Google Penguin Update / Over Optimization Penalty, April 24th launch for real estate

[Justin Havre]

Here is another great post over at SEOMOZ on how to survive Google's unnatural link warning. Click HERE

[KSA]

Someone asked me the following question, and I don't know how to answer it. A "web designer" put code on a Point2 website: a Dynamic Drive script to change photos in the header and code to control the menu. That code is some combination of HTML and code from a menu maker called Open Cube.

He is now telling her that the code on the site has caused her site being removed from the Google index corresponding to the Penguin update.

Does anyone know if this might be possible? Could anyone look at the code to see if it is malicious? A fee might be payable for this assistance.

I'm just not enough of a coder to help out.

Thanks,
Kathleen

[Agnafl]

Here is another great post over at SEOMOZ on how to survive Google's unnatural link warning. Click HERE

It is great if you got the warning in GWT but I didn't get a single one over any of my sites. The real estate site is odd. Serps are still good, not as good, but good. Still have some #1's and several page 1's, BUT, traffic is down over 50% and the day that it plummeted was 4/25. What gives?

[webmaster]

One of the things I wanted to do was profile some of our top ranked (1-5 in Google for main area real estate) that are clearly NOT effected by any of these updates, and try to identify some of the similar links that "seem" to be ok **disclaimer, just because these people didn't get hit and are using these tactics does not guarantee these tactics are still ok, it's just an observation"

My first site review:

Ranks #1 for competitive area real estate term, extremely old, many old linking techniques mixed with new techniques.
Main link types (in volume)

Article submissions: Many article links from sites like ezinearticles etc - anchor text is varied and points to many different pages.

Blog rolls: not a ton of blog roll links, but some. When I look at the sites they link to in blog roll, these sites seem to also have a link back in theirs. Blogroll anchor text is typically "area real estate" and to the main page. This one I would deem "iffy" at best, as it is clearly a kind of friendly blogger exchange likely from many years past. Most of the sites in the blogroll also continue to rank very well.

Directories: Lots of old directories from many years ago (nothing has been submitted to directories in many years if I recall). These are anything from DMOZ to Real Estate ABC to the Yahoo directory type links.

Donated sites: A few sites "donated" to organizations / causes that the user is associated with (non profit type things). There is a "thank you to client x" link on each of these site for donating time and design kind of thing.

Portfolio / CSS Gallery sites: This site has seen many designs over the years, all of which have been amazing - it has made it into articles on good web design, CSS design galleries (which often share to others) and that sort of thing.

References: Again due to design TONS of links on there in forums for people saying "I am looking to have a site designed, I want it to look like "this" (insert link) or worse (hey how much to steal this design lol) <<< These people get dealt with obviously.

All in all, there is not a HUGE influx of any one tactic, it's pretty balanced. Also there are many earned (because of the design and web relationships) links that are non reciprocal. I can't see to find any that are sitewide / paid style looking (I certainly know we didn't build any of this type) - And the site is doing just fine.

What insights can we glean?

[webmaster]

You did not get hit with the "link warning" penalty, you got hit by penguin (clearly!) - They are different, many webmasters are making them one and the same which is not correct.

It is great if you got the warning in GWT but I didn't get a single one over any of my sites. The real estate site is odd. Serps are still good, not as good, but good. Still have some #1's and several page 1's, BUT, traffic is down over 50% and the day that it plummeted was 4/25. What gives?

[Agnafl]

You did not get hit with the "link warning" penalty, you got hit by penguin (clearly!) - They are different, many webmasters are making them one and the same which is not correct.

There is nothing CLEAR about this

[webmaster]

It does not sound like it could be the culprit - the penalties for penguin are predominantly "inbound" link based - post the URL and we can take a look though.

[webmaster]

That's actually not the case - if your drop was dramatic, and directly on or right after April 24th, you know for certain you were hit with a penguin update. You ALMOST certainly know that you were hit because of your inbound links, and you know for certain what kind of links google reports they do NOT want to see. So there are many places to start

There is nothing CLEAR about this

[Agnafl]

That's actually not the case - if your drop was dramatic, and directly on or right after April 24th, you know for certain you were hit with a penguin update. You ALMOST certainly know that you were hit because of your inbound links, and you know for certain what kind of links google reports they do NOT want to see. So there are many places to start

I am just having a hard time wrapping my head around the drop in traffic but still ok, or even a very slight drop, in the serps...? They should be respective of each other. It definitely looks like it is still dancing. This afternoon the site in question was #1 and #2 for a city real estate term. Yesterday there was only an interior page at #4. Craziness.

[KSA]

It does not sound like it could be the culprit - the penalties for penguin are predominantly "inbound" link based - post the URL and we can take a look though.

Thanks so much Morgan. The site is at www.virtualhomesgroup.com

Funny, but the guy that said it was the menu now wants big bucks to "fix it".

Ha!