Google Updates and SERP Changes - April 2014

[Mentat]

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System: The following 2 messages were cut out of thread at: http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4650302.htm [webmasterworld.com] by robert_charlton - 1:45 am on Apr 1, 2014 (PST -8)

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For me, since this Saturday, google reverted the changes they did last week.
Going down, again...

[Mentat]

Ok, I see a bad sign of another silent update.
Lowest traffic in the last 5 years. It looks like a Panda reiteration.
The low traffic is adding to the plummeting adsense eCMP => incredible bad impact.

I had the same problems last year, after the Catholic Easter...

[Martin Ice Web]

@Mentant, I can confim your observation. Lowest traffic ever. All our main keys are gone, replace by brands that do not have anything in common with the search string.
For sure this is a Panda. I think they took an old one and let it go through the index.

Google keeps going their way to destroy all ecom except amazon/ebay. Ther is no sign of "Leveing" or even Panda beeing softer.

[Mentat]

My figures and search results seems very similar to the pre-soft-Panda...

[SnowMan68]

@Mentat

What do you mean by Pre Soft Panda? You saw a big drop before that run? What was the end result for you after that Panda run?

[RedBar]

Something changed Sunday night my UK time 20.00-21.00 GMT, traffic suddenly appeared and already today I have had more traffic than either Saturday or Sunday with 10+ hours to go.

We'll see what the next few hours bring in.

[Mentat]

@SnowMan68 - My site was hurt each 2 weeks since spring 2013, but 3 weeks ago I saw a little light in the tunnel.

It only lasted for about 2 weeks, now the beast It's eager to keep up for those lost weeks :(

When you see -20% for your site name in WMT is Panda! (no logical explanation)

For me the new update was online Friday afternoon (GMT).
I can clearly see it on the Analytics compared with last Friday/hour.

But to add insult to injury, in the same time eCPM from adsense also decreased by 30%...

[Martin Ice Web]

@Redbar, i hope it sticks for you but i know this behaviour right before the next downturn comes in. In most cases more worse than the one before.
So once again, hope it sticks.

[RedBar]

@MIW - So far, so good, already at 120% v the whole of Sunday...Friday, Saturday and Sunday's dramatic drop was like nothing I've ever seen before, like Mentat, 50% across an entire sector of international sites, local UK sites with nothing to do with my widgets remained stable.

Something's shaking down in my niche for some reason, no idea what as yet, hopefully they may get rid of all those copy scrapers...ok, I can dream:-)

[rustybrick]

Google told me on record that they are not aware of any update.

[Some_Bloke]

That seems a strange way of wording it. Does it mean they're not actually sure? (like each department working independantly)

[RedBar]

Obviously totally out of anyone's control:-)

[Shepherd]

Google told me on record that they are not aware of any update.

Thanks for the update.

[roseberry99]

I wonder if what people are noticing is something different from Panda and maybe something Google wouldn't call an update. Starting last Thursday night/Friday morning, Google has been more aggressively changing SERP display titles. At minimum this affects CTR, but potentially could affect long-tail traffic.

It's clear to me based on daily SERP screeshots for a sample that this has happened across a wide range of sites. Wonder if other folks can verify if Google is more frequently re-writing display titles (even if just a minor difference). Would be interested to hear if they had a response to how they are handling this specifically.

[RedBar]

Google told me on record that they are not aware of any update.

No offence but since 21.00 GMT Sunday my traffic suddenly doubled back to normal+?

What a load of crock!

rustybrick, I have respect for you, they are not being forthcoming.

[Shaun_M]

While it's still way too early to draw any conclusions because of daily fluctuations, we're on pace to see an increase in traffic today from Google organic (after adjusting for seasonality or at least attempting to do so). This is for an ecommerce site that had been hit by panda in the past (multiple times).

What's strange about this is we saw a bump on the 24th of March when people first thought that the softer panda update had been rolled out. From the March 24th to about April 3rd, non seasonal traffic was about 15% higher than normal (most increases were on long tail terms), then things suddenly went back down.

I'm curious if anyone has seen anything similar? When our traffic increased around the 24th and then went back down roughly 9-10 days later I thought that it might have been due to a seasonal surge that we didn't account for or some other anomaly, however now that we're potentially seeing a similar traffic increase on a day when Google may have rolled out another update it makes me wonder a bit.

Could it be possible they had pushed an update out on the 24th then maybe rolled it back and pushed it out again today? If today's traffic from Google continues on the current pace it will be similar to the bump that we saw on March 24th.

[sabita]

@roseberry99 I have noticed on my eComm site that Google has changed our SERP Titles in the last week as well, basically shortening them on a few.

Today started out so well in comparison to last Monday, that I thought the Panda update was true when I read it. But about 6 pm, it was like the brakes were put on. So I only ended up by 13%, which could be a normal fluctuation within the traffic I have now. And just to note, my traffic is still down 90% from last July 11, 2013.

[Angappan]

Google Panda Refresh has recently updated. Is this affects any of your websites

[Zagek]

Is anyone else noticing an increase in articles improving in rankings? Typically they are old too.

Basically, I am based in the UK and work on predominantly ecommerce websites. For SERPs which are typically filled with ecommerce sites, I have seen rankings increase for articles. In some cases, quite dramatically.

E.g. the following screenshot is for a keyword which an article from 2010 is now ranking in position 1 for me. This previously never ranked anywhere.

[i60.tinypic.com...]

This is not just specific to this keyword either. I've seen it over quite a large amount of keywords.

[CaptainSalad2]

@Zagek your referring to whats now known as “high authority spam”.

It’s the way google operates now, they rank pages based on the parent domain authority rather than the qualities of the page itself, the effect is any large brand can put up (or have up from years back) a page that touches on a subject and Google will rank it above an in-depth niche site dedicated to the subject (key phrase) because it lacks the domain authority of the larger brand. It’s not something that is going away; in fact we can count on it increasing with each and every update until the serps look identical to the high streets, devoid of small business and replaced by faceless aggregators and corporate brands. We need someone at google to lobby for small business before innovation, originality and personal service in the serps are snuffed out!

[edited by: CaptainSalad2 at 10:25 am (utc) on Apr 15, 2014]

[Zagek]

I find it interesting that only now has Google started to rank the article in the screenshot I posted (The Guardian) in position one yet it was posted in 2010. That domain has been an authority for a long time.

[CaptainSalad2]

@Zagek they have turned up the dial on authority sites little by little with every update, more of these older pages will show up with every turn of the dial.

The SERP you show is seen across many niches now, in some cases, especially local serps, local companies for given service have been completely removed from the first 2 pages, 2 years ago it was all local.

[edited by: CaptainSalad2 at 10:34 am (utc) on Apr 15, 2014]

[Zagek]

Thank you for your input, CaptainSalad2.

What you're saying aligns with the data I have. It's great to get another person's opinion on the matter.

[EditorialGuy]

We need someone at google to lobby for small business before innovation, originality and personal service in the serps are snuffed out!

This may be old news to most of this forum's participants, but Google is already working on making the next generation of Panda friendlier to "small Web sites and small businesses." Matt Cutts has talked about this several times, and we've had threads on the topic here, most recently at:

[webmasterworld.com...]

Still, we need to be realistic about the limitations of spidered search (including Google Web Search). If an algorithm sees a hundred or a thousand e-commerce sites selling the same products or services with the same vendor-supplied text and photos, how is it supposed to know which of those sites offers the quickest fulfillment times, the lowest average shipping charges, or the best handling of cancellations or returns?

If Mom and Pop want to beat the big guys in the SERPs, they need to offer something the big guys don't--and it has to be something that a search engine can recognize and measure. Original, intrinsically valuable content is a good start.

[aristotle]

CaptainSalad2 wrote:
@Zagek your referring to whats now known as “high authority spam”.
It’s the way google operates now, they rank pages based on the parent domain authority rather than the qualities of the page itself, the effect is any large brand can put up (or have up from years back) a page that touches on a subject and Google will rank it above an in-depth niche site dedicated to the subject (key phrase) because it lacks the domain authority of the larger brand. It’s not something that is going away; in fact we can count on it increasing with each and every update until the serps look identical to the high streets, devoid of small business and replaced by faceless aggregators and corporate brands. We need someone at google to lobby for small business before innovation, originality and personal service in the serps are snuffed out!

Great post. It's a perfect description of what Google has been doing. For years they been testing various adjustments and modifications to their algorithm looking for ways to boost the rankings of big brands, big sites, and big organizations. That's why the algorithm no longer gives much weight to quality and relevance, because those factors would boost the rankings of small sites, which isn't what Google wants.

[CaptainSalad2]

>>>If Mom and Pop want to beat the big guys in the SERPs, they need to offer something the big guys don't--and it has to be something that a search engine can recognize and measure. Original, intrinsically valuable content is a good start. <<<

talking from personal SERPS I watch in that case 'directories' are all the rage! Rather than have say local painter and decorators listed out of relevance google prefers to have directories (funded by Adsense) which then list the same local painter and decorators found on page 1 two years ago! (And still on yahoo/bing)

is that because these directories add intrinsic value as an extra 'in between' click or is it because they are bigger brands and by virtue of that domain authority crush the most in depth local tradesmen sites with there own original photos and text! They are not much more than high authority contact details scrapers in many cases!

I know mat said about panda and if that happens that would be...yay, but Matt also said over a year back the sites that aren't mobile friendly will be down ranked on mobile SERPS, when is that going to happen?

[EditorialGuy]

For years they been testing various adjustments and modifications to their algorithm looking for ways to boost the rankings of big brands, big sites, and big organizations.

If that's the case, they're still struggling. For most of the SERPs that I watch, the top 20 results are a mixture of pages from big-name sites and Joe or Jo Nobody sites. (Can it be that hard for Google's engineers to give big brands a leg up over location-based EMD sites?)

Or maybe devising a perfect search algorithm that satisfies everybody isn't as easy as unhappy Monday-morning quarterbacks would like to think.

[aristotle]

EditorialGuy wrote:
If that's the case, they're still struggling. For most of the SERPs that I watch, the top 20 results are a mixture of pages from big-name sites and Joe or Jo Nobody sites. (Can it be that hard for Google's engineers to give big brands a leg up over location-based EMD sites?)

In cases where they're struggling, it's because their algorithm often has trouble finding high-quality relevant information on the sites of big brands and big organizations. As I said, that's why they had to reduce the weight of quality and relevance in their algorithm, because in many cases it's the only way to get high rankings for big brands and big organizations. For further enlightenment about this, you should re-read CaptainSalad2's earlier post about “high authority spam".

[CaptainSalad2]

EG, hand on heart 2-3 years ago the serps I watch were simply amazing, no spam, all relevant traders.

I don't know what searches the people who moan about “spam” must have been making back then because I never saw anything that didn't answer my question.

Maybe it was just the searches I make, I have never needed to search for Viagra (touch wood,.....pun) or payday loans.

As a searcher I NEVER knew there was a problem with the spam because I never saw it. I thought spam was that Viagra crap that continues to fill my email inbox to this day, not some local window cleaner who brought 100 backlinks 10 years ago which then turned his website content into spam once penguin rolled around!

Why should a national automated directory that just lists contact details outrank a local cleaner who has taken the time to craft a nice response design, has detailed case studies, photos, advice, offers and keeps the site updated? Yahoo and Bing don't have this problem with local companies, and nor did google a few years ago.

[System]

The following 2 messages were cut out to new thread by aakk9999.

New thread at: Open letter to Google from one of the biggest German Publishers [webmasterworld.com]
1:32 pm on Apr 16, 2014 (gmt 0)

[edited by: aakk9999 at 2:02 pm (utc) on Apr 16, 2014]
[edit reason] Fixed URL [/edit]

[Martin Ice Web]

Does someone recognize a new Change in serps/traffic.
We got a bad hit this night again. 50% traffic from greece!
bing is way up.

ecom, germany