Panda 4.0: "Source of Info" websites are the winners?

[Zivush]

It can be that on Panda 4.0 Google took a new direction (again :-)).
They decided to prefer/outrank "source of information" websites over authority (brand names) site.
Taking two leading conclusions from this in-depth article about Panda 4.00

[cognitiveseo.com ]

1. "Google might be looking at in-depth concepts and not just generic and simplistic content nowadays."

2. "Other sites that seem to have benefited from the Google Panda 4.0 update are the ones that focused on unique, high quality and well-organized content. "

Thoughts? Inputs?

[EditorialGuy]

I think Panda 4.0 does favor subject expertise over "broad and shallow." Google has been edging in that direction for a while, from what I can see, and Panda 4.0 has sealed the deal.

[Chris_Boggs]

A ton of great examples in there. This seems to line up nicely with the initial SearchMetrics winners and losers data to show that clone and shallow sites are in trouble.

As a disclaimer, I haven't had a lot of time to do personal research or even read a lot about Panda 4.0 yet. I am going to catch up but here are some thoughts from the brief time I spent thinking about this thread after reading (most of) the Cognitive article.

I looked at one loser from the SearchMetrics list and found this page, which fits classically within the anti broad-and-shallow argument, for a number of peotential UX/SEO reasons. starpulse.com/Actresses/Bullock,_Sandra/

The page is hard to find from a user perspective (Google Custom Search found it after the following "B's" page that was frustrating starpulse.com/Celebrity/B.html (side note it must be pretty easy to get the "celebrity" moniker these days judging from how many "B's")

Also, the content for most of the celebrities that I viewed in that directory is a rehash of what Google can already display on the knowledge graph (interesting side conspiracy theory here). There has been some attempt to beef up the bios linked-to from the celeb pages, but that is all "known" content as well.

The winners are definitely ones that have invested in more unique content, but I have started to see other research such as Cognitive that shows that high authority metrics also seem to "count less" when weighing like content. The Cognitive example of eMedicine vs Live Science authority signals comes to mind, and I would love to find some of the other examples that exist out there across industries of content seemingly outweighing authority signals. (Because honestly I believe these will be the exceptions rather than the rule now, as those sites that have newfound exposure will subsequently benefit from the increased authority signals pointed to the content)

I will try to spend some more time reading up on what our esteemed moderators in here have suggested, and do some more research as I want to get a strong thesis on the "kinder gentler" Panda.

[aristotle]

Maybe Google will finally demote all of these people that write reviews about products they've never even used.

[EditorialGuy]

Maybe Google will finally demote all of these people that write reviews about products they've never even used.

Not to mention pages that purport to be reviews but have nothing but a batch of price-comparison links and an invitation to "Write a review."

(Come to think of it, I haven't been finding as many of those in Google's SERPS as I did a while back. CNet and ZDnet must be furious.)

[Planet13]

I am not trying to gloat here, and I m not 100% sure that this is exactly what you are asking about, but...

I have seen about a 50% increase in traffic since May 17th.

These have been to my INFORMATION / article pages on my site (which has both an ecommerce section and an article / info section)

Oddly enough, my site was never really "clearly harmed" by Panda. I have taken a few dings over the last couple of years, but those seemed to line up more with PENGUIN rather than with Panda when I look at a timeline of the changes.

My most popular page (an information page) has seen a 57% increase in traffic since May 17th. The second most popular page (another information page) has seen an 88% increase in traffic.

The first page gets lots of comments from readers, so content has accrued steadily (although it is often the same question being asked over and over again). The second page has had almost no new content in about two years.

My #3 and #4 pages are ecommerce pages that saw a 22% and 29% increase in traffic.

I would love to give you all some sage wisdom on how to "fix" your site so that it could take advantage of the Panda 4 algo update, but unfortunately, I don't really have any. I didn't really do a whole lot of work to my site (it has been kind of on life support for a while now). Really, the only content updates are when people make comments on the articles.

The only thing is that there is a definite connection between the products we sell and the articles that appear on our site.

Also, the articles are kind of old. I think that they might be from 2003 or even earlier?

Of course, with google, whatever gains we have made may all come crashing down tomorrow, so there you have it.

[bumpski]

Planet13, you burst my bubble!

I have seen quite a few notes about a significant Google change on the 20th, but you are the first to mention the 17th, and when did I start my big experiment, of course, the 16th, how does Google do it, sync up with every possible experiment, 500 parameters to tweak I guess. (By the way still practicing run on sentences, which Google does seem to like.)

I would definitely call this site a "source of info" site and queries started a linear climb on the 17th, and are probably still climbing today, BUT, I'm integrating in a lot of site wide mobile tweaks, and for every tweak GWT queries turns down, then starts to climb, new tweak, turns down, etc. Fortunately this site was probably already at its low point so hopefully the only way to go is ......

[RP_Joe]

I have seen an slight increase in small sites.

[EditorialGuy]

I have seen quite a few notes about a significant Google change on the 20th, but you are the first to mention the 17th

We an increase in Google "organic traffic" of 21 percent on May 18 (Sunday over the previous Sunday), but the big jump came on May 20 (230 percent, Tuesday over Tuesday).

Possibly Google was testing a few days before the official rollout?