Panda 4.0 indirectly affecting my rankings (maybe)

[followuk]

Hi,

So my site supplies Q&A type of content - user queries a question and generally they get the answer from my site (landing page). I always make sure my content is (1) unique (2) answers the question (3) extensive in answering the question - reason being I rely on social shares quite a bit and that system works very well, sharing happens with my content.

But one of my main pages has dropped from position 5 to position 10 in the last few days - I assume its panda 4.0 because my rankings have been rock for around 2 years.

But I don't think its dropped my site, I think it has boosted others above me. The thing I don't understand is the sites its boosted above me have very little content and in some cases lots of Adsense surrounding it.

I'm not moaning just a bit confused: I have 750 words of good content, another sites comes out of nowhere with 50 words -> how can Google decide the 50 word site is better using the panda algo?

This is me assuming the panda algo is purely content/copy based. Does it take other things into account such as freshness, layout, bounce rate?

Thanks.

[DennisSeymour]

Historically, Panda does consider a lot of other stuff. I would personally wait a few weeks. Each time an algo update (a major one) happens, crap sites will always show up and in many cases, rank better than good sites.

For now, you should look at the site, see if there is anything that you can improve. Internal linking, UI/UX, speed, etc. Monitor your webmaster tools for changes in your visibility and other usual panda stuff.

If you continue to produce great stuff then you should be fine.

[followuk]

Thanks for your reply.

Makes sense, hopefully some of these sites get pulled back a little.

Do you think the way a website arranges content on the page matters also? So instead of having a chunk of content in a block, have it broken apart more with sub-headings, tables, bullet points etc?

[David-Kley]

Please dont immediately freak out.These updates when they are just beginning can mess with all kinds of rankings. The last thing you want to do during an update is to go and change all of your content that has "been rock for around 2 years". That would probably be the worst thing you could do, unless you already know of areas on your site that need improvement.

I understand that it sucks to see a competitor soar above you, when their site is "worse" than yours. Sometimes, we see a competitors site as worse, because we want ours to win so badly, rather than looking at the facts. In some cases our competition may beat us in a few areas. It would be more beneficial to you to look closely at the high ranking sites, see if they stay in a high position, and if so, see what you can learn from them. We did this about 6 months ago, when we noticed rankings slipping a bit. We closely analyzed what the other sites strengths were, (they had a few ideas that were awesome) and implemented our own custom strategy, and have been doing great since. You stated that your rankings have been consistantly well during the past few years, does this mean that your site was and content was left stagnant, perhaps while the competition was updating and working hard to out rank you?

Rankings change, it will happen all the time. Sometimes it will be one spot, sometimes it could be many. This is the fun part of advertising and marketing on something you dont own aka Google. A few things to remember are: optimize logically, dont make rash sudden decisions when you see ranking changes, focus on your users, and partner with trusted sources.

@dennis "Each time an algo update (a major one) happens, crap sites will always show up and in many cases, rank better than good sites. " I have seen this also. Maybe this is Google's way of giving the crap sites a break on their PPC budget for a while  

[DennisSeymour]

LOL, "Ok, we're going to destroy your rankings shortly. Please, invest more in Adwords afterwards."

Seriously though, I think the algo resets certain factors at the beginning, so these spammed or crappy stuffed sites will get the advantage initially and as a little time passes, the algorithm will be able to catch up and move those sites down - well, in simple terms that is. It'll take 1000 words to fully explain what I really want to say haha.

[DennisSeymour]

Definitely.

I've seen better results for both readership and google if proper formatting is used.

I think Google would prefer it like that as well if you think about it.

I'm betting that you'd hate reading big chunks of text without any breaks, subs, media or bullets.

[followuk]

Nice, extremely helpful - thanking you both Dennis + David. Its not often I get responses on forums where im actually going to action the advice but I will here.

Going to share a few things in the hope I can gain some more actionable advice/insight.

So im purely after rankings in UK search - a query which is highly valuable to me is 'bank holidays 2014'. I was ranking in the top 5 for the last 2 years (sometimes I would be 3rd for a few months), David is completely correct my content may well be 'stagnant' as I don't refresh my content at all really - little worried it might flick a switch Google's end so I tend to do as little as possible changes wise.

Like I said, I have now dropped to bottom of page (FollowUK) and have even seen flux onto page 2. You will notice a lot of Auth sites which is absolutely fine with me, I understand the reason and the work involved to out rank. Its just the others which confuse me because far as im considered (taken David's advice on competitor analysis) all they have over me is tables. So the ones im looking at are -> year-planner-calendar.wanadoo / ownersdirect / publicholidays - All of which were below me before a week ago.

But I have to admit being open their content looks more interesting than mine, which falls back to Dennis's reply regarding content formatting.

Even still, when you take 900 unique relevant words against 50/150 words you would assume mine would be more valuable to Googe's users - unless you think adding something as simple as a table would do the trick (I doubt it).

Thoughts?

[followuk]

Thank you very much (see my reply below).

[followuk]

Thank you very much (see my reply below).

[CommT]

What's your bounce rate like? Is it high? If so, maybe you do need to make some changes. How about time on page/site?

I'm believing more and more that google uses user engagement metrics to help rank sites. I don't know if this is part of Panda or not though.

As others have said, I wouldn't change anything until the dust has settled.

Implementing a few tables here and there is not a difficult task (I wouldn't have thought) and maybe is just what you need to make the content you have more readable. I would have thought a table is just the tool to display bank holidays! Though, of course, now that the second May bank holiday has passed us, there aren't many left (BOOOOO).

Good luck, and make sure you wait for the dust to settle before you do anything.

Amelia