Google Algorithm Changes

Does content quality matter? It does now more than ever with the implementation of Google Panda, the new search algorithm from Google. With the new changes to Google's algorithms, sites that contain copied text or useless information will receive lower rankings than sites with higher quality content. If a site has a high amount of ads, or the headline of the page doesn't match the content, it could end up receiving a lower ranking. Things that Google considers high quality are; sites with proper grammar and spelling, sites that add unique information for a topic, and most importantly, sites that don't have scraped content that has been directly copied from other sites.

Manufacturer Product Descriptions: Use At Your Own Risk!

One side effect of the implementation of this algorithm is that it considers stock product descriptions duplicate content. If a merchant site is using the stock description of a certain product, and this description appears on other merchant sites, Google Panda could consider the content as being duplicated and lower the rankings of the site. Even a syndicated business listing could be affected by Panda. If a site manager can replace stock product descriptions touch with original descriptions, the site will not be penalized for duplicate content by Panda.

Google's Guidelines For High Quality Content

Goggle has not publicly released how they decide what content is considered "low quality," but released a list of 23 quality assessment questions on their Google Webmaster Central Blog that site operators should ask themselves. Some of the questions include:

• Would you use their credit card with the site?

• Do your users consider a site to be authoritative, or more shallow in nature?

• Does the site have excessive ads?

• Does the article describe both sides of a story?

• Is it the sort of page you'd want to bookmark or share with a friend?

Asking questions like these can help decide if your site has what Google considers high quality content, and if it will be affected by Google's new algorithms.

Quality Is Ultimately Judged By People

A factor that went into Google's development of these questions was Google Chrome users using the Chrome Site Blocker, which allowed users to block domains from Google search results. While Google is not using these blocked domains as part of their rankings, they could look at the results to improve search results in the future (see: Coherent Social Media). Asking if a typical user using Google would block a site on their first visit could have a major impact on the ranking of a site as Google revises their ranking algorithms.

The only way a site will not be affected by Panda is by making sure that it has nothing but original, quality content. MediaPiston touch can guarantee unique articles and content touch by automatically selecting the best writers based on the expertise needed by the publisher. This guarantees that only the highest quality and unique articles are created to help publishers stand out in search rankings instead of the generic, filler content that Panda is trying to remove. Making sure that your site has unique, high quality content can keep you at the top of Google's rankings.