Recently Google updated its search engine algorithm and code named it
Panda. It has been reported by many site owners, that they are suffering drops in their rankings because of this. But what exactly does the Panda update mean for
article marketers and article directories? Read on to find out more.
The reason for the Panda update was to lower the search engine rankings of lower quality content. Spammy lower quality articles submitted to article directories has been downgraded by the Panda. SEO consultants can no longer post spam articles for a cheap relevant back linking technique. And so they shouldn’t :-)
What this means is submitting articles solely for the purpose of link building using poor quality content is no longer an option. Some people have claimed that even high PR links from the top article directories are not passing on the link juice anymore. Grrrrr that Panda has a lot to answer for doesn’t it!
However, using article directories for just another back linking technique is not the best way of generating traffic anyway. Think about it for a second, would you rather have a single site (Google) referring visitors to you or hundreds of sites that have hundreds of subscriber’s referring the traffic to you instead?
Article directories are designed for allowing publishers to use free high quality content on their web sites. So it makes sense to create high quality content because site owners will then publish it on their web sites. Instead of relying on Google for the traffic to your site, you will be getting targeted traffic from the websites that have published the article.
Furthermore, if the article is of high quality and other sites are publishing it then that means you should get some link juice from their web sites instead of the apparent Panda killed directories. It still can’t hurt to have the extra back links since other search engines are not affected by the Panda update.
The result of the Panda has made article directories less effective at building search engine rankings, especially with spam and rightly so. But they can still have some part in the marketing of your sites when the content is high quality and gets syndicated.
Google have hired a Panda and its taste buds have changed. Spam is the new favoured food, so don’t let your content get eaten. If you’re an SEO that uses spam for generating back links then it’s time to start writing quality content or risk feeding the hungry Panda. Joking aside, article marketing is still a useful traffic building strategy when done right. Just make sure the content is quality and worth publishing.
