Did you hear the news yet? Well, Google (after its last year's Panda update) now launches a new change - 'Page Layout Algorithm'. Through this algorithmic change, Google reinforces its definition of high quality websites, and penalizes those that run a lot of ads. Though this change doesn't have as attractive a name as the last one (Panda), it surely can get you into trouble by reducing the search rankings of your website, all of a sudden.
The Purpose of this Algorithmic Change
Google clarifies that websites that run too many ads above-the-fold ruin the web experience of users. In fact, the search engine giant has received regular complaints from people who are unable to see quality content after clicking a link in their search results.
In an effort to provide top quality content, Google will penalize websites that are ad-heavy, or those that have more ads visible than content. As a result of this new change, you may see a sudden decrease in your organic traffic. Though advertising is a proven way of monetization, one can never exploit it by hiding the content (which users are actually looking for) under a sea of ads.
Which Sites will be Most Affected!
You won't get penalized only because you display multiple units of ads on your web pages. The 'Page Layout Algorithm' will impact the search rankings of only those sites that display plenty of ads above-the-fold, to the extent of making it tough to find the original content on a page. If users, after clicking a URL, view more ads than content in the initial screen, the change is certainly going to affect your search rankings in Google.
According to Matt Cutts (a Google associate), the new update will impact no more than 1% of searches globally though.
The Solution
First of all, there are no specific tools that you can use to find out whether your website will be targeted or penalized after this update. All you need to do is use your common sense and find out whether your web page is really too heavy with ads. If the main content gets obscured due to the display of too many ads, you might get yourself into trouble.
A good idea to escape this punishment is to check out the initial screen (the ratio of main content to displayed ads) in commonly used screen resolutions. Google, on its Webmaster Central Blog, suggests you use their Browser Size tool (a product of Google labs) to find out how your site appears in different screen resolutions. That's all you have right now to deal with the situation.
The rest is all about your own discretion. Just make sure, you have the main content above-the-fold so that users can find what they came looking for after clicking your URL in SERPs.
How Soon Can You Expect to Get Out of it?
If your website gets penalized, you need to take action immediately. Don't expect an instant recovery, even after you reduce the amount of ads on your website. You'll get back your previous top rankings only when Google's crawler has identified the changes (and this information has been fed into Google's search ranking algorithm) that you make on your website.
It can take several weeks before you get back on your feet once again. The time may vary depending on the nature of your website. If you've a huge website with thousands of pages, you may need to wait a little longer. How quickly the Googlebot sniffs out the alterations will have a key role to play.
How do you see this recent algorithmic change by Google? Please feel free to share your comments, feedback and suggestions.
