There has been some talk around the web on sites like SEO Roundtable, Google Webmaster Help and Webmasterworld that Google rolled out another update this past weekend. As Google’s Matt Cutts has mentioned, Panda updates are still occurring monthly, over the course of a ten day time period. So was there an update last Friday?
A quick look at Mozcast, a “weather” report that reflects turbulence with Google’s algorithm, shows some high activity last Friday, with the high temperature of 105 degrees. On Saturday, however, temperatures went down to 62 degrees and have maintained at 63 degrees throughout this week.
There have been scattered reports of websites dropping in ranking which seems to coincide with the speculated algorithm update timeline. Some of the websites reporting drops are ecommerce and gambling websites, although, there doesn’t seem to be enough evidence to support the idea that any particular industry was affected. I personally have not noticed any major fluctuations so the impact of this possible Google update appears to be relatively minor. Although, as with most Google updates, some websites are affected more adversely than others.
Many are speculating that sites are doing the “Google Dance” where rankings drop temporarily and then climb back up after a short period of time. We’ll know more in the upcoming weeks if this proves to be true and we’ll be monitoring the industry to see if a pattern emerges. Or, who knows, maybe Matt Cutts will come out and say that there was another update. However, based on the reports from webmasters and metrics like Mozcast, something happened with Google’s algorithm last Friday.
In the meantime, sites should continue to make sure they are practicing good SEO, with a focus on high-quality content and an emphasis on providing an excellent user experience. Regardless of updates, Black Hat SEO practices such as link farming, keyword stuffing and spammy, low-quality content are a surefire way to sabotage your performance on Google and should be avoided at all costs.
Brian Carver is an Account Manager at SEOhaus. If you would like to stay up-to-date on all of the latest SEO industry news and tips, you can subscribe to our blog here.
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