Google Algorithm Updates for a great Googling experience

How these Google Algorithm Updates came into place?

Have you seen that when you search for something on Google, you are met with thousands of search results, with information that can assist you or give an answer to your question. Google is now the personal assistant of many of us. Google guesses what you are really looking for with about 200 signals that are programmed to analyze the query and the intention behind it.

As a result, Google has emerged to be a powerful internet gizmo for doing great business. Google can track the needs of its users and entrepreneurs can use Google to deliver people what they are looking for.

Entrepreneurs have identified this immense online potential and hence, competed with one another to create websites and then get a higher ranking for their websites on Google.

Being on top would boost business and going to the bottom meant losing customers and thus, a downfall for your business. As a result, people resorted to all sort of tactics, which could make them survive on top in search engine listings. Consequently Google results started declining in quality and content, which in turn would destroy users' confidence in Google.

WHY GOOGLE ALGORITHM UPDATES?

Considering the users' trust and their chance to make it as a great personal assistant who constantly delivers good results for their queries in terms of quantity and quality, Google adopted measures known as "Google Algorithm Updates" wherein changes were made in Google Algorithms or its programming signals which determine the query, process millions of webpages and return the best results. When these updates were rolled out, they made huge impacts to search engine results, hit several businesses with a blow and also rescued some.

MOST SIGNIFICANT UPDATES IN THE GOOGLE HISTORY

1. Google Panda Update (February 2011):

Ever since Google let out their SEO starter guide, the secret to how some websites made it to the top in search engine listings, Google benefited at first. 

But later Google was being spammed with content which was duplicated and of no quality, or which were filled with meaningless matter and full of grammatical errors. People inserted or stuffed keywords wherever they could.

So the Google Panda Update arrived. This update targeted content spammers. Thin pages (webpages having content with very less or no quality), webpages which were content farmed or had duplicated content was completely removed from Google listings.

The Panda or Farmer Update became a filter for all website. Each website which successfully passed these filters or met the terms and conditions of the website was crawled, cached and indexed by Google. Website which did not pass these filters were merely crawled and cached but never indexed.

2. The Penguin Update (April 2012):

As listed out in the SEO Starter guide revealed by Google, websites that had lots of incoming links to it would rank on top in Google listings. People generated links to their website from other websites and also started buying and selling links.

Webpages which were awarded a Page Rank by Google were considered the best websites to obtain links from. This resulted in an aggressive distribution of links by owners of websites having higher Page Rank. Several websites were launched by the same owner under one  host server, solely for the purpose of link building.

The Penguin Update was rolled out to attack such link spammers. Google disallowed selling of paid links as well as getting links from websites which carried out spamming activities.

They also pushed down the website which had doorway pages, i.e., websites which had less or no content. Under this update, websites which had quality links as well as links with trusted websites had higher positions in Google listings.

3. EMD Update or the Exact Match Domain Update (September 2012):

This update was a mechanism by Google which prevented low quality websites from ranking high on Google just because they had their domain name exactly matching with search engine user terms.

It also removed those new websites which were not able to achieve any sort of credibility in the form of Page Rank, in a given time period.

4. The Pigeon Update (July 2014): 

This update was not aimed at penalizing websites but related to local SEO, that is, providing location based search engine results. Google attempted delivering results based on the location of IP address, from which the query was coming from. For example, if someone in New York searched for "Restaurants", Google would return his queries with restaurants based at New York, not in Washington or some other place.Additionally, Geo-tagging or the adding of your location on Google Maps and showing the same on your website was also required.
Websites had to list their business on Google for local visibility, which was verified by a PIN number sent via post to the registered address.
It was also important to submit their website to the locally visible directories online, such as the Yellow Pages.

5. The Hummingbird Update (2013): 

This update focused in semantic search results. Google processed its search engine listings on the basis of the user activity, time spent on a website, the age, educational qualifications and the economic status of the search engine users, all of which were tracked with the help of Google's special cookies or Spy-bots.

6. Rankbrain Update (2015): 

An extension to the Hummingbird algorithm, the Rankbrain update uses artificial intelligence or AI to process search engine results as per the human needs. This update employed AI for tracking the user's needs based on their age group, individual preferences and their recent searches even on websites other than Google.

7. The Mobilegeddon Update(2015): 

The update arrived due to increasing online activity by users on their mobile phones. The update aimed at making the websites mobile friendly and viewing of websites comfortably on mobile phones, without having to tap or zoom.Websites which weren't mobile friendly would be pushed down in Search Engine Rankings or would not be shown in search engines results page in mobile phones.

8. The Pirate Update (August 2012):

It is a filter that was introduced for the purpose of protecting the website owner's rights on copyrighted content.

This update prevented websites that infringed the copyrights of other users' digital content or digital properties.

The victim was able to file a complaint for the infringement under DMCA (Digital Millenniums Copyright Act) under Google, after which Google would verify the exact owner and disable the defaulting party's website from appearing on search engine results.
Google's perpetual endeavor has made it the best tool for not only doing business but for getting answer to whatever you have in mind. Knowingly or unknowingly, Google has become that place where many decisions are taken and where rich information is the key for those decisions.

The above algorithms are part of the many signals that Google continuously and constantly uses to sort the results for the best search engine experience.

Maryam Marjan