Search engine optimization has changed a lot since the Panda and the Peguin updates have arrived. Bloggers are in constant fear of getting penalized. We have several case studies going on, on several reputable blogs. The major focus is to show how to recover from the Penguin and Panda updates. Penguin update 2.1 is something which has scared even the most steel willed bloggers. For a moment it got us too. We at Inspire2rise were so drastically hit that tears would not stop flowing down these eyes. Just kidding. Now getting back to point. In this one month we found what we had to do, and what not to secure our positions in search engines. So today we will share with you some awesome tips and things we learnt while trying to fight the killer penguin. The one post penguin seo strategy we would focus on is no over optimization. Let’s start Inspire2rise Post penguin SEO strategies guide.
Table of Contents
Post Penguin SEO strategies : The main points to ponder upon.
Post penguin SEO Strategies : Less is more.
While trying to fight the penguin I stumbled upon Learnblogtips.com by Rahul Kuntala. He had a gem of an article over there. The article was titled “Why Less is more.” It means that giving less sharing options to your users will lead to more social sharing. If you spoil your readers with more sharing options that the networks they are on, they will never share. A single isolated button acts like a trigger. You must have noticed we too have only three buttons now for sharing. This makes sure that the page loads fast and has the added benefit of looking stylish and streamlined. Read Rahul’s article here.
Post penguin SEO Strategies : Keyword variation and LSI keywords.
Over stuffing of keywords, even if they may seem related should be avoided at all costs. If you use meta keywords then also don’t use more than four to five keywords for optimally describing a single post. If you are someone who writes too many posts on the same niche then you should be beware. If most of your posts are revolving around keywords from the same niche. Then a penalty may hit you in the near future. Always make sure that the keywords and anchor text you repeatedly use across your site aren’t too same.
See more : Free Mashable style WordPress theme.
Post penguin SEO Strategies : Anchor text.
Optimize your anchor text carefully while making back links to avoid penalty. This thing is something that was pointed out to me by a SEO expert recently.
An example to further elaborate this will be :
If your target keyword is “Babaji Ka Thullu” then don’t go overboard in using the same term on every site you link back to your post. If you use Web 2.0 sites for making back links, then also practice caution. So, you should opt for subtle but related variations like “Info related to Babaji Ka Thullu”, “Why choose Babaji ka thullu?” etc. etc. while making links that point to your post.
My personal insights on what post penguin SEO strategies you should use.
- Are you following SEO guidelines too seriously?
The Yoast SEO plugin, or other SEO plugins say you to do this and do that and you follow it religiously. Then you are in for a hit. Never do things in such a way. Always add a personal human touch to the content you create. It doesn’t matter what the experts say, your readers and search engines love that touch. Nowadays, no one wants to read a mechanical post with an unimaginative title. Do some SEO but don’t go overboard. Don’t include your keyword so many times that even a four year old can tell that the writer has no other views apart from that set of words. And re writers are a strict no no. Re-writing looks good. But only to those people who sell such rewriting software. - Are you indulging in over sharing like me?
Are you trying to get more shares by over sharing? If yes, then do stop doing so! Google+ and Facebook have algorithms to find out whether a specific link is being shared by a particular user too much in a short span of time. If they find that to be true, they flag the link as spam. Sometimes full sites are marked as spam and harmful if they over share there links too much. We can never know how much is too much. But I would suggest to practice caution. - Are you including a single post in two or more categories?
If yes, then don’t do so from now on. Categories should not be used like tags. You should only use one category which suits an article the best. Choosing more than one categories only hampers your SERPS.
NOTE : Also implement cautious usage of tags, remember Less is more!
See more : Bing Snapshots for Bing related SEO.
- Is there no user engagement?
As one of my blogging friends, Akshay Jain in a very painful comment told me that anyone who didn’t have enough user engagement would be crushed in the near future. This was solely responsible for my traffic drop.
I would suggest these changes that I did.
Firstly, the should be a “CALL TO ACTION” after every post of yours. Your homepage layout, the whole design ideology should be geared towards having a specific action performed by the user.
It could be that ad you wanted clicked. It could be your email subscription box. It could be that affiliate link that promised to drown you in gold! It could be your related posts which you so painstakingly made to stand out. Or it could simply be urging the user to comment via the comment box. Whatever the call to action is, it should be singular and all the page’s flow should feel like it’s the stuff that the reader was waiting for.
Once you get your design right, the call to action stuff will stand out and the reader will actually click on that thing. All you have to do is make the rest of the page bland, simple and minimal and make the call to action stand apart. This very reason is one of the main factors behind Labnol.org’s revenues.
There is only one ad unit at the bottom of the posts. So what will a reader do after he finishes reading. Obviously, a large percentage will click on the ads.For those of you who are new to content siloing, read my blogging tips guide. It’s an often overlooked but important factor to blog SEO success.
See more : Beat the panda update, the easy way.
- Write what strikes you, mold it to your niche. What’s the point of blogging if you don’t like it.
Well, someone may ask me what happiness has to do with beating the penguin updates. But the truth is you need to stay motivated in order to deal with traffic lows. People have sold their blogs for fear of suffering further blows and loosing their domain authority, PR and readership. The average blogger can take a month or two to recover from the effects of penguin update. But don’t let either the high traffic get to your mind, or the low traffic effect your focus. Keep blogging with perseverance, write better. Write more. Be natural. And the result would be better than anything you could have ever imagined.
Stay inspired to rise! Bookmark the Post penguin SEO Strategies guide.
Follow Inspire2rise on Twitter. | Follow Inspire2rise on Facebook. | Follow Inspire2rise on Google+.
Hi Aditya,
So that’s how it works. Thanks for writing a post on it.
I’ve happily shared it on Inbound for you.
Cheers!
Thank you brother. Took me a month to fully understand the effects and bounce back 🙂
“Write what strikes you, mold it to your niche. What’s the point of blogging if you don’t like it”
This line forced me to make a comment of appreciation. This is what most of the bloggers don’t understand. Affected bloggers are mainly the ones copying topics and re-writing stuff from Big blogs.
Nice article, pretty clear, not just out-lining things for the sake of filling out article. Thumbs Up!
Thank you brother. Keep reading. Keep sharing. 🙂
Hi,
These are some great tips, especially about the over sharing. I had no clue if you overshared you could get penalized. Also like the tip about the amount of tags.
I used to put a ton of tags on my posts. Now I put less and I wasn’t sure if I was doing it correctly. However, after reading your post about “less is more” I know that I’m doing it correctly now.
Thanks for sharing and I hope you have a great day.
Yes mam, you will notice the effects in a week or so. Just keep posting regularly. The hummingbird update too has been a pain. We are analyzing it and will share what we have found which no one else would have revealed, soon!
I think you mentioned some excellent points here which every blogger should not only implement, but also understand.
Thanks Aditya. It is true that over optimization always harms your website and your subject of the article “Less is more” is quite good. I really like it. Now at present SEO strategy has been changed and quality is very important not quantity. It will give you proper results after your work is done.
Yes brother, quality reigns supreme. You read something good and you will know that it’s good!
I am often into blogging and I am a fan of your content. This specific article of yours has really caught my interest. And I loved how you described the penguin update recovery techniques. I am going to bookmark your website and keep checking for new information.
Great post Aditya.
I think the post penguin world is a lot different than what it used to be. I am still learning a lot like the anchor text variations and LSI keywords. LSI keywords are something that I am still in a little doubt, how to use them to the fullest.
However the post was very informative and thanks for sharing it with us.
Cheers 🙂
Leave the penguin aside, I think Humming Bird is the real thing and it is the ultimate change to Google search. Detailed information coming up in a new post! 😀
Now a days, Google is updating Penguin SEO strategy constantly. So we must follow according to update. It helps to get better rank in search engine. You mentioned on Tag & category very correctly. Lots of blogger use them wrongly. So your article will be a guideline for them. Thank you.
Hello,
It is clear that Google is focusing on quality content sites, so we must optimize our blogs for readers and not only for search engines. The best are really informative.
Thanks!
Natural writers will stay, the rest will perish!
Thanks for delivering this article. It will be useful in SEO strategy. But this update is affecting only old sites. My old sites are affected a lot but new are not. What is main reason behind that. Please post in your next blog post.
Hi Aditya, I have started blogging 4 years back when I was in my B.Tech 1 year . Everything went fine then and I used to rank a fresh blog of 2 months on blogger for all my keywords within a day. I have skipped blogging for four years and have recently started blogging again. Things are very new now. Everything has changed and so does my strategies. I am writing without even concerning about my keyword a lot. Thanks for such a neat note of what has been happening and which explains your learning curve. It certainly will help me to bounce back and hit it hard. Thanks again!
Now Google is doing the great job of eliminating the spam posts of published blogs and article, and only thing to be kept in mind is to do optimization for online user, post only relevant things.
Hi aditya,
Encouraging post.Over of anything is harmful and SEO z not exception in this.
Very helpful article, I am always interested in new things about Google and it’s strategy of improvements. thanks and keep writing!
People first decide the keyword and then write an article on it. This is where the meaning of blogging contradicts.
Blogging means write whatever you have knowledge about or feel about. Google is smart enough to rank those articles that were written straight from heart or mind and not on the basis of any keywords.
Keep calm and write more 🙂
For sure bro, will keep on writing more 😀
Google is updating Penguin SEO strategy all the time. So we must follow according to update. It helps to profit enlarged rank in search engine. You mentioned on Tag & category intensely correctly. Lots of blogger use them wrongly. So your article will be a guideline for them. Thank you.