Matt Cutts of Google provides some updates for upcoming algorithm changes that all SEO’s should know about.
Unsurprisingly most of the changes involve changes to the way links are counted, scored and sorted.
Here is a summary of the points Matt Cutts made in his webspam video
Upstream Targets – Link builders have been using layered hidden link networks to avoid getting punished for unnatural link building. Google is looking upstream at where the links are coming from and punishing those who are building unnatural link networks.
Penguin Updates – Google continues to tweak their penguin updates starting with a big change expected to go live in the next few weeks. This update is supposed to have an even bigger impact than the original penguin update which will make some people happy and others angry. Hopefully it won’t affect you.
Advertorials – Sites using advertorials to inflate their overall link profile were penalized earlier this year. Even more action against this type of link building is coming out later this year.
More Sophisticated Link Analysis – This point was perhaps the most interesting of all of them. Google claims they will be creating a more sophisticated profile of each site’s back links and where they are coming from. This more detailed analysis will undoubtedly help them find black hat SEO strategies and penalize them as well.
Spam Queries – Some keywords attract spam and black hat techniques more than others. Terms like payday loans, are flooded with hundreds of low quality sites. These types of high transactional value keywords are going to be getting the attention of Matt’s spam team.
Hacked Sites – Google will be implementing improvements on warning users of potentially hacked sites as well as notifying the webmaster so corrective action can be taken.
Authority Sites – It is no surprise to anyone that Google loves authority sites, and Matt made it a point to say that they will continue to give ranking boosts to authority sites.
Panda Smack – Google acknowledged that some sites which were hurt by the panda updates were not true black hat sites and will be working to lessen the impact this update had on some of these sites.
Multiple of Same Domain in SERP – To diversify the results on the first page of results Google wants to reduce the number of pages from the same domain displayed.
Webmaster Communication – Matt expressed his desire to have more open communication with webmasters so everyone can hopefully get the rankings they deserve.
