Not easy to do but don't over react and let things settle, last penguin my site got hit and bounced back the next few days. If you're still gone in a week you're probably gone for good though.
Don't overreact just yet, my sites have been jumping all day, just checked one of my sites (only used gsa) and it now at the highest it's ever been at, just hope it sticks.
@Pratick. Im referring to non-contextual/low quality links. They will tank your rankings whether they are T1 or T2. Once u reach a certain threshold of spammy links your site will sink like the Titanic. Content is king.
In the graph, you can see my rankings dropped hard in the 1st half of September. This occurred after I bombed my T1 with thousands of forum sig links, guestbooks, etc. All the shit that's frowned upon by G. By adding a few hundred high PR contextuals and getting them indexed I was able to rebound and have been moving in an upward direction.
This is the only type of links I build now because they work and my ranks for those KWs were not affected by the latest round. I wish I had done this from the beginning because its still a pain in the ass to recover rank. The real work is building a large database of contextual platforms. I have approx 4,000 unique contextual sites I can post to power up a single T1 if need be. I am constantly adding more to my DB. It took me 4 months of Gscraping and finding my competitors backlinks to build it up. I kid you not if you can get 4,000 contextual links indexed to a single tier 1 you will have one hell of a powerful link and can hit 1st page for many medium comp KWs from that 1 links alone. The key here though is make them higly higly unique.
I use AB with 20 spun articles but limit the posting to no more than 500 targets as the index rate will drop from my experience. I also highly recommend using unique article titles and making slight modifications to the spun content, adding pictures, etc, so it doesn't look machine generated.
If you suffered from Peng 2.1, start looking at which KWs dropped and improving the authority of those T1s. If your still in the top 100 u can recover quick. Outside of that will take a bit longer and u may need to start over depending on how junky your T2 link profile is.
Something interesting is that some of my manually written articles on sites like Tumblr, Bravesites, etc that I was using for Tier 1's and than blasting the kitchen sink at for tier 2's are now ranking as high as top of page 2 in Google for my targeted keyword phrases.
I had a few sites I manage hit as well. These were all local sites, local key word ranking etc. I thought I'd share what I've been seeing in case it helps.
First, the sites that got hit hardest seem to have been those that had a lack of content on their pages. Like a few paragraphs on the home page and 1-3 page sites. They lacked information besides the services offered in general short descriptions and a few pics. Age of the domain didn't matter on this. The amount of backlinks probably didn't matter as much either.
Next, the sites with good, unique information/content regarding their services - and a fair amount of it - on 1-20 page sites didn't get knocked too hard. One for instance was dropped 3 spots down on page one for it's primary key word.
On all of these sites I have ran GSA SER tier campaigns for the last three months. Like non-stop. Even using crappy spun Kontent Machine generated content for tier 1s. I used a diverse array of contextual links, long tails, etc. My point is the link building was the same for all of these sites. Some got hit harder than others.
This can be due to many factors, like the general shift in the SERPS with other sites rising and falling etc. Too much on-page SEO, like key word stuffing, too many contextual links and so on.
Now what I have come to realize for future ranking of sites/key words is this -
1. Your website is going to need good, unique content on its pages for sure. The more the better. Ideally hand written. Google is becoming more and more focused on a websites' content.
2. Make sure you don't over do the on-page SEO.
3. If your website has a low number of pages - build more. Like make a page for each service with 2-4 good handwritten paragraphs describing the service, injecting key words in a smooth fashion. If you have products - make a page for each product, following the same rule with plenty of information on the product.
4. Make your page titles using your key word for that page. Be specific in all of this. For instance if it's a service like say, remodeling - be specific about it as much as you can. Is it home remodeling or? Etc.
5. Like the others have said in this thread above. Avoid the spam links like trackbacks, image comments etc. That's way too obvious. Focus on high quality link building now. Even use HIGH QUALITY CONTENT ON ALL TIERS - not just tier 1s. Make sure it is readable. Unique as possible. Make sure its relevant to your key words. Target all pertinent pages of your website. Slowly build high quality links and drip feed them for indexing over time.
This may all be more time involved but you want a rock solid foundation. Google is changing and this isn't going to stop. We just have to adapt, change tactics and march on. The major thing I have noticed about SERPS now is that home pages are not so important anymore. The way the searches are functioning is they are trying to get more specific results for users. We're seeing more inner pages showing up in the search results now.
In example, now, what Google is trying to do is say if someone searches for "local credit union checking" - more than likely the actual page covering "checking" details on that credit unions website will show up before the main home page will.
@Chris Nice post. I to noticed that all my sites that were hit hard and are now nowhere to be found are 1-2 page sites. I have 1 site that has about 10 pages of good content and this one dropped from #1 to page 4. Maybe this site is still salvageable.
@sweeppicker How do you delete the effected T1 links? Also, what engines are you using for T1 and T2? Is it only contextual or are you adding some social networks/bookmarks, etc..?
"The real work is building a large database of contextual platforms. I
have approx 4,000 unique contextual sites I can post to power up a
single T1 if need be. I am constantly adding more to my DB. It took me 4
months of Gscraping and finding my competitors backlinks to build it
up." - Not sure I understand this part. How do you just find and put your own platforms in GSA?
Lastly, what are you using for indexing and how do you go about it and how do you diversify anchors(%)? Thanks.
@Sammicurr. I have all my user/passwords for T1. I don't create 10,000 T1s like some people do. Instead I do a batch and power them up. I want to build authority and contextual links are best for that.
@Sammicurr. Yes, that's about as natural as it gets for related Kws. Of course i still mix in lots of generics, naked URL, etc. I can monitor my anchor text % pretty easily with Backlinksmonitor.
@sweeppicker you said the contextual sites pointing to your T1 are high PR—is that the particular url your backlink is on, or the domain? If you don't mind me asking about the nature of the 4,000 contextual sites, are these web 2.0s?
@sweeppicker@ron I've seen you guys many times mentioning backlinks monitor. I take it as referring to Inspyder's backlinks monitor? Or some other software?
I don't think it's just related to anchor text / generic variety. One of my sites has 40% EM anchor (1 KW). It's still number 1. I expected it to see it on page 15.
Maybe in a few days it wil be.
I'm amazed at the number of people saying they do [x method] for all their sites. Surely you must vary it and try different approaches for different sites, or they'll all get slapped.
WOnder if it's not hit the UK yet. With Penguin 2.0 I remember Germany came few weeks later...
My advice to everyone who has been hit... Don't take it personally. Don't overreact... And remember the previous methods will probably work still on new domains. So get registering
When you power up your Tier 1's with your Tier 2 links, what anchor text do you use? I have used Generics in the past and saw them go up.. not sure if using a bunch of long tailed anchors with my exact match inside of them is going to hurt me or help me more than just using generics..
sr1racer I think it is still salvageable. Better to push back to the top from 4 pages back than 50-100. Lol. I'm doing some testing now on a site I don't care too much about. More and more I noticed what I said about more inner pages being shown on search results rather than home pages. Build you some inner pages related to your key words and push them.
Well there is a lot of misconception about Google will penalize a website which is not mobile friendly even though on their blog post they have clearly mentioned that if you have a mobile friendly website then you can get better rankings for mobile search but for desktop search there is no change.
For all other kind of reasons why google penalize a website you might want to look at this article here
Comments
But i certainly will now. Thanks for the info.
First, the sites that got hit hardest seem to have been those that had a lack of content on their pages. Like a few paragraphs on the home page and 1-3 page sites. They lacked information besides the services offered in general short descriptions and a few pics. Age of the domain didn't matter on this. The amount of backlinks probably didn't matter as much either.
Next, the sites with good, unique information/content regarding their services - and a fair amount of it - on 1-20 page sites didn't get knocked too hard. One for instance was dropped 3 spots down on page one for it's primary key word.
On all of these sites I have ran GSA SER tier campaigns for the last three months. Like non-stop. Even using crappy spun Kontent Machine generated content for tier 1s. I used a diverse array of contextual links, long tails, etc. My point is the link building was the same for all of these sites. Some got hit harder than others.
This can be due to many factors, like the general shift in the SERPS with other sites rising and falling etc. Too much on-page SEO, like key word stuffing, too many contextual links and so on.
Now what I have come to realize for future ranking of sites/key words is this -
1. Your website is going to need good, unique content on its pages for sure. The more the better. Ideally hand written. Google is becoming more and more focused on a websites' content.
2. Make sure you don't over do the on-page SEO.
3. If your website has a low number of pages - build more. Like make a page for each service with 2-4 good handwritten paragraphs describing the service, injecting key words in a smooth fashion. If you have products - make a page for each product, following the same rule with plenty of information on the product.
4. Make your page titles using your key word for that page. Be specific in all of this. For instance if it's a service like say, remodeling - be specific about it as much as you can. Is it home remodeling or? Etc.
5. Like the others have said in this thread above. Avoid the spam links like trackbacks, image comments etc. That's way too obvious. Focus on high quality link building now. Even use HIGH QUALITY CONTENT ON ALL TIERS - not just tier 1s. Make sure it is readable. Unique as possible. Make sure its relevant to your key words. Target all pertinent pages of your website. Slowly build high quality links and drip feed them for indexing over time.
This may all be more time involved but you want a rock solid foundation. Google is changing and this isn't going to stop. We just have to adapt, change tactics and march on. The major thing I have noticed about SERPS now is that home pages are not so important anymore. The way the searches are functioning is they are trying to get more specific results for users. We're seeing more inner pages showing up in the search results now.
In example, now, what Google is trying to do is say if someone searches for "local credit union checking" - more than likely the actual page covering "checking" details on that credit unions website will show up before the main home page will.
"The real work is building a large database of contextual platforms. I have approx 4,000 unique contextual sites I can post to power up a single T1 if need be. I am constantly adding more to my DB. It took me 4 months of Gscraping and finding my competitors backlinks to build it up." - Not sure I understand this part. How do you just find and put your own platforms in GSA?
Lastly, what are you using for indexing and how do you go about it and how do you diversify anchors(%)?
Thanks.
Still not sure how to delete the verified links though
Maybe in a few days it wil be.
I'm amazed at the number of people saying they do [x method] for all their sites. Surely you must vary it and try different approaches for different sites, or they'll all get slapped.
WOnder if it's not hit the UK yet. With Penguin 2.0 I remember Germany came few weeks later...
My advice to everyone who has been hit... Don't take it personally. Don't overreact... And remember the previous methods will probably work still on new domains. So get registering
For real!! Im reading this until I see "penguin 2.1" hum?! Look at date, 10/2013
Pls don´t do this mate