[Initial Effort]

Just taking a look at the new algo update, this one sure is interesting. Here is essentially what Google did IMO. Just for reference, I'm currently monitoring a few hundred sites for rankings.

1. Google decreased value of aged domains.

2. Google increased the value of having more pages on your website.

3. Google increased the value of having multiple anchor text. ie if your anchor text exceeds "x%" of your total backlinks than you don't rank well for that term.

[Nutter2000]

Interesting, I also wondered if there may have been a devaluation on EMDs too.

[_Richard]

I am seeing similar results but most of the sites of mine that have dropped hit a trifecta as my older sites tend to be smaller with less keywords so it is going to be harder for me to separate out which of the factors are causing the most problem. Does make me glad that I moved to a larger site model though as so far most of those have held their own or improved.

The anchor text percentage is going to be the easiest to fix so I will probably start there.

[_Richard]

Interesting, I also wondered if there may have been a devaluation on EMDs too.

The question is are the emd's themselves the problem or that most emd's are more narrow in scope with less keywords?

[heyman]

Just taking a look at the new algo update, this one sure is interesting. Here is essentially what Google did IMO. Just for reference, I'm currently monitoring a few hundred sites for rankings.

1. Google decreased value of aged domains.

2. Google increased the value of having more pages on your website.

3. Google increased the value of having multiple anchor text. ie if your anchor text exceeds "x%" of your total backlinks than you don't rank well for that term.

All 3 of these things fit the patterns I'm seeing for the small sample of sites I'm tracking. The interesting one is #2 considering it sort of contradicts Panda updates.

[RealEcon]

Im seeing sites with their content highly organized like Silos ranking well, but it could just be they have lots of pages of content.

[adamcm]

IE, I am curious in the sites you've analyzed if you've noticed anything similar to what Mansoor said in the other larger Google update thread?

The keywords that I am ranking for it was ok for them to be mention in h1 or h2 tags but any of my site that had the main keyword in h1 AND h2 tags went down.

[Nutter2000]

The question is are the emd's themselves the problem or that most emd's are more narrow in scope with less keywords?

Good point, also emd's would probably count towards an anchor penalty by default.

Edited by Nutter2000, 25 April 2012 - 06:45.

[SmallBizOwner]

From my experience this morning, it appears

if (Title = keyword) and (H1 = Keyword) and (% of archor text keywords > than 50%) (50% is a guess, could be 30% ??)
Then page will drop in rankings.

So what used to work quite well for me is working against me.

But This latest change is not delivering better content to google search users in the keywords area I track.
Crappy 3 page sites with adwords and sites which have been left for dead by their owners now outrank my sites.
How can that "level the playing field" for small mom and pop businesses?

[Initial Effort]

I just looked at another batch of 50 sites that were ranking well. Here is what I noticed...

1. New websites

2. 1 to 5 pages in the indexed, contradicts my more pages in the index, I noticed several ecommerce sites get boosts, but the last few updates have really hammered them so this might be a small tweak by Google.

3. Overoptimized onpage - H1, Title tags with Keywords

4. Anchor Text Variation - We targeted 10 keywords per website

Edited by Initial Effort, 25 April 2012 - 07:04.

[_Richard]

4. Anchor Text Variation - We targeted 10 keywords per website

What size sites are you talking about?

[AdamWB]

Not sure if it was an over optimization thing. All of my sites have Keyword in title, h1-3 tags, keyword in 1st and last sentence.

None of my sites got hit, not a single one. In fact a bunch of them got some pretty incredible boosts.

Weird update.

[vindel1985]

I can't see how EMDs can be penalized on their own. If there is an EMD penalty, it's much more realistic to assume that it's due to an EMD + Overly High In-Context KW % + >50% anchor profile. <Title> and <H1> may play into it, but there may be too much room for error to say that ONLY spammers and SEOs are using their KW's in title and h1 tags.

Edited by vindel1985, 25 April 2012 - 07:29.

[Geegeez]

#1 and #2 don't hold true in the niches that I'm in. I'm seeing aged domains and subdomains ranking out of nowhere to the top 10. Also, I seesome sites with 10+, 20+ pages of content drop more than sites with 1-5 pages. Definitely not consistent in the niches that I'm looking at.

With #3 I've had multiple anchors for the longest time (since 4-5 months ago) and I have some that went up and some that went down.

EDIT: Also my KW density on all my sites is below 1%, so that can't be it either.

Edited by Geegeez, 25 April 2012 - 07:29.

[KevinA]

Not sure if it was an over optimization thing. All of my sites have Keyword in title, h1-3 tags, keyword in 1st and last sentence.

None of my sites got hit, not a single one. In fact a bunch of them got some pretty incredible boosts.

Weird update.

Approximately how many different anchor text variations do you use when backlinking?
And do you usually focus on deep link urls or mainly the homepage?

[brandonbaker]

1. Google decreased value of aged domains.

Weird, I'm seeing the opposite...

[richbell20]

My e-commerce site jumped back up to top spot for a bunch of terms after being stuck around 3 or 4 for the last couple of months. The only other noticeable movement I saw was a competitor of mine. A 10 year old e-commerce site that's been in the top 1 and 2 for years, drop down to position 7 for a bunch of terms. I have been fairly aggressive with private log posts and web 2.0s this last few weeks though. Needless to say I'm happy, and I'm enjoying it why it lasts.

[briggstown]

I am seeing similar results but most of the sites of mine that have dropped hit a trifecta as my older sites tend to be smaller with less keywords so it is going to be harder for me to separate out which of the factors are causing the most problem. Does make me glad that I moved to a larger site model though as so far most of those have held their own or improved.

The anchor text percentage is going to be the easiest to fix so I will probably start there.

When you say a larger site model how many pages are you talking about?

100? 1000?

[adamcm]

Not sure if it was an over optimization thing. All of my sites have Keyword in title, h1-3 tags, keyword in 1st and last sentence.

None of my sites got hit, not a single one. In fact a bunch of them got some pretty incredible boosts.

Weird update.

How about the URL?

[Myheavens]

One of My Wordpress based blog Got hit badly today. I have around 1000 Pages of Unique Content. Its a review site and I have posted products reviews there.

I did not did much backlinking, People are linking back to my site their self YET my site got hit.

I cannot belive this

New Blog Post getting Indexed as under 5 mins.

Edited by Myheavens, 25 April 2012 - 08:09.