After the Penguin update, negative SEO is looking like a real possibility. It doesn’t take much low quality linkbuilding before Google Webmaster Tools sends you a warning message. In that message, they’ll  mention that your site has been found to have a high number of suspicious inbound links, and that these links should be removed as quickly as possible. While that message doesn’t necessarily imply a penalty, it does mean that Google has noticed your linkbuilding efforts.

Since it doesn’t take much to trigger this warning message, how easy would it be to point a cheap Fiverr package at one of your competitors’ websites? How easy would it be to point 50 Fiverr packages at their websites? If you know of a complex link network that has been discovered and penalized by Google, who’s to stop you from maliciously switching your links from this network over to a competitor’s?

To make things worse, recovering from a Penguin penalty isn’t that easy. In fact, Matt Cutts says that, in the event your website recovery techniques don’t work post-Penguin, you’re better off just starting a new website from scratch.

Google’s response to negative SEO

Google’s response to the criticisms of negative SEO is concerning: they simply claim that it is difficult to devalue a website that is already ranking well. Ultimately, the good linkbuilding that the site has done will outweigh the bad. But if that were true, then why are so many good websites floundering post-Penguin update?

Furthermore, how much ‘bad’ can a site take before it starts to outweigh the ‘good’? If you notice a competitor has weak white hat linkbuilding tactics but is ranking well, then it shouldn’t be too difficult to throw hundreds of thousands of cheap, spammy links at their website and then watch them plummet in the rankings. With Google’s algorithm constantly changing its opinion on various websites, it doesn’t seem to take long for a site that was previously seen as high-quality to be devalued for being bad.

Conclusion

Ultimately, it’s difficult to make conclusions on negative SEO until a real study has been done on its effects. Webmasters have been concerned about negative SEO for ages, and as of yet, it hasn’t made a real significant impact upon SEO strategy. Whether that will change after the Penguin update remains to be seen.

Social integration

It’s tough to beat Google at its own game. In terms of offering intelligent results for all major keywords, Google has the search engine industry locked down. Despite the billions of dollars that Microsoft has sunk into Bing thus far, it just cannot compete with Google’s intelligent algorithm.

According to Microsoft, that is about to change. Thanks to Microsoft’s cozy partnership with Facebook, it is able to offer intelligent results that are more oriented to the social media crowd. Using this close relationship, it can tap into Facebook’s personal information and display it intelligently alongside other relevant results Bing also plans to adopt a similar approach for displaying Twitter results.

Whether you like social media or not, there is no doubt that it is here to stay. Sure, people may not be using Facebook five or ten years from now, but in some form or another, social media will not be leaving our lives any time soon. If Bing can optimize its algorithm to take advantage of today’s social media-savvy users and display intelligent results from both Facebook and Twitter, it stands a real chance of taking a chunk out of Google’s market share.

Three-column menu

Bing’s update is about more than just social media integration. In fact, the update is more focused on rolling out a three-pane menu system. The left menu will be reserved for the search engine results page itself, featuring Bing’s traditional blue links. The middle pane, meanwhile, is called “Snapshot”, and will help users complete tasks that are relevant to their search engine results. For example, if you’re researching hotels, then the Snapshot feature will take you right to a reservation system. Or, if you’re looking for movies in your area, you’ll easily be able to buy tickets and print them out online.

The right column is where the true magic happens with Bing’s social media integration. Recommendations from your Facebook friends will show up in this column, as well as other relevant information. If you’re looking for hotels in Maui, for example, then the right column may display a list of your friends who have been to that island. From there, you can easily post a question to their wall or send them a link to your search engine results.

What does Metaphix think?

Bing’s changes are ambitious. Integrating social media into search engine results is a lot harder than it sounds. Weeding out the pointless Facebook groups, app scams, and other crap on the world’s largest social media site could be a difficult task. Twitter, on the other hand, is changing by the second, which could make it hard for Microsoft to accurately reflect these changes in their search engine results.

The three-pane menu system is equally as ambitious. While the Snapshot feature should allow people to book hotels, check flights, and perform all other sorts of tasks more easily, will people actually use it? And what happens if an irrelevant Snapshot shows up when you’re researching a keyword that doesn’t really need it?

It’s tough not to cheer for Bing. Google’s policies are growing increasingly monopolistic, and until SEOs find a reliable way to respond to the Penguin update, there will continue to be a temporary hatred towards Google, as there is after every major algorithm update.

With millions of people frustrated by Google’s Penguin update, now is a good time for Bing to make such drastic changes. Penguin is wreaking havoc on many search engine results pages, with high value terms such as “payday loans” displaying websites that are just a few days old on the front page. Anger at Google is rising, and this could push away many of its users. If Bing wants to provide a legitimate challenge for Google in the lucrative field of search engines, then there is no better time than the present.

Bing’s updates aren’t expected to appear until later next month. However, if you want to get a sneak peek at some of the new updates being revealed, check out www.bing.com/new, which will display some of the new tweaks starting on Tuesday.

Get rid of bad-quality links

This step could be tough, but you’re going to need to get rid of the number of links pointing at your website from other low-quality sites. Google is penalizing sites en masse right now, and if your website is being linked to by a penalized site, then Google might drag down your rankings with a harsh penalty.

Whether you’ve participated in article marketing circles or private link-building servers, it’s time to reduce your spammy, low-quality link footprint as much as possible. If you can’t get rid of all of your low-quality links, then at least try to reduce them as much as you can.

Reduce the number of ads

Too many ads can detract from the user experience. It’s also a great way to let Google know that your website is more focused on making money then teaching users anything useful. If possible, stick to Google’s recommended 2-3 Adsense blocks per page. If you need to fill up additional blank space, try filling it with CPA offers or other monetization schemes that leave less of a footprint than Adsense.

Create fresh content

Ultimately, Google’s Penguin update comes down to your website creating high-quality fresh content that teaches visitors something useful. With that in mind, start producing content like this as soon as possible. Pay somebody to write it for you, if you have to. To be extra careful, you may even want to delete older pages and posts that have less useful information on them.

Delete posts with similar content

Nobody wants to read through five different posts with titles like “NYC cars”, “auto sales New York City”, and “used cars New York” in order to find the information they need. To improve the user experience – and make your website look nice to Google, consolidate any similar pages into one similar post. This will give users the maximum amount of information, and while your website may no longer be optimized for each specific variation of a keyword, you reduce your risk of suffering a significant penalty from Google.

Use Google+

Every update from Google forces Google+ on us a little more. If you haven’t already signed up, you should do so soon. You should also consider signing your business up for a Google+ page. Whether you like it or not, the entire SEO industry depends on the whims of our Google gods, and if Google declares that we should use Google+, then anybody who wants their website to rank well will follow suit.

For more information about putting your website on Google+. Click HERE.

Use Google Webmaster Tools

The internet marketing industry tends to have mixed feelings about Google Webmaster Tools (GWT). However, by signing up for GWT, you’re just confirming information that Google already knew about you. In addition, GWT provides you with information about your website’s performance, and could warn you if you’re about to suffer a penalty (or provide information why you suffered a penalty in the first place).

Use 301 redirects

If you’ve restructured your website, then Google recommends you use 301 redirects to point visitors towards meaningful content as opposed to showing them a blank page. While giving your visitors a useful user experience is important, spiders like the Googlebot will also be able to navigate your site more easily when you use 301 redirects.