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On Friday, October 4th, Matt Cutts announced the release of Penguin 2.1. Based on the amount of Penguin work I do, that meant one thing. Matt just threw a serious wrench into my Friday night (and weekend plans). Similar to previous Penguin updates, I began heavily analyzing websites hit by Penguin 2.1 to identify new findings and insights.
Needless to say, the past two and a half weeks have been fascinating, as I’ve now dug into 36 sites hit by Penguin 2.1. This latest update has definitely left a path of destruction across both large and small websites, from around the world.
A Tale of 3 Penguin Victims
This post is designed to give you a peek behind the curtains, into the world of Penguin. I will focus on three different websites, with three different outcomes.
The first story is a happy one, as I’ll explain more about a company that recovered during Penguin 2.1. The second company unfortunately took it on the chin, and twice. They were first hit by Penguin 2.0, only to get hit harder by 2.1. The third represents an all-too-common example of a company not understanding what its SEO agency was doing, and was blindsided by a Penguin 2.1 hit. Let’s begin.
1. Penguin 2.1 Brings Recovery
I know there are a lot of people that don’t believe websites can recover from Penguin. But they can; I’ve written several case studies about those recoveries in case you want to learn more. Once Penguin 2.1 hit, I quickly started reviewing the reporting of previous Penguin victims to see if there was any impact from our refreshed, icy friend.
During this most recent update, two websites I’ve been helping with Penguin hits recovered. I’ll focus on one of those sites in this post. While analyzing the site’s reporting, I saw a distinct bump in Google organic traffic starting on Friday, October 4th and increasing during the weekend. Note, this was a client with multiple issues, and was hit by both Panda and Penguin (historically). That’s actually a common scenario for a number of the companies contacting me. For this company in particular, I helped them identify technical problems, content issues, and link problems, and they have worked hard to rectify their issues.
A Penguin Recovery During the 2.1 Update:
The company was originally hit by a previous Penguin update, but delayed tackling their link issues as they worked on technical problems and content issues. If you know how I feel about the gray area of Panda or Penguin, I always feel you should move as quickly as possible while maintaining focus in order to recover from algorithm hits. The reality, though, is that not every company can move at light speed.
This company was no different. They had seen improvements from technical fixes and content work, and finally started to address Penguin over the past few months (after Penguin 2.0 rolled out). Unfortunately, Penguin was inhibiting their growth, even if they had showed signs of progress based on other SEO work.
During late spring and summer, unnatural links were removed as much as possible, while links that could not be manually removed were disavowed. By the way, that’s the approach I recommend. I’m not a big fan of disavowing all bad links, and I never have been.
Based on links downloaded from Google Webmaster Tools, Majestic SEO, and Open Site Explorer, the company tackled its unnatural link situation the best it could. Now they just needed another algorithm update to see if their hard work paid off. I recommend to any company hit by an algorithm update that they should keep driving forward as if they weren’t hit. Keep producing great content, keep leveraging social to get the word out, keep building natural links, etc.
When October 4th arrived, a spike in organic search traffic followed. The site’s Google organic traffic was up 43 percent following Penguin 2.1 (and up 67 percent to the specific landing pages that had been impacted heavily by the previous Penguin hit). The filter had been lifted and the site was being rewarded for its recovery work.
Key Takeaways:
- Move quickly and keep a strong focus on what you need to tackle link-wise. Although this company recovered, it delayed its Penguin work for some time (and the negative impact remained).
- Be thorough. Don’t miss links you need to nuke. Penguin is algorithmic and there is a threshold you need to pass.
- Remove as many unnatural links as you can manually, and then disavow the rest. Avoid the knee-jerk reaction to disavow all of them.
After your Penguin work has been completed, keep your head down and drive forward. Act as if you aren’t being impacted by Penguin. You’ll send the right signals to Google throughout the downturn in traffic.
2. A Penguin 2.0 and 2.1 Combination Punch
The second example I wanted to explain was an unfortunate one-two punch from Penguin. You wouldn’t think a Penguin can pack a combination punch, but it has in several situations I’ve analyzed recently (where companies reached out to me complaining of a Penguin 2.1 hit, after a Penguin 2.0 hit.) And worse, this was after thinking they addressed their unnatural link problem thoroughly.
After getting pummeled by Penguin 2.0 on May 22nd, the company gathered its troops, thought they identified all of their unnatural links, and worked hard on removing them. After what seemed to be a thorough cleanup, they eagerly awaited another Penguin update. When Penguin 2.1 was announced by Matt Cutts, they watched their reporting with intense focus, only to be thoroughly disappointed with the outcome. They got hit even worse.
The Initial Penguin 2.0 Hit:
The Second Penguin Hit on Oct 4th:
So what happened? Quickly reviewing the site’s link profile revealed a problem: companies put a stake in the ground and remove as many unnatural links as they can at a given point in time. They don’t continue analyzing their links to see if more unnatural links pop up and that’s a dangerous mistake. I saw many unnatural links in their profile that were first found during the summer and fall of 2013. Many showed up after their Penguin work had been completed. Those links are what got them hit by Penguin 2.1.
Fresh Unnatural Links Caused the Penguin 2.1 Hit:
The combination punch I mentioned above is a strong reminder that Penguin never sleeps. Don’t assume you are done with your link removals because you have a spreadsheet from a few months ago. You need to continually review your link profile to identify potential problems. If this company had done that, they would have picked up many additional unnatural links showing up this summer and fall, and dealt with them accordingly. I believe if they did, they could have avoided the nasty one-two punch of Penguin.
Key Takeaways:
- Your Penguin work is ongoing. Don’t drop the ball.
- Have your SEO continually monitor your link profile for unnatural links (whether that’s an internal SEO, agency, or consultant).
- The one-two punch of Penguin is killer (and can be backbreaking). Avoid multiple algorithm hits. They aren’t fun to live through.
Unnatural links have an uncanny way of replicating across low-quality sites and networks. I have clearly seen this during my Penguin analyses. Beware.
3. A Fresh Hit, Care of a “Trusted” Third Party
In April, I wrote a column titled Racing Penguin, where I explained an unnatural links situation that looked like negative SEO. However, it ended up being a “trusted” third party that was assisting a company with its marketing efforts. Unfortunately, that situation is all too common, as businesses outsource SEO and aren’t tracking what those third parties are doing.
After Penguin 2.1 was released, I received a call from a business owner blindsided by the latest update. After showing the business owner many of the unnatural links impacting the website, he was blown away. He made it very clear that he never set up those links.
I took him through a process I normally take blindsided Penguin victims through to try and determine how the links were set up. I also explained that I’ve been contacted about negative SEO many times since Penguin 1.0, but it almost always ends up not being negative SEO. The trail typically leads to someone connected to the company (and a high percentage of those people had the right intentions, but the wrong execution).
A Penguin Hit Timeline Can Bring Answers:
That was the case for this business owner. He contacted several people who had helped him in various capacities over the past few years, but one vendor came back with a quick and affirmative response. As it turns out, the business owner hired an agency to help with SEO and they began a linkbuilding campaign. They built links all right… just not the ones a business owner wants to build. The links were Penguin food, plain and simple.
The business owner was left trying to clean up the Penguin mess. Instead of running his business, he’s dealing with link exports from various tools, contacting webmasters, and getting familiar with the disavow tool. Yes, this business owner is getting a Masters Degree in Penguin Sciences.
How to avoid this situation? My advice is the same as it’s always been. Know who you are hiring and what they will be doing; get it in writing and make sure you know what has been completed. Ask hard questions, get clear answers, and keep the pulse of your website. Algorithms like Penguin and Panda can cause serious damage to your business, as Google organic traffic can plummet overnight. Then you’ll have months of hard recovery work ahead. Avoid this situation at all costs.
Key Takeaways:
- Thoroughly vet the SEO agency or consultant you are planning to hire. Don’t get caught hiring a company that makes your situation worse. That’s not the point.
- Know what your agency or consultant will be completing for you, and get that in writing.
- Communicate with your SEO agency or consultant on a regular basis to receive updates on the projects being completed. Ask for written updates, screenshots and examples as the projects continue. Don’t get caught at the end of the project with lingering questions.
- When you see an increase in rankings, ask why that’s happening. Try to understand the tactics being used to impact SEO. Unfortunately, there are some tactics that cause short-term gains only to cause serious, long-term problems.
Take the initiative to review your own SEO reporting to better understand what’s going on. Learn your way around Google Webmaster Tools, Google Analytics, and link analysis tools like Majestic SEO and Open Site Explorer. You might be able to nip serious SEO problems in the bud.
Summary: Penguin 2.1 Bringeth and Taketh Away
I hope these three examples provided a view into the world of Penguin. In my opinion, Penguin 2.1 was bigger and badder than Penguin 2.0. The good news is that not every site was impacted negatively. There were recoveries. Though they’re often overshadowed by the destruction, it’s important to know that Penguin victims can recover. It just takes a lot of hard work for that to happen.
If you’ve been impacted by Penguin 2.1, you need to download and analyze your inbound links, flag unnatural links, remove as many as you can manually, and then disavow what you can’t remove. As I mentioned in the second case above, don’t stop analyzing your links once the initial phase has been completed. Continually monitor your link profile to make sure additional unnatural links don’t appear. Remember, another Penguin update might be right around the corner. Good luck.
Google Penguin 2.1 is launching today, according to a tweet from Google's Distinguished Engineer Matt Cutts.
The first update to the second-generation Penguin algorithm designed to target web spam will affect "~1% of searches to a noticeable degree."
Google Penguin 2.0 went live on May 22 and affected 2.3 percent of English-U.S. queries. When it launched, Cutts explained that while it was the fourth Penguin-related launch, Google referred to the change internally as Penguin 2.0 because it was an updated algorithm rather than just a data refresh.
"It's a brand new generation of algorithms," Cutts said in May. "The previous iteration of Penguin would essentially only look at the home page of a site. The newer generation of Penguin goes much deeper and has a really big impact in certain small areas."
This is Google's fifth Penguin-related launch.
Google originally launched the algorithm that was eventually become known as Penguin 1.0 in April 2012. There were two refreshes last year: in May and October.
You can learn more about Google Penguin 2.0 in our stories below.
Penguin 2.0 hit in May of this year and was described by Google's Matt Cutts as more comprehensive and deeper than Penguin 1.0. What that meant at the time wasn't entirely clear. However, that wasn't good enough for UK-based MathSight, which attempted to deconstruct the algorithmic update from a reverse engineering process.
What MathSight claimed to find was that Penguin 2.0 was really about "low readability" levels of content on a site, and stated that its research was able to uncover with a 95 percent statistical confidence that Penguin targeted factors that include:
- Main body text
- Hyperlinks
- Anchor text
- Meta information
"The insights came from analyzing websites affected by Penguin 2.0, which examined all onsite SEO aspects that led to a step change – positive or negative – in SEO traffic from Google," said Andreas Voniatis, managing director at MathSight. "It's worth mentioning that many people forget that an inbound/outbound link profile originates from website's pages. So by analyzing the onsite SEO, we are effectively finding the stylistic properties of those external linking pages, which provides predictive value for Penguin 2.0."
MathSight's research analyzed sites within specific industries like travel, gifts, mobile apps and jewelry, and corporate B2B companies including business awards, advertising and PR. Consequently, Moz looked at industries that may have been affected most by Penguin 2.0 and showed some similar sectors.
"We didn't set out to examine any specific theories or aspects of Penguin, for example, hypothesizing based on conjecture," said Voniatis. "Instead, we examined a broad dataset and allowed the MathSight platform to uncover mathematical patterns common to the pages that won or lost traffic from Penguin 2.0."
Voniatis said this resulted in "empirical evidence of patterns revealed about Penguin without any preconceptions or bias."
In its research paper, MathSight presented three case studies that attempted to explain what aspects of three different sites were rewarded or punished with Penguin 2.0. Data showed those punishments and rewards varied across sites.
The following is just one illustration of how MathSight organized the Penguin 2.0 analysis for a site:
"This would suggest that any advice given would be most effective if tailored to the individual domain, or type of domain if domains can be grouped or clustered into types," Voniatis said. "For example, with site B the presence of anchor text was seemingly punished as a feature, whereas for site C it was heavily rewarded."
However, MathSight did draw conclusions about how Penguin 2.0 worked overall using the data it found. First, MathSight said using "rare words" in the body text meant pages performed better in terms of traffic. Voniatis said the words they are referring to are not listed in the 5,000 most-common words in the English language. MathSight stated using these in the content would raise the readability level (he referenced specifically aiming for higher Dale-Chall readability scores).
MathSight also reported that longer title tags using words with more syllables tended to fare better.
From a content perspective, although we do have algorithms to deal with, becoming hyperfocused on details such as syllable count and the use of "rare" words could take marketers away from the big picture.
With that in mind, I asked Voniatis how SEO professionals should use the information in MathSight's report.
"The insights provided are 'technical' so they are not intended as a replacement for a highly skilled and experienced SEO. Whilst the MathSight platform can mathematically deconstruct search engine algorithms with supporting empirical data, it cannot provide the reason why – that's for Google to answer or for SEO professionals to theorize over," he said.
Additional conclusions from MathSight on the general behavior of Penguin 2.0 included:
- The use of headings are rewarded, and it's advantageous to use words that are less commonplace within them.
- The number of hyperlinks "appears" to be rewarded, meaning the more hyperlinks, the greater the increase in traffic, in some cases. MathSight warned that the data here could be too vague to take action upon, but did say that there wasn't any bias towards external or internal links.
- Depending on the type of site and based on MathSight's "limited survey," the presence and increased character length of meta descriptions and the increased quantity of words in anchor text are now slightly more rewarded than previously.
"SEO professionals can use the Penguin 2.0 study to explain to their clients that the update was about penalizing 'low readability' levels of content," Voniatis said. "SEOs can also use the findings to offer Penguin 2.0 recovery plans by identifying and responding to on-site and off-site content with poor readability scores."
Voniatis said MathSight provides data via an API to help SEO professionals examine which onsite pages need their content rewritten as a response to Penguin 2.0. From an offsite point of view, the data also scores and identifies which links to remove or disavow.
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Jessica Lee @
Search Engine Watch
The latest Panda Update began rolling out the week of July 15 and was confirmed by Google. I was happy to see Google confirm the update, since that wasn't supposed to happen anymore.
During the July update, many webmasters reported recoveries of varying levels, which seemed to match up with what Google's Distinguished Engineer Matt Cutts explained about the “softening” of Panda. Also, this was the first rollout of the new and improved Panda, which can take 10 days to fully roll out.
But remember, there were other significant updates in May, with both Penguin 2.0 and Phantom. Since many sites were hit by those updates as well, I was eager to see how the new Panda update impacted Penguin and Phantom victims as well.
And we can't leave out "Phanteguin" victims (companies hit by both Phantom and Penguin 2.0). Could they recover during the Panda update too?
Needless to say, I was eager to analyze client websites hit by Panda, Phantom, Penguin, or the killer combo of Phanteguin. What I found was fascinating, and confirms some prior beliefs I had about the relationship between algorithm updates.
For example, I've witnessed Penguin recoveries during Panda updates before, which led me to believe there was some connection between the two. Well, the latest Panda update provides even more data regarding the relationship between Panda, Penguin, and even Phantom.
Pandas Helping Penguins, and Exorcising Phantoms
Past case studies about Penguin recoveries during Panda updates led me to believe that Panda and Penguin were connected somehow, although I'm still not sure exactly how. It almost seems like one bubbles up to the other, and if all is OK on both fronts, a site can recover.
Well, I saw this again during the latest Panda update, but now we have a ghostly new friend named Phantom who has joined the party.
During the latest Panda update, I saw several companies recover at varying levels from Panda (which makes sense during a Panda update), but I also saw websites hit by Penguin and Phantom recover. And to make matters even more complex, I saw a website hit by Phanteguin (both Phantom and Penguin) recover.
Today, I'm going to walk you through three examples of recoveries, so you can see that Pandas do indeed like Penguins, and Phantoms can be exorcised. My hope is that by providing a few examples of sites that recovered during the latest Panda update, you can start to better understand the relationship between algorithm updates, and how Panda is evolving.
Case 1: Panda Recovery – Fixing Technical Problems + The Softer Side of Panda
Several of my clients recovered from Panda hits during the July 15 update, and I'll cover one particularly interesting one now. The website I'm referring to has seen a significant loss in traffic over the past several months. Based on a technical SEO audit I conducted, the company has performed a massive amount of work on the website over the past several months.
The site had a number of serious technical problems, and many of those problems have been rectified. It's a large site with over 10 million pages indexed, and inherently has thinner content than any SEO professional would like to see. But, that's an industry-wide issue for this client, so it was never fair that it was held against them (in my opinion).
The site also had technical issues causing duplicate content, massive XML sitemap issues (causing dirty sitemaps), and many soft 404s. A number of these technical problems led to poor quality signals being presented to Google, which eventually caused problems Panda-wise.
Thin Content Identified During a Test Crawl of 50K Pages
But on July 15, the site experienced a nice bump in Google organic traffic. Impressions more than doubled and Google organic traffic increased by 60 percent.
The site in question removed technical issues causing duplicate content, soft 404s, etc. To me, that was the real problem, as users still benefited from the content, even if the content was "thin."
I also think this is a great example of the softening of Panda. The correction was the right one, and I'm glad to see that Google made the change to its algorithm.
To sum up this example, technical changes cut down on duplicate content and soft 404s, but the original content remained (and it was technically thin). The new Panda seemed OK with the content, and rewarded the site for fixing the issues sending dangerous quality signals to Google.
Case 2: Panda Recovery While Still Being Impacted by Penguin
One site I analyzed after the latest Panda update saw a nice increase in Google organic traffic, even though it had gotten hammered by Penguin (and had not recovered from that algorithm update yet).
From a Panda perspective, the site got hit in November of 2012, losing approximately 42 percent of its already anemic Google organic search traffic. Then the site remained at that level until the latest Panda update in July 2013. Unfortunately, the website got hit by Pandeguin, or both Panda and Penguin.
Now, I've seen Penguin recoveries during Panda updates before, but I wasn't sure if you could see a Panda recovery on a site being severely impacted by Penguin. This case confirms that you can recover from Panda even when you're still being severely hampered by Penguin. The site in question got hammered during the first Penguin update (April 24, 2012), and lost ~65 percent of its Google organic traffic overnight.
The business owner worked hard to remove as many unnatural links as possible, and used the disavow tool, but didn't recover during subsequent Penguin updates (even Penguin 2.0). Actually, the site saw another dip during Penguin 2.0.
July 15 arrived and the site recovered from Panda to its pre-Panda levels. Specifically, the website doubled its organic search traffic from Google, but it's still below where it was pre-Penguin 1.0.
This makes complete sense, since the site shouldn't return to its pre-Penguin levels since there are still more links to remove from my perspective. So, returning to pre-Panda levels make sense, but the site still needs more work Penguin-wise in order to recover.
To quickly recap, the website was impacted by Penguin 1.0 and 2.0, and hit by Panda in November 2012 (or Pandeguin). The webmaster worked hard to remove unnatural links, and used the disavow tool as well, but hasn't removed as many links as needed to recover from Penguin.
The site didn't recover during Penguin updates, but ended up recovering during the latest Panda update where it returned to its pre-Panda levels. It's a great example of how a website could recover from Panda even when it's still being impacted by Penguin.
Case 3: Phanteguin Recovery – Penguin and Phantom Recovery During a Panda Update
This might be my favorite case from the latest Panda update.
A client I'm helping was hit by Penguin 1.0 in 2012 and never recovered. Then they were impacted by Phantom on May 8, and hit even harder by Penguin 2.0 on May 22.
When you've been hit by Phanteguin, it means you have both a content and unnatural links problem. So you have to fight a battle on two fronts.
This case, in particular, shows how hard work and determination can pay off when you are hit by an algorithm update (or multiple algo updates).
My client moved really fast to rectify many of the problems riddling the website. They attacked their unnatural links problem aggressively and began removing links quickly. It's worth noting that the site's link profile was in grave condition (and that's saying something, considering I've analyzed more than 220 websites hit by Penguin).
From a content perspective (which is what Phantom attacked), they had a pretty serious duplicate content problem. Their content wasn't thin, but the same content could be found across a number of other pages on the site (and even across domains).
In addition, there was a heavy cross-linking problem with company-owned domains (using exact match anchor text). That's another common problem I've seen with both Phantom and Panda victims.
A large percentage of the problematic content was dealt with quickly, which again, is a testament to how determined the owner of the company was to fixing the Phanteguin situation.
On July 15, the site began its recovery (and has been increasing ever since). The site is now close to its pre-Phanteguin levels. And once again, the reason it's not fully back is because it shouldn't have been there in the first place. Remember, there was an unnatural link situation artificially boosting its power, including unnatural links from company-owned domains.
So, this case study shows that Penguin recoveries can occur outside of official Penguin updates, and it also shows that recovery from Phantom-based content issues is possible during Panda updates.
It's important to understand that this is going on. Nobody outside Google knows exactly how the algorithm updates are connected, but I've now seen them connect several times (and now Phantom is involved).
What Didn't Work
Now we've examined what worked. But what didn't work for companies trying to recover?
July 15 wasn't a great day for every website impacted by Panda, Phantom, or Penguin. Here's why:
1. Lack of Execution
If you've been hit by an algorithm update, and don't make significant changes, then there's little chance of recovering (at least to the extent that you desire).
I know a number of companies that were reluctant to implement major changes, including gutting content, refining their structure, changing their business model, and tackling unnatural links. They didn't recover, and it makes complete sense to me that they didn't.
There are tough decisions to make when you've been hit by Panda, Phantom, or Penguin. If you don't have the intestinal fortitude to take action, then you probably won't recover. I saw several cases of this during the July 15 update.
2. Rolling Back Changes and Spinning Wheels
I know a few companies that actually implemented the right changes, but ended up rolling them back after having second thoughts. This is one of the worst things you can do.
If you roll out changes, but don't wait for another update, then you will have no idea if those changes worked. Worse, you are sending really bad signals to the engines as you change your structure, content, internal linking, etc., only to roll it back a few weeks later.
You must make hard decisions and stick with them in order to gain traction. Do the right things SEO-wise and solidify your foundation. That's the right way to go.
3. Caught in the Gray Area
I've written about the gray area of Panda before, and it's a tough spot to be in. If you don't change enough of your content, or remove enough links, then you can sit in algorithm update limbo for what seems like an eternity.
You should fully understand the algorithm update(s) that hit you, understand the risks and threats with your own site, and then execute changes quickly and accurately. This is why I'm very aggressive when dealing with Panda, Phantom, and Penguin. I'd rather have a client recover as quickly as possible and then build on that foundation (versus getting caught in the gray area).
Key Takeaways
If you're still dealing with the impact of an algorithm update (whether Panda, Phantom, or Penguin, or some combination of the three), hopefully these takeaways will help you get on the right path.
- Have a clear understanding of what you need to tackle. Don't be afraid to make hard decisions.
- Move fast. Speed, while maintaining focus, is key to successfully recovering from an update.
- Clean up everything you can, including both content and link issues. Don't just focus on one element of your site, when you know there are problems elsewhere. Remember, one algorithm update may bubble up to another, so don't get caught in a silo.
- Stick with your changes. Don't roll them back too soon. Have the intestinal fortitude to stay the course.
- Build upon your clean (and stronger) foundation with the right SEO strategy. Don't be tempted to test the algorithm again. It's not worth it.
Summary: Analyze, Plan, and Execute
Like many other things in this world, success often comes down to execution. I've had the opportunity to speak with many business owners who have been impacted by Panda, Phantom, and Penguin. I've learned that it's one thing to say you're ready to make serious changes, and another to execute those changes.
To me, it's critically important to have a solid plan, based on thorough analysis, and then be able to execute with speed and accuracy. Working toward recovery is hard work, but that hard work can pay off.
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