Recent Google copyright application has the SEO community buzzing. At a bare minimum this document reveals the direction Google is taking its upcoming search criteria. Changes in the way Google will be evaluating pages for search rankings are intended to address two most important problems:
- Search engine spam, and
- Make sure that “fresh” documents gain higher than “old” ones
Here is a review on a small number of the common principles outlined in the document. Good number SEO specialists agree these are reasonable principles, and it is only a matter of time before they are accepted.
• Anchor text of links is still crucial. Focus on your anchor text. It must have your targeted keyword.
• Google expects that anchor texts will fluctuate. Much identical anchor text suggests an “unnatural” linking pattern. Anchor texts must vary, but contain related phrases.
• Google will record when specific links were first revealed, and watch how they change eventually. Links with a long duration are considered more important than links with a short existence. This adds support to the link delay theory – that links do not start “counting” till the time they have been in place for a small number of months. So get working on those links without delay, but don’t wait for instant satisfaction from Google.
• If a new website gets a flood of new inbound links, this will be a sign of probably spam activity. Links must be introduced slowly and in line with a steady pattern.
• Google accepts that there might be link “spikes”, and so an arrival of new links will be interpreted as legal if some of the links are from “trustworthy” sites. Go after links from reliable sites.
• If an old webpage continue to receive new incoming links, it will be considered fresh. Keep adding up links pointing to main pages.
• In some cases the links from fresh pages will be more valuable than links from “out of date” or old pages that have not been updated in recent times. Get links from pages that are active. If you have high value links from main sites, build up a plan for keeping those links fresh.
• Google places additional importance on a site where link growth remains steady and slow. Slow and steady wins the race. Keep getting those links.
• Pages with a lot of inbound links will call for proportionately extra new links so as to remain fresh. The theory is that the more links a page has, the more it should be getting in the future. Or else it starts slipping into the “stale” category. Focus more interest on your most important pages.
Not considering whether Google implements all of these criteria, the general direction is clear. More importantly, these points make excellent SEO sense, and provide a wonderful place to start when planning a link strategy.
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