AN EXTENSIVE LIST OF GOOGLE PENALTY & HOW TO OVERCOME THE TROUBLE!
AN EXTENSIVE LIST OF GOOGLE PENALTY & HOW TO OVERCOME THE TROUBLE!
In this cut throat commutative
age, every business strives hard to achieve the highest possible listing on
Google so as to surpass their rivals. But in the effort of accomplishing the
highest ranking, often times, businesses use questionable techniques which end
up backfiring instead of securing the top positing in SERPs.
There are some certain Google’s
webmaster guidelines that businesses need to keep into account while applying
techniques to boost their ranking. Violating these guidelines result in Google
penalty that brings down your website’s ranking or completely removes it from
the Google’s search result pages.
What Are Google Penalties?
You would be well familiar with
sports penalties. In a professional sport, if a player violets the rules of the
game or does something unsportsmanlike, he/she is penalized for his/her deeds. Depending
on the severity of the infringement, the player can either be suspended from
playing the game for a certain period of time or may even be banned to play the
game forever in the future.
Google penalty in SEO is very similar
to sports penalty. Google penalties are designed to chastise the websites that have
violated the Google’s webmaster guidelines or have done something wrong. These
penalties can greatly impact a site's performance in search results and beyond.
What Does A Google Penalty Mean?
A Google penalty means either the
ranking of your website’s targeted keyword will drop dramatically or your
website will no longer be listed in Google search result pages. It simply means
that if your site is penalized by Google, you will not be visible to your targeted
audience and when your audience is unable to find you, your website’s traffic and
ultimately revenue will drop down.
Google can penalize any website. Sometimes,
even website optimizers have no idea what wrong they have done as at times Google
penalty can be the result of well-intended efforts of improving site's ranking.
Nonetheless, once you are penalized by Google, it is extremely intimidating to
get back into the Google's good graces or get the good ranking back.
So, the best course of action you
can take is to stay alert and take preventive approach as to not fall prey to
Google’s penalty. To avoid twiddling your thumbs in the Google penalty box,
steer clear of the following penalties.
The Big List of Google Penalties for SEO
·
HACKED
WEBSITE -
If your website is
hacked by the cyber criminals, Google will penalize your website.
·
UNNATURAL
LINKS TO YOUR WEBSITE -
If Google ever detects
any unnatural link on your website that has been created by you or someone else,
it may penalize either the entire website or the links by devaluing them.
·
THIN,
SCRAPED OR DUPLICATE CONTENT -
Content is the
life and soul of your website. Google algorithms put a premium on the quality
of content. It simply means that the contents you post on your website must be
unique, relevant and valuable to the readers. Thin, shallow or duplicate contents
are considered spam and treated accordingly.
·
KEYWORD
STUFFING -
There is a well
said saying, “Excess of anything is bad” and the integrity of this axiom can be
best witnessed in SEO. We all know that keywords help a website to rank higher
in SERPs but excessive use of them can bring you in trouble. If there is
keyword stuffing in your website’s content, the Google “refs” will throw the
yellow flag and penalize your site. While you can use keywords multiple times
on a page, just be sure to use them prudently which make good sense with the
context of your message.
·
PURE SPAM
-
Spam is a ‘BIG NO’
in Google’s dictionary. Google hates spam. That is why the websites crammed
with cloaked pages, scraped content, filler text and other gibberish will be
penalized.
·
HIDDEN
TEXT -
Google is just
like an accounting auditor who wants to see everything in the open. There should
nothing to be hidden from it. Even if you try to hide it, Google will find it
and will penalize you for attempting to hide something from its eyes. This rule
is applied to everything, even with the text that your readers may not want to
see.
·
SPAMMY
FREEHOSTS -
If Google finds
spam on several websites hosted by a single person, it penalizes all the
websites run by the host.
·
CLOAKING
-
Cloaking is a
refined technique of SEO that shows a different version of the website to the
search engine than the one, which visitors see. Google considers cloaking to be
a deliberate attempt to manipulate its search results. So, if you are ever
caught for cloaking, stay prepared to be penalized and face the consequences.
·
PAID
LINKS -
Google’s
guidelines on paid link are crystal clear. Google dislikes the practice of buying
or selling of the links in a way that passes on search engine ranking credit. While
paid links are an easier and economical way of improving the search engine
ranking, if you get caught doing it, you will have to pay a hefty price as a
Google penalty.
·
SNEAKY
REDIRECTS -
Redirecting is the
act of sending a visitor to a different URL than the one they initially
requested. If you try to redirect the visitors/users to a piece of content that
does not match to their search criteria, you may fall prey to Google penalty
list.
·
AUTOMATICALLY
GENERATED CONTENT -
Automatically
generated content is the one that is generated programmatically and often
times, it intends to manipulate search rankings rather helping the users. Google
may take actions on such content and penalize the site for the same.
·
DOORWAY
PAGES -
If you create a bunch
of pages in your website that are of no good use and just aim to rank the
keywords, in that case, Google may take actions against you.
·
CREATING
PAGES WITH MALICIOUS BEHAVIOR -
Creating contents or
software on your website that behaves in different way than the users’ expectation
is a violation of Google Webmaster Guidelines. Google not only aims to provide its
users the most relevant search results but also wants them to be safe on the
web. So, creating pages with malicious behavior mean violating the Google’s guidelines
for which you can be penalized accordingly.
·
AFFILIATE
PROGRAMS -
Google Webmaster
Guidelines ask you to create websites with original content that can really add
good value to your users. It is indispensably important for the websites that
participate in affiliate programs. More often than not, affiliate websites
feature same product descriptions that appear on all the websites across that
affiliate network. Consequently, websites featuring content from affiliate
networks can have to suffer Google's penalty. Google believes that affiliate
websites do not provide additional value to the users.
·
COMMENT
SPAM -
Comments are a
great way to build community and readership but unluckily, they are often
abused by spammers. If you ever receive a comment that seems much like a random
link to an unrelated site or an advertisement, it is comment spam for which you
can be penalized by Google.
Algorithmic Penalties -
Google has seven major
algorithmic penalties that can drastically affect the ranking of your website.
1.
PANDA
2.
PENGUIN
3.
PIRACY/DMCA TAKEDOWNS
4.
PAYDAY LOAN
5.
PIGEON
6.
HUMMINGBIRD
7.
TOP-HEAVY LAYOUT
You can be penalized for any other reasons that might not be
listed here. However, most of the manual actions come from this list. Honestly speaking,
the list of Google penalty triggers is extensive. In simple words, it can be
summed up like -- “Google penalties are triggered by any action a website takes
to harm the user experience or to fool a search engine in some way”. So, take
preventive approach to steer away of the above said penalties and try not fooling
Google. It is much smarter than you.
Cleaning Up the Wreckage -
This is all about the Google penalty
list but what you will do if willingly or unwillingly you have violated the
Google’s webmaster guidelines and your website has been penalized. It is really
a disheartening situation but instead of getting panic and sitting idle, you
need to look for the solution to overcome the trouble.
Google understands that
violations, particularly the minor ones, are unintentional. So, it has a
process in place whereby one can work to resolve the situation. If you are unsure
or unaware about this resolving process, get in contact with a reputed digital marketing
company to get assistance. The professional SEO experts will do this tricky job
for you.
Good luck with your website
ranking game! Play safe and win big!
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