Do you follow Matt Cutts on Twitter? If you don’t, you really should go follow him. He posts updates about Google’s policy and algorithm updates that could have major reprecussions on your business. Just this week, he wrote that Goole Penguin’s 2.0 version was imminent for release. What does this mean for your digital marketing for business efforts?
Straight from the man himself, confirmation that a new Google Penguin iteration is coming. Are you a little scared? Well, you should be. The last major Penguin update hurt the rankings of even long established businesses, and it’s taken some sites months to recover. Others have just never recovered. Cutt’s has also promised that this update will be one of the most talked about updates of the year.
What will they be targeting?
This update will likely be an extension of the original Penguin update, which hit exact match domains and unnatural link profiles. This includes things like link farms, exact match anchor text, and any kind of paid links. Also, the authority of links will be more important. Links from low quality domains will hurt more than ever, and links from trusted domains will be more of a boon. It’s unclear to what extent, but authorship and social cues are also expected to be more important than ever.
What can you do?
With your limited time available before the update, your best bet is to examine the incoming links you have. If you have a wide variety with diverse anchor text, you should be able to weather this storm. If you have been building unnatural links with all of the keywords hyper-targeting your goal keywords…you better get cracking.
Also, be sure to follow Matt Cutts on Twitter!