Matt Cutts Announces Google Panda 4.0 Roll Out Today

“Google is rolling out our Panda 4.0 update starting today”, Matt Cutts announced on his Twitter page a few hours ago.  This latest progress in Google’s search algorithm changes is one of the most awaited news in the search industry.

Search Engine Land (http://searchengineland.com/google-begins-rolling-panda-4-0-now-192043) assumes that Panda 4.0 is a major update which could mean that this is a newer version and not just a mere data refresh.  Though this is the case, SEJ emphasizes that according to Google this update will be gentler for some sites and lay the groundwork for future changes.

For this update, Google told SEJ that Panda 4.0 affects different languages to different degrees.  For example, in English language, SEJ reports that only ~7.5% of queries are affected.

Reactions from the SEO Community

Of course this latest development can’t just pass without any reactions from the community that is largely affected.  Here are a few that stood out.

Is the rumor true that to cut spam you removed Turkey, India, Ukraine, China and some others completely from the index? 😉 – IncrediBILL

I think this is going to be big and not just a refresh, considering it is named 4.0. What do you guys think? – Mani Karthik

I want to say yay because since this Panda algo began, it has been worse and worse and worse. In other words, any major Panda at this point can’t possibly bring me any further down. Right? Please somebody assure me that I can’t be headed even lower. Mercy has to play into the equation at some point. This could be my pink slip or this could be reason to jump for joy. I’m so torn and afraid. – Graham_Douglas

Good to see the ongoing updates rolling out. Our team saw some movement over the last week and we assumed that some updates were ongoing. Our client sites with heavier high value content have seen some good bumps up in ranking. Those with less content saw some fluctuations and settled back down. Seems the focus is still on high value, well organized content combined with social signals. – Zamir Javer

Whenever Google rolls out an algorithm update it takes some time to get it rolled out fully, I reckon same should be the case here as well. As far as the impact goes, it has already been seen and it will be seen for a long time, it’s about how soon a website comes under the update’s radar. – Vipin Kumar

To read the rest of the SEO community reactions, visit here (http://searchengineland.com/google-begins-rolling-panda-4-0-now-192043) and here (https://twitter.com/mattcutts/status/468891756982185985).

To learn more about the detailed story behind Google Panda, check this link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Panda).

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