Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
I feel G are just tinkering around the edges with their algo, granted this can affect sites that are on the 'SEO edge' but my area sees little seo and the serps are all but unchanged and have been for a couple of years.
My guess is, for example, if G was happy with 10% max KWD last week and dropped the filter to 9.9% this week then anyone just below the bar will get hammered for what is essentially only a minor change.
That said I have had a site disappear before and no explanation factual or theoretical helps with the sickening feeling!
Regards to all
Rod
This would fit the LSI theory. Google is no longer returning pages about the query terms but pages related to the query terms, however vaguely.
Which isn't good enough. If I search for Clockwork Widgets I want pages about clockwork widgets not pages about the history of German mechanical engineering that happen to mention that the first clockwork widget was produced in Berlin in 1867.
It's all looking very similar to the farcical Austin update about this time last year, which many people said then was the result of LSI.
Then, Google eventually backed out the update. Let's hope they do the same again and this time do it quickly.
It is a fact that incomplete data, while fine for estimating within probability bounds, isn't exactly what people expect indexes to built with if the calulations are based on data that will not be in the index or that the data will kept to one side in the index instead of being placed where the calculations place it.
Now to the chap that mentioned key word density.
I've seen sites rank high in the serps with extremely high and also with zero keyword density. It makes no sense, even when factoring the number of sites in that serp universe.
The funniest one was when there was a blank page and it got first place, you now know what to use for content makes page creation a snap.
Then, Google eventually backed out the update. Let's hope they do the same again and this time do it quickly
I haven't seen a huge change in the search results for the keywords that I watch, but I have seen some improvement in the quality of the results--and not just for the terms that have contributed to a big boost in my own Google referrals. :-)
One oddity:
I searched for "[common shortened generic name of prescription drug] side effects" and got a page of gibberish results (mostly script-generated junk sites). When I repeated the search with "[fully spelled-out generic name of prescription drug] side effects," the results were right on target.
God will bless Google with everything if they make the final switch to that datacenter ;)
I hear ya Brett :) - I wasn't (on main site) until this update!
This update thread brings memories flooding back, remember when the Recent Posts link seemed to glow it got that many clicks every time of the month?
I am seeing a lot of dodgy tactics reaping benefits in one of my areas, offset DIVS, hidden text, etc, all the stuff that I thought was old news !
One top position for a VERY competitive term is taken by a site which would make an excellent example of what you SHOULDN'T do!
It is that blatant I am in disbelief!
But hey, that's the game, they will (hopefully) eventually be dropped and all will be well.
For those white hats that have taken a beating with this update, my thoughts are with you, I still firmly believe that content is king and it will rule again.
Im my humble opinion the big G updates are far too complicated (at least for me) to try and grasp in their entirety, too many parameters, too many Phd mathematicians and too much stress!
I will just sit back and wait, it isn't worth getting my blood pressure up :)
Good luck to all!
Dazz