’s Matt Cutts said in the announcement of the update.

He also said, “The change will decrease rankings for sites that we believe are violating Google’s existing quality guidelines.”

“We see all sorts of webspam techniques every day, from keyword stuffing to link schemes that attempt to propel sites higher in rankings,” he said. To me, that indicates that this is about all webspam techniques – not just keyword stuffing and link schemes, but also everything in between.

So it’s about quality guidelines. Cutts was pretty clear about that, and that’s why we’ve been discussing some of the various things Google mentions specifically in those guidelines. So far, we’ve talked about:

Cloaking
Links
Hidden text and links
Keyword stuffing

Another thing on the quality guidelines list is: “Don’t create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.”

Of course, like the rest of the guidelines, this is nothing new, but in light of the Penguin update, it seems worth examining the guidelines again, if for no other reason than to provide reminders or educate those who are unfamiliar. Duplicate content seems like one of those that could get sites into trouble, even when they aren’t intentionally trying to spam Google. Even Google says in its help center article on the topic, “Mostly, this is not deceptive in origin.”

“However, in some cases, content is deliberately duplicated across domains in an attempt to manipulate search engine rankings or win more traffic,” Google says. “Deceptive practices like this can result in a poor user experience, when a visitor sees substantially the same content repeated within a set of search results.”

Google lists the following as steps you can take to address any duplicate content issues you may have:

• Use 301s: If you’ve restructured your site, use 301 redirects (“RedirectPermanent”) in your .htaccess file to smartly redirect users, Googlebot, and other spiders. (In Apache, you can do this with an .htaccess file; in IIS, you can do this through the administrative console.)
• Be consistent: Try to keep your internal linking consistent. For example, don’t link to http://www.example.com/page/ and http://www.example.com/page and http://www.example.com/page/index.htm.
• Use top-level domains: To help us serve the most appropriate version of a document, use top-level domains whenever possible to handle country-specific content. We’re more likely to know that http://www.example.de contains Germany-focused content, for instance, than http://www.example.com/de or http://de.example.com.
• Syndicate carefully: If you syndicate your content on other sites, Google will always show the version we think is most appropriate for users in each given search, which may or may not be the version you’d prefer. However, it is helpful to ensure that each site on which your content is syndicated includes a link back to your original article. You can also ask those who use your syndicated material to use the noindex meta tag to prevent search engines from indexing their version of the content.
• Use Webmaster Tools to tell us how you prefer your site to be indexed: You can tell Google your preferred domain (for example, http://www.example.com or http://example.com).
• Minimize boilerplate repetition: For instance, instead of including lengthy copyright text on the bottom of every page, include a very brief summary and then link to a page with more details. In addition, you can use the Parameter Handling tool to specify how you would like Google to treat URL parameters.
• Avoid publishing stubs: Users don’t like seeing “empty” pages, so avoid placeholders where possible. For example, don’t publish pages for which you don’t yet have real content. If you do create placeholder pages, use the noindex meta tag to block these pages from being indexed.
• Understand your content management system: Make sure you’re familiar with how content is displayed on your web site. Blogs, forums, and related systems often show the same content in multiple formats. For example, a blog entry may appear on the home page of a blog, in an archive page, and in a page of other entries with the same label.
• Minimize similar content: If you have many pages that are similar, consider expanding each page or consolidating the pages into one. For instance, if you have a travel site with separate pages for two cities, but the same information on both pages, you could either merge the pages into one page about both cities or you could expand each page to contain unique content about each city.

Don’t block Google from duplicate content. Google advises against this, because it won’t be able to detect when URLs point to the same content, and will have to treat them as separate pages. Use the canonical link element (rel=”canonical”).

Penguin possibly solution

So much talks about this penguin update and lot of versions. but most of things is clear from start.

1. google provided examples what contextual links from un-related page is what that they fight right now. It mean what that kind of unrelated contextual links can lead to negative juice. Really it can be more - unrelated sidebar/footer links also can lead to negative juice.

that lot of spam in serps happen because lot of old sites used such tricks for long time and many have interlinked all their sites + link exchanges (often not in same niche).

Google now giving out penalty to sites with such unrelated links, but looks so little sites pass such 'quality test', it why many spam in serps and mostly broad search results now (it wikipedia, youtube and amazon).

I thinking what page category classifier system launched now for inbound/outbound links and if so much links not in same category (or in lsi or main site category as cancer->health) from/to your site - site get hit. Also avoid sites with mixed content (which hard to categorize).
Just check adwords - ad groups ideas, it show what them have some kind of classifier now.

2. according to matt cuts speech - them looking to give bonus for fresh sites without lot of links but with great content. So them right now analyzing user factors (time on site, bounce ratio) for lot of more sites.

This serps is still updating and why it changing all time at this days. Looks big moving will for long time (peoples will try fixed and new 'zebra' updates coming soon. User factors going to be one from most important ranking factor in future.

I really i not understanding why peoples not looking into things which bigG showing them before update and lot of strange theories at all forums. G not using any randomization, just this factors for now. Also backlink profiles/on-page seo not tell you full story, because this update about links categorization.

General sites can link niche sites, but opposite in some limited amount. Many unrelated links to sites in other niches causing red flag.

Really it good, because lot of competition vanished now, but hard to tell what them will do next (trouble is to small amount of sites passing quality mark).

So penguin solution ways :

1. remove all links from your pages to unrelated urls (which not in your niche). When health site link mortgage site (in context or not) it looks bad for penguin.

This is absolutely need to do now to recover your positions. Also remember about other google new penalization factors as ads at top of screen, only keywords in title/desc/keywords/h1/b. mix keywords with lsi and some additional text. I have found what many pages ranks not for optimized keyword but for something else. So try to use lsi but not exact keyword in your backlinks and use min 50% of full page url.

2. Inbound links, most hard part. But i think removal of outbound links will enough at this time. Few my sites show stable rising after removal of outbound unrelated links.

PENGUIN UPDATE

after the penguin update my site dropped below the .com, 2 wikipidia pages, the .co.uk and I was placed

so I did some link building with (.edu and .gov) and so far it's working and I visited the number one site and noticed that they have about 10 same site link on the first page and a very good link structure with a two side bars full of same site related links. this site use the keyword on the domain and first page <title> like my site there is about 150 to 200 words no more. and the main keyword is not mentioned any where in the first page but all other word in the site is related to the niche like the site was created for the reader not the search engine.
my site have name on domain keyword on title, description, H1 and bold, link structure is not amazing, it's related but I could done a better job.
but I went to a good design. so my site is not too bad hit by the PENGUIN UPDATE because is not a bad site but I can see very clear that if wasn't for my backlinks I would be anyway.
I will tweak my site based on the site and I'm sure I'll be on the spot again


I HOPE MY POST HELP SOME OF YOU GUYS WITH THE PENGUIN RESEARCH AND UNDERSTANDING this is my experience so far

My site and Penguin update

I was on 1st page of Google on my main keyword and also in many keyword related to my niche.
After the update I went to now I'm on my main keyword.
I also had 100's of keywords related to my niche on first page of google.
with millions of competition. I got my site #1 only mostly using scrapbox only abit of on page SEO.

SO BELOW I'll explain what's happening NOW

when I started this site few years back the site had the keyword on the domain with extention (.com) the was wikipedia  was wikipedia site had the keyword on the domain with extention (.co.uk) so I got myself a domain with the keyword with extension (.org) I used wordpress to create the site
used some SEO plugin like all in one seo etc.. did some onpage SEO but not over, no more them 100 words so didn't take me long to get on  them started doing some manual link building and eventually got to position 2 passing even wikipedia but not the the site with the keyword + .com on the domain name. them I got scrapbox
the best software I ever got. this got me to position. I just used crap over spammed lists that I could get hold here and there. I'm too lazy to scrap myself :) I stayed in the top position for over 2 years I made xxxxx of $.
I survived the PANDA UPDATE with no changes to my Rank in Google.