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Publication of articles in CP: After the penguin

Kristof Maret
la rafle pingouin

After promoting the backlink by overvaluing its weight in the algorithm that determines organic search results, Google is fighting tooth and nail to flush out the artificial backlink.

The April 2012 update is called “Penguin” and, more than Panda in 2011, its effects are radical.

Saturday, June 16, 2012, like every day, I start my day by launching my mailbox and checking my emails.

I don’t expect anything essential and I’m about to devote a few hours to Backlinking my clients as I do every weekend.

In the middle of two spam emails and two political ads (the French elect their deputies tomorrow, Sunday), two unusual messages catch my eye.

Google communicates

Google is sending me this warning

“Dear owner or webmaster of the http://site-de-referencement.ca/ site, We have detected that some of the pages on your site are using techniques that violate Google’s Webmaster Guidelines. In particular, we encourage you to look for potentially artificial or fake links on your site that would redirect the user to other sites in order to manipulate PageRank. These dummy links can be added, for example, as part of the sale of links to improve PageRank ranking or link exchange processes. We encourage you to make changes to your site to bring it into compliance with our quality guidelines. Once you’ve made these changes, please submit a request for reconsideration to have your site included in Google’s search results. If you have any questions about how to resolve this issue, please visit our Webmaster Help Forum. Sincerely, Google’s Search Quality Team»

 

This message concerns two of my article publication sites, two very modest but well-crafted sites, rated PR2, whose contribution in the agency’s referencing strategy (and that of some contributors) was a very correct support.

Was a good support…

I immediately type in the url of both sites and check the positions of essential articles…

Of course, the message is true and the consequence is applied: it is the immediate sandboxing, the big clean-up, the total disappearance of the SERPs from the content of the two incriminated portals.

The articles published on these sites are out of the game while I cited the good performance of some of them in this article on the well-structured editorial team three weeks ago.

This is the final cut.

Quick Investigation

These sites having been spotted by spammers for a few weeks, I first think that during the night, the clever black hat guys have again gone to publish their porridge and I imagine solving the problem with a moderation of the latest penalizing articles.

It can’t come from there.

I then switch to my RSS feed reader: I logically tell myself that, if the punishment is a Penguin effect, the news will be talked about. Because, according to what I see, this new layer of Penguin correction is neither more nor less than the more or less arbitrary condemnation of article publishing sites.

Brief history of article publishing sites

They are the result of a somewhat perverse evolution/exploitation of real press release sites.

Originally, put online by press organs to allow them to collect wide, classified and regular information, these sites have become portals for the publication of more or less advertising content. Over time, “press releases” have shifted to advertorials and then to articles written solely for backlinking.

The SEO community got its hands on the model and made it a pure backlinking tool whose effectiveness became formidable… but whose multiplication and lack of quality (in the USA in particular) are fatal to it today.

Master on board

Google, master of its own house, steers its boat as it sees fit. Officially thirsty for justice, he tirelessly searches for the magic formula that will put the top ten sites on the front page of an ever-increasing number of websites. The 10 best according to his judging criteria…

However, I feel an injustice in this

My sites were of high quality, severely moderated, they didn’t publish duplicate content or spinned articles, they limited authors to 3 links, they imposed 350 words, they were accompanied by images.

I spent a lot of time moderating the papers, I even filled in their tags and inserted photos to compensate for the laziness of some editors who didn’t take the time to do it. I had the aesthetics of the site at heart, no Ad Sense cobblestones disfigured it.

I had limited the number of categories to keep only generics and above all I worked in total transparency and never hid the reason for the existence of these sites.

The extent of the roundup

The sites of the same type that I used in France met these quality criteria, they are generally affected in the same way.

  1. As a result, I feel that this quest for quality and transparency is treated in the same way as the worst renegade sites of its kind.
  2. I find this punishment unfair to people who took the trouble to write original content.
  3. I find this limitation of promotion, of visibility implicitly given to new sites, to small ones, to those without budgets, unfair. Just because they’re new to the web doesn’t mean that their professional services aren’t effective and their web visibility less legitimate.

For Google, the link is your recognized authority… But let’s be logical, why would the brand new site of a floor sanding craftsman or an exterminator receive spontaneous links? And from whom?

How do you expect someone to talk about a young site, if it remains at the bottom of the ranking?

Who is going to promote a site, an activity, a service… if he doesn’t start by doing it himself as in real life?

By killing these sites, Google is shooting a legitimate means of promotion, many of my clients were first visible via autopromotion.ca or site-de-referencenent.ca before seeing their sites rise in the organic results. By removing this type of site, Google deprives small portals of a better positioned medium than theirs, a kind of launching pad that played the role of a springboard to their own referencing. Fortunately I still have two that I will restrict access to a little more

State of play and future direction

I bow down and will continue my journey, I consider that our profession is based on the quality of our analyses, the ability to implement strategies and that “imagination remains in power”

The execution of the few Quebec article publication sites is a shame, but they were only one element of my strategies…

Of the excellent list of Samuel Hounkpe’s SEO blog (45 French sites, a list kept up to date until April 2012. thanks to him) only about twenty sites come out unscathed… For how long?

What are the prospects?

The solution may pass

One thing is certain, it is that backlinking will cost more and more because it will require a star touch and a tenfold increase in working time…

The next layers

How far will Penguin go?

In the manner of Panda in 2011, the application of the “Penguin correction” has been applied since April in layers, in waves. The fundamental rules are known and the hunt for illegitimate links continues. The following questions will be asked:

No conclusion

This article is more of a reaction than a deep analysis, but the list of article publication sites that I give you is verified as of June 16, 2012, it is still a concrete piece of information to consider. I will update this list once a month. Subscribe to the comments to be notified.

The penguin has not finished squealing and so have we…

PS:For information

Of all the sites that I manage or optimize, only these two article publishing sites have been sanctioned. None of my clients suffered a setback, on the contrary, they benefited from the hindsight of the others…

Update 1: Verified on July 12, 2013…

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