While at Ad-Tech, I lamented the clogging of Google’s results
with spam filled sites. I asked Google to clean up its index.
Although I’m sure there’s no connection between the
two (unless Sergei and Larry are paying a lot more attention to
me than I thought) Google responded just a few weeks later with
the Florida update. And boy, have they responded big time!
If you haven’t ventured into an SEO forum for awhile, you
might not have heard of the Florida update. It’s Google’s
latest dance, and it’s a doozy. It appears that Google is
trying to single handedly shut down the entire affiliate industry.
The scene is awash with guessing and speculation. Was it a Google
mistake? A plot to force advertisers to move to AdWords for placement?
Barry Lloyd did a good job of trying to bring sense to the mayhem.
I’d like to jump in with some further research we’ve
done and my own thoughts of what’s happening with the Google
index.
A Florida Guide
First of all, the Florida update was rolled out November 16th.
It appears to be a new filter that is applied to commercially
based searches, triggered by certain words in the query. The filter
clears out many of the sites that previously populated the top
100. In several tests, we found the filter generally removes 50
to 98% of the previously listed sites, with the average seeming
to be 72%. Yes..that’s right: 72% of the sites that used
to be in Google are nowhere to be seen!
Who’s Missing?
The target is pretty clear. Its affiliate sites, with domains
that contain the keywords, and with a network of keyword links
pointing back to the home page of the site. The filter is remarkably
effective in removing the affiliate clutter. Unfortunately, legitimate
commercial sites with lower page rank are being removed as well.
There seems to be a PageRank threshold above which sites are no
longer affected by the filter. We’ve seen most sites with
PageRank 6 or above go through unscathed.
And the Secret Word is…
The filter also appears to be activated only when search queries
contain certain words. For example, a search for “Calgary
Web Design Firms” activated the filter and cleared out 84%
of the sites, while a search for “Calgary Database Development”
didn’t activate it. Search volumes are roughly equivalent
for both phrases. The filter seems to be activated by a database
of phrase matches, and doesn’t appear to be affected by
stemming. For example, “Panasonic fax machines” activates
the filter, but none of these words as a single search phrase
does. “Fax machines” activates the filter, but “Panasonic
machines” doesn’t.
Also, it seems that only a few single word searches activate
the filter. We found that jewelry, watches, clothing, swimwear,
shelving, loans and apartments all activated the filter. Other
terms that you would think would be bigger targets for spam, including
sex, cash, porn, genealogy, MP3, gambling and casino don’t
activate the filter. Obviously, when you look at these words,
Google is more concerned with commercialization than spam.
Volume, Volume, Volume
Another factor is whether the filter is tripped or not seems
to be search volume. Any commercial searches with volumes over
200 per month (as determined by Overture’s search term suggestion
tool) seemed to trip the filter. Searches under that threshold
seemed to remain unfiltered. For example, a search for “Oregon
whitewater rafting” (about 215 searches last month) activated
the filter, while a search for “Washington whitewater rafting
(about 37 searches last month) didn’t.
What is Google Thinking?
Obviously, given the deliberate nature of the implementation,
this isn’t a hiccup or a mistake by Google. This was a well
thought out addition to the algorithm. And in the most competitive
searches, it produces much better results than did the “pre-Florida”
index. If you search for “New York Hotels” today,
you’ll find almost all of the affiliate clutter gone.
Where the problem occurs is in the less competitive searches,
where there’s not a sufficient number of PageRank 6 or higher
sites to fill the vacuum caused by the filter. If you do a search
now for most phrases you’ll find the results are made up
of mainly directory and irrelevant information sites. In cleaning
house, Google has swept away many sites that should have stuck.
As an example, visit Scroogle.org and search for “Calgary
web design firms”. Scroogle is from the deliciously twisted
minds of Google Watch, and gives graphic representation of the
bloodshed resulting from Florida. In the pre-Florida results,
the top 10 (all of which were wiped out by the filter) included
6 Calgary based web designers and 1 in Vancouver (two of the remaining
results were additional pages from these firms). The other result
was a directory called postcards-usa.com with a page of design
firms from around North America. Eight of the 10 results were
directly relevant, one was somewhat relevant and one was of questionable
relevancy for the geographically specific search.
In the filtered results, there is not one web design firm from
Calgary. The top 4 listings are directory site pages, two of which
are not even specific to Calgary. Ranking 5 and 6 belong to Amazon.com
pages selling a book on web design (nothing to do with Calgary
other than a reader review from someone who lives there). Rankings
7 and 8 go to pages about evolt.org, a non profit organization
of web designers, and a profile on a Calgary based member. Listing
9 goes to the web design page of an abysmal web directory, again
not specific to any region. And listing 10 goes to an obvious
link farm. Of the 10 results, none of them were relevant.
Google’s Next Move?
Pulling out the crystal ball, which in hindsight was amazingly
accurate 2 weeks ago, here’s what I think will happen. The
Florida filter will not be revoked, but it will be tweaked. It’s
doing an amazing job on the ultra competitive searches, but the
algorithm will be loosened to allow inflow of previously filtered
sites to bring relevancy back to the less competitive searches.
Hopefully, the sites finding their way back into the index will
be better quality legitimate commercial sites and not affiliate
knock offs. Google has to move quickly to fix the relevancy for
these searches, because they can’t afford another blow to
the quality of their search results.
I really don’t believe that Google purposely implemented
the filter to drive advertisers to AdWords, but that is certainly
a likely side effect. The most dramatic impact will be the devastation
of the affiliate industry. Just 3 short weeks ago I listened to
4 major internet marketers say they didn’t bother with organic
SEO because their affiliate partners did it for them. Those days
are over. If Google was targeting anyone with Florida, it was
affiliate sites. A number of forum posts indicated that Google
was taking aim at SEO. I don’t believe so. I think Google
is trying to wipe out bad SEO and affiliate programs and unfortunately
there are a number of innocent bystanders who got hit in the crossfire.
But every indication from Google itself (both from posts to forums
and in replies to help requests) seems to indicate that Florida
is a work in progress.
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