Mediaboss Marketing

Since February 2011, I've had the opportunity to help a number of companies deal with Panda hits. As part of that work, I've assisted several large-scale websites (sites with more than 1 million pages).

Many of those companies got blindsided by Panda, as they mistakenly saw the misleading surge in traffic as a positive signal SEO-wise. Unfortunately, that sinister surge led to Google seeing a boatload of poor user engagement due to thin content, duplicate content, tech problems causing content issues, etc.

Poor user engagement is Panda's best friend. Low dwell time in particular can be a killer for sites in the gray area of Panda. That gray can turn black in a hurry.

As I conduct comprehensive audits through the lens of Panda, companies that have been impacted gain solid look at the various problems they need to fix. Addressing those problems can be completed in the short-term, and that can help those companies recover.

But this post is about the long-term danger that large-scale websites face from a Panda standpoint. Sure, the technical and content teams I'm helping are often very smart and can usually implement changes at a fairly rapid pace. But the long-term problem is upstream from the grunt work. You see, the problem is the site itself.

Large-scale websites with more than 1 million pages often have complex site structures, many sections, multiple subdomains, etc. All of this leads to a tough situation when you're trying to break out of the Panda filter.

For example, problems can easily roll out that impact parts of a site you aren't necessarily focused on. And if you're focusing on problems A, B, and C, but new problems like X, Y, and Z arise, then you might miss dangerous Panda-inducing issues.

It isn't fun when you have serious content problems pop up across a site. That's especially the case when you find out about those problems after a Panda update rolls out.

Go here to see the original:
6 Tips to Protect a Large and Complex Website From Google Panda [Case Study]