With all the talk about the new panda update penalizing sites that have low quality content, I was surprised to find a very poor result in the first spot in Google for the key phrase [google buys beatmyquote] . Clicking on the link to a Smart Company result takes the user to a virtually blank page (apart from the ads and an excerpt). This page /Search.html?keyword=BeatMyQuote is clearly an auto-generated page that shouldn’t be indexed at all.
The link on this page points to an article about how Google penalized a site that it had just acquired for violating the company’s webmaster guidelines. Now considering with the above search, a user would most likely be looking for a news or blog post about Google’s recent acquisition of BeatThatQuote.com, this doesn’t seem to be the best result for a number 1 spot in Google.
I got affected by Google Panda myself aswell…
I’ve recently been searching for ways around the Google Panda update and I’ve done a whole bunch of testing on my own sites.
Here are a few key points to take into account:
1) reduce bouncerate on your web sites
2) remove/nofollow/noindex thin and poor quality webpages
3) increase Ctr in the SERPS (E.g implement crazy call to actions and things on your page titles)
4) give a lot more increased value on your site (increase users onpage time)
5) interlink your web site through optimized anchor texts
6) use a privacy policy, bulletpoints, paragraphs, subtiles, images, address/phone number, SSL, google maps location, contact us, about us etc etc (every “achievable” added quality elements you can think of)
7) Obtain additional quality one-way links with effective anchor text variation.
Link building has to be done in a very diverse and steady manner.
Another thing, I’m a ‘beta’ tester of LinkALoha at the moment and I am seeing GREAT results. I know they are going to open a couple new spots soon, you guys should check it out. Those guys are great
Thanks for the feedback Erma, good advice for any web site