The Google Panda algorithm update initially rolled out in February 2011, and it impacted around 12% of search results across the globe. In April of 2011, it was released to the majority of the English-speaking world, and in January 2016, it became part of Google\u2019s core algorithm.<\/p>\n
Google is continually updating its algorithm on a daily basis. Although most of these updates are very minor, from time to time, Google will release a core algorithm update that has a significant impact on rankings.<\/p>\n
The Panda algorithm update was the first of these significant updates to be released. The Panda update kicked off Google\u2019s battle against \u2018black hat\u2019 SEO tactics and spammy content and to this day, remains one of the most significant changes to happen in the world of SEO.<\/p>\n
Why is it called Google Panda? The update was named after the Google engineer, Navneet Panda, who developed the technology behind the algorithm.<\/p>\n
The Google Panda update was intended to tackle the issue of poor quality or deceptive content that was appearing the search engine page results (SERPs). The Panda update rewarded high quality content, but how does the algorithm differentiate between poor and high quality content? Google chose the following ranking factors as indicators of poor quality content which should not appear in high positions in SERPs.<\/p>\n
Since its first rollout, the majority of the updates to Panda have been minor tweaks or data refreshes, but there have been significant updates. All refreshes and updates are listed here.<\/p>\n
February 23rd, 2011: Panda 1 \u2013 the initial rollout of Google Panda<\/p>\n
April 11th, 2011: Panda 2<\/p>\n
May 9th, 2011: Panda 3<\/p>\n
June 21st, 2011: Panda 4<\/p>\n
July 23rd, 2011: Panda 5<\/p>\n
August 12th, 2011: Panda 6 \u2013 Google Panda release a.k.a. international rollout of Google in all English-speaking countries, and in non-English speaking countries excluding Japan, China and Korea.<\/p>\n
September 28th, 2011: Panda<\/p>\n
October 5th, 2011: Panda 8 \u2013 Flux \u2013 Google added some new signals into the Panda algorithm and recalculated how the algorithm impacted websites.<\/p>\n
November 18th, 2011: Panda 9<\/p>\n
January 18th, 2012: Panda 10<\/p>\n
February 27th, 2012: Panda 11<\/p>\n
March 23rd, 2012: Panda 12<\/p>\n
April 19th, 2012: Panda 13<\/p>\n
April 27th, 2012: Panda 14<\/p>\n
June 8th, 2012: Panda 15<\/p>\n
June 25th, 2012: Panda 16<\/p>\n
July 24th, 2012: Panda 17<\/p>\n
August 20th, 2012: Panda 18<\/p>\n
September 18th, 2012: Panda 19<\/p>\n
September 27th, 2012: Panda 20<\/p>\n
November 5th, 2012: Panda 21<\/p>\n
November 21st, 2012: Panda 22<\/p>\n
December 21st, 2012: Panda 23<\/p>\n
January 22nd, 2013: Panda 24<\/p>\n
March 14th, 2013: Panda 25<\/p>\n
June 28th, 2013: Panda 26<\/p>\n
May 20th, 2014: Panda 4.0 \u2013 major Panda update affecting 7.5% of queries<\/p>\n
September 23rd, 2014: Panda 4.1 \u2013 major Panda update affecting 3-4% of queries<\/p>\n
July 18th, 2015: Panda 4.2 – Google announced a substantial Panda update which would roll out gradually over several months<\/p>\n
January 16th,<\/sup> 2016 – Panda became part of Google\u2019s core algorithm<\/p>\n Since August 2018, there have been several updates that have affected how Google assesses the quality of content, including Google updating its Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines. These guidelines make it clear that Google prioritizes E-A-T when determining where to rank a piece of content, i.e. expertise, authority and trustworthiness. Specifically, the update devalues content that is thin, irrelevant, deceptive, inaccurate, lack authority or uses a high amount of affiliate links.<\/p>\n We have all heard the term \u2018fake news\u2019 in some context, but it has become an important enough concern that Google is taking steps to reward factual and accurate content and devalue content deemed to be unreliable. This is particularly relevant when the content is on a potentially serious issue such as law, finance or health. Many medical websites and their affiliates, as well as websites offering legal or financial advice, were hit hard by the August 2018 update (which was subsequently called the \u2018Medic Update\u2019).<\/p>\n The fact that the 2018 update echoed and reinforced the quality signals which the Panda update first targeted in 2011 is evidence that Google is likely to continue to use the same ranking factors for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n Because Panda is now part of Google\u2019s core algorithm, it is difficult to differentiate between general updates and those which are related to the Panda criteria and the way content is judged and ranked. Keyword stuffing, spammy or ad-heavy content are widely accepted as poor SEO tactics.<\/p>\n Instead, Google is continuing to improve its algorithm\u2019s capacity to recognize quality content, natural language patterns and to place search queries in context through BERT (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) which is Google’s neural network-based technique for natural language processing (NLP) pre-training.<\/p>\nHow to optimize for Google Panda in 2020<\/strong><\/h3>\n