Panda Update and Duplicate Content

The recent Google Panda update has affected many webmasters and publishers, which raises a very important question: Why are they all seeing such a drastic drop in their page rankings? Google admits that some websites may see a drop in rankings and less traffic than they normally do; however, Google also suggests that the cause is related to low-quality content present on the websites.

Also referred to as the Content Farm Update, the Panda Update reduces rankings for sites with low-quality content; it does this by using an algorithm to detect sites that may have what it considers spam, which may or may not have been intended by the publisher. Also, the update evaluates the content on the website and determines whether or not it is a duplicate.

What is Duplicate Content?

Duplicate content is having the same content written verbatim within the same website or across multiple sites. It also refers to content that has been spun and closely resembles another website. Once the Googlebot sees this, the website is automatically given a Duplicate Content Penalty; the site loses ranking and is nearly hidden from viewers. So, what is low quality content and how does a webmaster improve it in order to increase rankings and traffic?

Google’s Advice

When the SEO and webmaster community confronted Google about this update, Wysz from Google responded:

“…if you believe you’ve been impacted by this change, you should evaluate all the content on your site and do your best to improve the overall quality of the pages on your domain. Removing low-quality pages or moving them to a different domain could help your rankings for the higher-quality content.”

Although a large portion of webmasters saw decreased rankings in Google, they did not see any changes in other search engines such as Bing or Yahoo!. Because Google is a dominant search engine, it is important to follow that advice to increase the overall quality on the existing web pages — but how?

Suggestions for Better Content

Before you begin the deletion process of any website, another method would be to analyze the existing content first. Using SEO software such as DCFinder will help you determine if you have any duplicate content that may be hurting your page ranking. If so, then the content should be rewritten.

Also, use an SEO strategy to implement strong keywords or phrases that readers may be searching for. Use these sparingly while still providing high-quality content that keeps the reader on the page and clicking through the website. After reworking the existing content and checking for duplicate content with DCFinder, your page should begin climbing the Google ranks and placed in its original spot.