Category: SEO

A Google ranking penalty can have a huge impact on your business due to the dominance of Google as a search engine.

Ranking on Google is important to ensure that your potential customers can find you and ensure you get a return on your digital investment. Ranking for the right search terms can potentially make the difference between business success and failure.

There are lots of different advice out there on how to do this, however not all tactics that can get you higher up in the rankings are condoned by Google. When discovered you can see your website being punished by the search giant.

This punishment comes in the form of a Google ranking penalty. This can be manual or algorithmic and see your site drop in the rankings or disappear from the search engine entirely.

How Does Google Rank Websites?

Google wants to connect users of its search engine with the most relevant information as quickly as possible. Google rewards websites that provide clearly defined and high-quality information and does not display sites that are difficult to use and are of low quality.

It does this using an extremely complex and ever-changing algorithm which is not made available to the public. It does however issue guidance and good value web design and SEO companies watch this closely to ensure their clients comply.

Why Do Google Punish Websites?

The value of ranking at the top of Google means that less reputable companies will try and “cheat” the algorithm to appear above competitors with less effort.

These tactics are known as Blackhat SEO.

When Google discovers these attempts, they are punished to restore balance and discourage others to ensure they can connect users with the most useful search results.

This results in businesses being punished due to the actions of an outsourced SEO company if they are not acting in line with the rules.

How To Tell If You Have A Google Ranking Penalty?

If you are given a manual penalty by Google then they will tell you. If your site is poorly designed or has minor infractions punished by the algorithm, the first sign may be a drop-in revenue or website traffic.

Clues that you have had a Google Ranking penalty may include:

• Your website does not appear in results when you Google your business name
• Dropping down the rankings rapidly
• Messages within Google Search Console
• Complaints by customers that they cannot find you easily online

If you are unsure about your SEO position then give the Aspiring Panda team a call and we can investigate.

Digital marketing and tech specialist Anoop is a well-known figure in the Harrow and North London community. Currently the Operations Director for Aspiring Panda, the company uses cloud and development expertise to solve some of the toughest business challenges – which has recently included consulting with East African nations to provide sustainable farming.

Therefore, it is important you are not doing any of the things that can lead to your Google ranking falling or your site being removed from search results entirely.

Slow Website Speed

The objective of Google is to connect users with relevant information quickly, if your website takes too long to load then it is unlikely to be given priority over other faster loading results.

If your site comes back and the response time is over 5 seconds, then it may be worth speaking to your web designer about ways to improve the load times.

See our blog on slow website speeds

Duplicate Content

Repeating the same content with the right keywords used to be a great blackhat SEO tactic for getting a high ranking. However, Google realised that this usually results in a poor user experience.

Duplicate content can result in a lower Google ranking so product pages and services should be written uniquely on every occasion to avoid issues with Google.

Blackhat SEO

The use of aggressive SEO strategies that focus on rankings rather than content can have a huge impact on your Google ranking. Google punishes companies that it believes are trying to “game” the system or take shortcuts.

If you are not sure if your website is following best practice, then let me know.

Insecure Websites

Google does not want to send its users to sites that may harm its users. If your site is deemed to be insecure or have security issues then this will affect your ranking.

This could include a lack of security for online purchases or not having the most up to date software versions on your CMS platform.

Not Mobile Friendly

Smartphones and devices account for most Google searches.

The majority of websites are now optimised for mobile devices if your website is older or poorly designed then this may affect how your site ranks when users search using their smartphone.

If you are unsure check our mobile friendly guidance here

If you are unsure about your SEO position then give the Aspiring Panda team a call and we can investigate.

Digital marketing and tech specialist Anoop is a well-known figure in the Harrow and North London community. Currently the Operations Director for Aspiring Panda, the company uses cloud and development expertise to solve some of the toughest business challenges – which has recently included consulting with East African nations to provide sustainable farming.

Search engine optimisation (SEO) is important for small businesses as this marketing discipline allows them to be found by people searching the web for their product or service. It can however be quite confusing for small business owners.

Google are constantly updating and changing their algorithm that ranks where your business’ website ranks for different keywords. This is designed to improve the service they offer to users and to punish and discourage companies from trying to “game” the ranking system.

This creates a landscape where business owners are given conflicting advice and where they can do serious harm to their prospects if they walk down the wrong SEO path.

Therefore, we put together three basic SEO principles that will, if followed, create solid foundations to build with.

Make Sure You Website Is Set Up Correctly

Google SEO is based on indexing your website and working out the different keywords that are relevant to your business. They then use this and thousands of ranking factors such as the authority given to your website by other sites to determine your ranking.

Therefore, the first thing you need to do is make sure that the SEO settings of your site reflect the keywords you want users to use to find you. For example, for a plumber in Harrow, keywords would probably include “plumbers in harrow”

Have An Active Website

Google is looking to connect users with active and relevant websites, therefore you should be creating content regularly that is relevant to your target audience and contains the keywords that customers will use to find you.

See more about active/passive websites here

Build The Right Kind Of Links To Your Site

It used to be that having as many links to your website was the way to rank higher on Google, this behaviour is now punished by Google due to abuse by some marketing companies on behalf of their clients.

It is now about getting the right websites to share and link to your content in the right way to show that your site has authority and relevance.

SEO is complex and involves research and analysis to get right, to find out more call us on call on  (+44) 020 8861 0115 to get your questions answered.

Digital marketing and tech specialist Anoop is a well-known figure in the Harrow and North London community. Currently the Operations Director for Aspiring Panda, the company uses cloud and development expertise to solve some of the toughest business challenges – which has recently included consulting with East African nations to provide sustainable farming.