Google introduced a major change in its algorithm on February 24th. The change, which is called the Google Farmer update, is a move to shoot down content farms and web content of poor quality. Google claims that the change has had immediate and widespread impact, changing almost 12% of search results displayed on Google.
Here at SEOXprt.com, we analyze data from millions of domains and thousands of keywords / keyword phrases. Changes are tracked and patterns are evaluated. Ever since the Google Farmer update was released, we have been continuously striving to learn how websites (and which) were impacted by the Google Farmer update.
Here are some of the more interesting results.
Some have called this change as the ‘anti-Media’ update. As a result, many websites are making themselves out to be ‘anti-on demand media sites’. One website in particular, eHow.com, which was poised to be one of the worst affected, has actually experienced a spurt in visibility – almost a 14% increase in visibility.
Another website that has benefited a lot from the Google change in algorithm is wikihow.com. Although some may contend that wikihow is a classic example of a content farm (when compared to Wikipedia), the website has experienced 80% increase in visibility. A sizeable increase indeed.
Yahoo! Answers was another beneficiary with a 30% spurt in visibility. In fact, Yahoo! Answers fared much better than similar sites like answers.com and answerbag.com. Answerbag.com slipped by almost 60%.
Amazingly, ezine was affected but not for all keywords. For certain keywords, Ezine still features at the top of search engine listings.
Unfortunately, it seems that a few quality websites too have been hit by the update even when they have great, useful content.
Many webmasters report getting more traffic to some of their websites while others have been affected adversely. Suite101 is among those adversely impacted by the update, which is something of a surprise considering they do have certain quality control measures on their articles and the content is generally useful. Other websites like associatedcontent and articlebase have also been impacted, though not to the same extent.
In terms of absolute visibility, some of the biggest losers include answerbag, answers, blippr, hubpages, about, mahalo, wisegeek, suite101, ezinearticles and freedownload.com, among other websites. Those who gained in terms of absolute visibility include wikihow, Yahoo Answers, eHow, howstuffworks and facebook.com. News portals like msn.com have come through as winners.
As you can see, it is difficult to categorize the losers and winners on any particular criteria at the moment. However, one can say that along with questionable content, Google has also taken into account factors like visit duration, bounce rates and social reach. Therefore, the algorithm is not that easily calibrated.
So, what are the numbers? How many websites have been affected?
An anonymous poll conducted just 5 days after Google’s Farmer Update states that approximately 40% of websites were affected by the update. The rest either experienced a spurt in traffic or experienced status quo.
For more specific information, get in touch with SEO Expert – Search Engine Optimization Company.
