noindex completely or noindex just googlebot?

[littlegiant]

Here are the numerous changes I made to my pandalized site:

-Complete site redesign
-Rewrote 15% of the site to eliminate any possibility of duplicate content
-Improved page load speed score from 71 to 91
-Greatly improved above-the-fold ad-to-content ratio across the site

These changes all went live on June 29. When Panda 2.3 came around, I got clobbered again and lost even more traffic. I'm now down to about 30% of my pre-panda traffic which has in turn decimated my Adsense earnings. This is pretty much my last gasp for this site.

I'm now seriously considering noindexing some pages which I'm guessing (operative word: guessing) may be considered low quality by Panda. However these pages still rank really well in Yahoo for their targetted keywords.

My question: Should I noindex just the googlebot or noindex all bots?

(Sorry if this might be a stupid question. I'm getting a little paranoid about this whole Panda thing. It's like walking through a minefield...)

[tedster]

The answer seems clear to me. Just noindex for googlebot if other search engines send ttraffic to those pages. Why would you doubt it?

[littlegiant]

Thanks for the reply, tedster. I read on another 'panda recovery' thread where somebody mentioned that noindex-ing really didn't work for helping to recover from Panda and after looking extensively for a follow-up to that comment (and finding nothing) I was just wondering if there was something I missed about exactly how to noindex pages to combat Panda.

[tedster]

From all the reports I've been hearing, I also wouldn't hold out very much hope for noindex to help fix Panda issues. If you have shallow content pages (not "thin content" but really "shallow", as in not having much value for the visitor) then I'd either get rid of them completely or improve their value.

[littlegiant]

Well, tedster, you've obviously read much much more than I have on this forum, being an adminstrator and all but the common denominator that I've seen in all the Panda recovery stories I've read is noindex-ing. This has stuck out in my mind over the past little while because it's the one thing I've been very reluctant to try. For example, Dani of Daniweb said in her video that she made 'heavy use' of noindex, nofollow.

[tedster]

What's unfortunate about Dani's report is that her recovery only occurred AFTER she made that video. I don't know why she chose to represent her situation the way she did, but recovery only came after the next Panda algo change was run - at least according to daniweb's Quantcast stats, at any rate, which are public.

What I never heard was a report of recovery that followed ONLY noindexing. It was always a part of a big mix of changes. And why are those pages on the site anyway, if webmasters are so willing to throw them away?

Still, I do know that many people have been talking about noindex for Panda problems with Google, and it certainly won't hurt. Just look at your stats closely and make wise choices. And only do it for googlebot.

[littlegiant]

Okay thanks for the advice, tedster. In my situation, I'm desperate for a solution so I'm considering noindex-ing what I consider to be some of my weakest pages (traffic-wise and length of content) although in all honesty, I personally don't consider them to be low quality. They provide lots of value to the user.

[Rasputin]

Tedster, I think I have a situation where I would like to keep pages but have no-indexed them post panda:

I have a travel site which is reasonably popular and a government organisation asked if I would include details of their 'national monuments' - opening times, location on a map etc. They provided the information, which also appears on their own site - the pages are useful to my visitors but the same text also appears on their own site (but nowhere else). My site attracts a different audience to theirs, an audience who would be unlikely to find the information directly, but I do include a link to them on each page.

If you think this is the wrong course of action I would be very interested
Cheers

[tedster]

Are those pages that link to the government's "national monument" pages the ones you noindexed? And do they only have the identical information to the government pages, and nothing else? If so, how many are there?

[Rasputin]

Yes, it is those I have just 'noindexed', they do have identical information to the government site - I didn't realise that until I was investigating possible panda causes.

There are about 120 pages (out of a site with several thousand pages). They currently have no other information on except a list of 'other places to visit nearby', automatically generated from the geocordinates.

I haven't visited the places so can't claim to be an authority or write anything more knowledgable about them than what I have been given, although I could just rewrite what they have already told me in different words.