Panda 4.1 Rolling Out

[netmeg]

Based on user (and webmaster!) feedback, we’ve been able to discover a few more signals to help Panda identify low-quality content more precisely. This results in a greater diversity of high-quality small- and medium-sized sites ranking higher, which is nice.

Depending on the locale, around 3-5% of queries are affected.

Google+:
https://plus.google.com/+PierreFar/posts/7CWs3a3yoeY [plus.google.com]

(sorry, it's https so it won't link)

Searchengineland:

http://searchengineland.com/panda-update-rolling-204313 [searchengineland.com]

[edited by: aakk9999 at 11:40 pm (utc) on Sep 25, 2014]
[edit reason] Made link clickable [/edit]

[samwest]

All I can say is that this is the worst converting traffic I've ever seen...but SUDDENLY that can swicth and traffic turns HOT and converts...many times within minutes of the first conversion....then off for another 12 to 24 hours...not a peep. Like a swingin' carrot.

[Robert Charlton]

All I can say is that this is the worst converting traffic I've ever seen...but SUDDENLY that can swicth and traffic turns HOT and converts...many times within minutes of the first conversion....then off for another 12 to 24 hours...not a peep. Like a swingin' carrot.

samwest - This brings to mind some of the types of calibration and testing Google has done over the years when there have been significant algorithm changes, and/or changes in serp page features. What you describe sounds like what has been previously described on this forum as "zombie" traffic, which some have seen as a type of traffic profiling. There have been multiple discussions and many theories.

As I'm in the process of rushing to get ready for PubCon, the best I can do right now is to refer you to two of the major threads we've had on the topics of "zombie traffic", "traffic shaping", and "traffic throttling". I think you might find them interesting reading....

Google & Traffic Shaping - a hidden method to the quality madness?
Oct, 2010
http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4222996.htm [webmasterworld.com]

And the above revisited, with links to some intervening discussions...

Zombie Traffic and Traffic Shaping - Analysis
Apr, 2012
http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4437835.htm [webmasterworld.com]

When zombie traffic persists for a long time, IMO this suggests that Google is seeing something about the site as marginal enough that the site becomes a subject of frequent Panda testing. I hope that doesn't happen to you, as members who have gone through that find it extremely frustrating.

From these discussions, one characteristic of zombie traffic that stands out in my mind is that it's very often foreign traffic, for whatever reason used for testing purposes. This could well depend, of course, on what Google happens to be testing for... might be truer for geo-localization, testing, eg, than for other purposes... but even that much is a guess.

[seoskunk]

Dust off and old script to eliminate google analytic's from zombie traffic and prevent increasing bounce rates.......

<script type="text/javascript">
if (document.referrer != '') {
var _gaq = _gaq || [];
_gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'YOURACCOUNT']);
_gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);

(function() {
var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true;
ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js';
var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);
})();
}
</script>

[Andem]

All I can say is that this is the worst converting traffic I've ever seen...but SUDDENLY that can swicth and traffic turns HOT and converts...many times within minutes of the first conversion....then off for another 12 to 24 hours...not a peep. Like a swingin' carrot.

I understand your sentiments. I've never sold anything online in the past 21 years, not even on eBay, but I see this type of switching-on-switching-off phenomenon on a weird, unpredictable scale for the past few days. On the other hand, I was actually able to find something on the first try with Google a couple of days ago without having to modify my search terms.

[seoskunk]

On the other hand, I was actually able to find something on the first try with Google a couple of days ago without having to modify my search terms

Was the term "Youtube" :)

[Andem]

Was the term "Youtube" :)

No, it was actually a thread on stackoverflow, more specifically a built-in PHP function that was deprecated around 2 years ago.

[JD_Toims]

I am a small business on the web for 16 years, US, ecom. Google loved us up until Panda 1.0 three and a half years ago. It devastated our rankings and has be tightening noose with every panda since.

---

So today I deleted my 15 year old site with 1500 carefully cultivated product pages. Monday I sign the bankruptcy papers on my 21 year old business. Six people out of work.

That's a sad read -- I wish you the best moving forward in whatever direction you go.

And before you say it, yes, I shouldn't have relied on google for the majority of my traffic. But they sent it to me, so I took it, and made a ton of money off it. Then Panda took it all away.

I think the preceding is incredibly important today and actually much harder to do, especially when a site which has generated traffic and been "high quality" algorithmically for years basically implodes.

I just wished google would come clean about what their true agenda is. It seems that nearly everything they "announce" eventually turns out to be the opposite of what we see with our own eyes.

I know exactly what you mean and contrary to the "Well, maybe..." and "Well, Google says..." and "If you 'did it right'..." crowd likely [IMO] believes, I find one of Google's commercials for it's new App to be telling about Google's idea of the right answer.

The one I'm specifically referring to is effectively:

Little kid [who becomes totally annoying after the first view or two]: Da Moon, Da Moo

Dad: Okay Google, when is my package arriving?

Google App: Your most recent package has shipped.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I think a multi-national brand has "lost the plot" a bit when they approve an ad which includes a question then provides an answer to a different question.

---

Think about it:

Google has complete control over it's ads and couldn't get the question/answer correct in one of them, so how we're supposed to believe it's algos are so advanced as to provide people with "the answer they want to find" when Google doesn't in a controlled environment is beyond me...

Personally, if I ask, "When something is going to arrive?" I don't want to hear, "It's shipped."

"It's shipped." is actually a really *bad* answer to the question, IMO.

"It's shipped." doesn't tell me anything, except "I have no clue when it's going to arrive." -- "It's shipped." doesn't even give me a "good guess" as to when something is going to arrive, because I'm in the US and "It's shipped." doesn't tell me if: It ship from a warehouse or manufacturer in China. Shipped from a warehouse in the US across the country from me. Shipped from the location of the store/business I ordered from. Shipped from the state I'm in. Shipped today, yesterday or a week ago.

If I called a supplier and asked when something was going to arrive and the person [assuming I could get to one of course] on the phone said, "It's shipped...", I would reiterate the question and if I couldn't get a definitive answer to it, I would ask questions like: "When did it ship?", "From where?", "What carrier?", "How: Air, ground, express?", because "It's shipped." is the *wrong* answer to "When is [whatever] going to arrive?"

---

TL;DR

If Google totally misses the answer to a question in a commercial which it has complete control over, how on earth are we supposed to be "buy into" the idea it's algos are actually as advanced and "do what the coders think they do" even though that's what we keep hearing from Google?

[EditorialGuy]

Let's not muddy the waters with irrelevancies. Search engineers have nothing to do with ad copy in commercials (just as ad copywriters don't get to write search algorithms).

[JD_Toims]

Let's not muddy the waters with irrelevancies.

Yes, we should just ignore:

The "Buzz" privacy fiasco.
The "Google Books" lawsuit(s).
The "Youtube Copyright Infringement" lawsuits.
The "$60,000,000 'Non-Recruting'" settlement Google was involved in.
The "Wifi Data Recording" issue [Oopsies -- It was a rogue programmer, and the algo did it, not us, really.]
The "$1,000,000,000 AdWords" [basically theft] settlement.
Etc.

Because, it's not like they were all done by the same company with the same leaders involved -- You're right, we should just be good sheeple and take Google at it's word without questioning anything when it comes to the SERPs.

Never mind the lawsuits, the out-of-court settlements, or especially the fact Google, for some reason, decided to settle out of court with a large number of former employees who it was accused of conspiring against with other companies to essentially establish a wage freeze.

Google's SERPs *must* be on-the-level, because Google says so and any questioning of it's results or motives behind the results is just "noise" which couldn't possibly affect how people approach building/promoting a site, business or what's necessary for rankings in Google today...

[superclown2]

The latest update would, we were told, improve the SERPs by promoting smaller, more focussed sites. I have seen the opposite, with even more "big brand" sites dominating page one even though their content is far less relevant to the search term. Why? I wonder if a need for speed is the reason?

Google seems to be quite fond of fast loading sites. I wonder if they have extended this to their own site? Rather than search out the best sites for, say, apples and pears, it would be a lot quicker to search for fruit, period. If someone is looking for a single day rail ticket, it would be faster to offer three day, month, even annual ones.

In this way the results are becoming one huge compromise, muddied by information which is taken from the visitor's search history which may, or may not, be relevant. Google has lost sight of the KISS principle.

Perhaps we need to forget (at least until the next 'update') about tightly focussed niches and concentrate on generalities which just give a passing mention to those niches. Ugh.

[netmeg]

And there we go again.

[samwest]

I don't know who the person was that posted about their site being shuttered, but I can certainly sympathize. Eventually G will shut down enough business owners who are not afraid to stand up and report their story to the media. I think if everyday people knew the cloak and dagger techniques that make a megalithic company richer and the middle class poorer, we'd see some changes...in a perfect world of course, because in this world, Google is above all reproach.

[aakk9999]

Is anybody still see any changes in SERPs or do we think the rollout of Panda 4.1 has finished?

I noticed that for a number of queries that I watch, the home page that used to rank was filtered out and the internal page now ranks instead, but not quite on the same place.

[superclown2]

And there we go again.

Where?

What I want to know about is what Google is doing and why. If they are happily sacrificing relevance for loading speed then it gives some clues as to their priorities which may help in deciding how to optimise sites in future.

I may be barking up the wrong tree completely but it's a possibility that's worth looking at IMO.

[johnhh]

aakk9999

See some changes here in the UK this morning in my niche - could be still rolling.

[dethfire]

I think it's just finishing. This weekend I might have been hit. It's been a very bad weekend. Tomorrow will confirm.

[samwest]

The paradox continues here...listings unchanged, seeing mostly +1 moves, dozens of page 1, #1 results. Hundreds of page 1 <#1 results, yet...No traffic. GA per hits per minute is a zero most of the time, a few spurts of direct traffic, but then back to hours of zero / one per minute, like it's clamped.

The paradox being that my listings look fine, but my traffic is shut off some how. No, it's not my analytics installation (using two separate analytics). Conversions are non existent. Traffic mostly mobile, but I see many IOS devices are being reported as desktop, I assume iPads. In my niche, those are as useful as no traffic at all.

[Mentat]

Friday night I was hit again; I do not know if it's Panda or another algo.

[rish3]

I see more swings this morning. A mix of good and bad for me (US, ecom).

[EditorialGuy]

I just compared our Google organic traffic for the past week with the previous week, and the hour-by-hour graphs are almost identical. Unlike 4.0, which resulted in big gains, Panda 4.1 continues to look like a non-event for us.

[samwest]

Here it comes, and there it goes...
Site was sitting at zero for over an hour...suddenly traffic starts flowing like crazy (for me 10per min is crazy) from multiple IP's. Bang, bang, two sales in under 5 minutes...again!
The site quickly dropped back to zero.

The exact same thing happened yesterday...two conversions in 4 minutes, then they shut it down for 24 hours. Must be a new daily flux for me.

Update: about a half hour later and the site is still stone dead.

I know for me it's a short trip, but this is driving me CRAZY!

[Mentat]

It is possible that Penguin has started...
[serps.com...]
[mozcast.com...]

[rbarker]

Mentat, thanks for that link...

My situation is similar to some here. Since the beginning of the roll-out my sales tanked but my placement and traffic remained unchanged. I have no idea how something like this could happen, and hope it changes back soon...

[samwest]

@rbarker - isn't that the oddest thing? It makes no sense. Listed, but no traffic or "pulsating" ON/OFF traffic. There seems to be no logic to this...by design me thinks...or maybe they are occasionally re-starting the algo and during that short period, it stops penalizing the site. Just the impression I get.

[jmccormac]

Yes, we should just ignore:

The "Buzz" privacy fiasco.
The "Google Books" lawsuit(s).
The "Youtube Copyright Infringement" lawsuits.
The "$60,000,000 'Non-Recruting'" settlement Google was involved in.
The "Wifi Data Recording" issue [Oopsies -- It was a rogue programmer, and the algo did it, not us, really.]
The "$1,000,000,000 AdWords" [basically theft] settlement.

Google Forfeits $500 Million Generated by Online Ads & Prescription Drug Sales by Canadian Online Pharmacies
[justice.gov...]

Can one really trust Google? Google has burned through a lot of webmaster trust and destroyed businesses. It had better start working to regain some of that trust. However there will be shills pushing this latest bit of twiddling as the greatest thing since, well, the last twiddle. The proof will be in recoveries, if any.

Regards...jmcc

[edited by: jmccormac at 6:44 pm (utc) on Oct 5, 2014]

[Zivush]

I am almost certain that a new algorithm update is just started. Tomorrow, I may be more specific.

[Shepherd]

I agree Zivush, may not be a roll-out but definitely testing, likely penguin

[JD_Toims]

...maybe they are occasionally re-starting the algo and during that short period

Keeping in mind they are trying to use AI, the algo itself may be testing for patterns rather than someone "flipping a switch" at Google.

I've seen some odd cases where traffic spiked up 400% on every 2nd or 3rd Sunday only to revert to the current average level on Monday, which to me indicates either: The weekend team is having a fight with the "regulars" and rolling an algo Sunday that gets reverted on Monday or the algo itself is making adjustments/testing at fairly regular intervals.

Personally, I have a tough time believing they have been rolling an algo out on Sunday and reverting it on Monday fairly consistently, so I'm leaning to the algo itself making changes to the results.

[rbarker]

Whatever is happening, I hope they watch their conversion data to see what happens when the algo does this or that. It is in their best interest to send us the best traffic possible or we'd go out of business, and they know that would be bad for their bottom-line...

[samwest]

@rb - I don't think we matter anymore...there's plenty of ad network partners to meet their needs.