The Google Penguin Update – Some Tips To Protect Yourself
Restored from the Empower Network archive (2011–2017), lightly edited to meet our current advertising standards. Views are the original author’s.
If you’re into geeky stuff like getting a ton of traffic from Google using SEO (Search Engine Optimization) techniques then you will have most certainly heard all about the recent Google Penguin Update. You may even have been directly affected by it, for many people it’s had a devastating effect on their business and monthly pay cheques.
Rankings have been slashed, sites penalized, people sent into uproar and many legitimate ‘white hat’ sites have been affected negatively too….
But here’s the thing, if you’ve been affected and are now scrambling to make changes to your website to regain your ranking, while you may very well accomplish what you set out to do, who’s to say what the next algorithm update will bring, or even when it will happen? So, instead of toiling away, trying to beat the system, why not come up with some more creative ways of generating traffic? Here are a few ideas to get you started at Google-proofing your business:
1. Use Social Media. Form relationships with your friends and followers and offer them value in following you. Getting people interested in you through social media is a great way to generate not only traffic to your site, but targeted traffic to your site – which is really the best kind of traffic to have.
2. Create Press Releases. Launching a new product? Adding a new service? Lowering your prices? Announce it with a press release and publish it via online PR distribution companies. On top of publicizing some great information about your company, this also provides a great way to get links to your website (in a way Google likes). Even better is the fact that although your site might not rank very well, many of these PR distribution companies are very well positioned in Google, and so too may your release if written well and with appropriate keywords in mind.
3. Use Your Tribe. Building a list, or “tribe” as it’s being called these days in web speak, is one of the best possible ways to Google proof your business. If you already have a list (that is a list of email addresses generated from your website where people have given you permission, or “opted-in” to receive updates, news, or ezines), then you have a direct line to your target market. You need to start using it and marketing it. If you don’t have one, then now’s the time to get started!
4. Start Article Marketing. Like press releases, article marketing is a great way to generate links to your site. It is also a great way to position yourself as an expert in your industry. An article that is well written and distributed to popular and/or niche article banks can produce some great exposure for your business. Very popular websites often gather material for their blogs and ezines from these sites. Getting your article included on one of these sites could generate tons of traffic to your Google deprived website.
5. Join Stuff. Okay, this sounds a little silly, but if you think about it, joining associations, groups and members only forums related to your industry is a great way to, a) get listed in their directories and get found at a place that people would frequently search for others in your industry and b) mingle with others in your industry to see what they are doing to get noticed.
The ideas are endless. If you make use of your imagination and some of these suggestions, you will be ready for whatever fuzzy animal update Google comes up with next….More at Google’s Penguin Update: Is It Time to Google-Proof Your Business …
Image by law_keven via Flickr
I think with any business it makes sense to not have all your eggs in one basket. I mean seriously….should we really be only relying on Google for our pay cheques? After all they are not our friend…..they are a business and out for their own gains just as we are….and sometimes there’s a conflict of interest.
By being smart using the above tips we can help to immunize ourselves from any further and ongoing Google penguin changes and you can bet your bottom dollar that there WILL be more changes coming. Google are getting more sophisticated as every day goes by so we need to smarten up by not only making sure our websites are in line with their quality guidelines (or at least fly under the radar) but also looking for other long term, reliable traffic sources.
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I hope you enjoyed this Google Penguin update, stay tuned for more of the latest news!