Google's distinguished SEO engineer Matt Cutts recently talked about what webmasters can expect to see this summer in terms of SEO for Google. In particular, SEO changes that combat black hat spam from various angles. Cutts boiled down the coming changes into 9 main categories, and prefaced them by saying that nothing is set in stone and each change should be taken with a grain of salt.
Here are the nine changes that were discussed:
- 1. Next Generation Penguin
Penguin 2.0 will be much more comprehensive than Penguin 1.0, going deeper and having a larger impact than the original.
- 2. Devalue Upstream Linking
New tactics to get detailed link analysis and make link buying less effective
- 3. Authority
New algorithms will dictate whether your site can be considered an authority in a particular area.
- 4. Native Advertising
Many current advertorials violate Google's quality guidelines. Google is planning on enforcing these guidelines much stronger in the coming months. If you use advertorials, it will become more important that they are marked as paid advertising.
- 5. Problematic Search Queries
Cutts mentioned that problematic searches will be tackled in a couple different ways. Specific areas that have traditionally been seen as more spammy will be targeted more.
- 6. Hacked Sites
Next generation hack detection will be rolling out this summer which will be able to notify webmasters about malware and hacked sites.
- 7. Cluster Results
If you're doing deep searches in Google, meaning you are going back to pages 5 or more, you will usually see the same site popping up with a cluster of results on those pages. Changes will be made to make this less likely.
- 8. Panda
Google will be looking for additional signals that sites are in the “gray area†in terms of quality.
- 9. Better Information for Webmasters
Cutts says they want to give webmasters more specific and detailed information with better webmaster tools.
The bottom line is that if you are focused on putting out high quality content, you don't have much to worry about in the way of search engine optimization this summer. If you don't feel comfortable with the quality of the content on your site, it may be time for a refresher! Contact CyberMark International today for a free website evaluation!
