When Google was first launched and quickly grew in popularity, it became apparent to many that they placed a high value on links in their evaluation of websites. This led SEO specialists to delve into how Google’s algorithms worked. In Google’s early days, there was a strong focus on links—especially on anchor text, which is the text you click on when following a link.
In these early stages, Google had difficulty differentiating between the quality of various links. The quantity of links a webpage had was often seen as an indicator of its authority. This focus on quantity over quality and the emphasis on PageRank made PageRank the most sought-after metric on the internet.
As a natural consequence, an entire industry dedicated to buying and selling links emerged. It was relatively easy and affordable to acquire links from high-ranking websites.
Google’s primary focus was on popularity rather than relevance. This meant that one could acquire links from a wide variety of sources, regardless of whether they were relevant to one’s content or not, and still see a positive effect in search engine rankings.
Over time, however, Google refined their algorithms to reward quality, relevance, and naturalness in link building. This has changed the landscape for SEO specialists and made link building a more nuanced and strategic discipline.
One Could Get Away with Almost Any Kind of Links
Initially, Google did not have the necessary means to handle all the link building tactics that SEO specialists and spammers used to manipulate results. But that was about to change. Google was determined to ensure that the most relevant and valuable results appeared at the top of search results. This led to the creation of the Webspam team, led by one of Google’s most recognized employees, Matt Cutts. Their main task was to identify spam and reduce its value in search results.
However, as time went on, there were changes within Google’s internal structure. Matt Cutts, who had been the face of Google’s search team and led the fight against web spam, left his position in 2014. In 2015, he was officially replaced by a new and unknown Googler whose name was not disclosed.
In response to the growing problem of link spam, Google began rolling out link penalties. Although it required a significant number of violations at the time to be hit by such penalties, it became a discussed topic. More detailed information about link penalties will be covered later in this book.
Why Did Google Seem Passive?
Many wondered why Google allowed so many obvious manipulation tactics in the SEO world back then. It resembled a Wild West scenario where the best and most relevant websites did not necessarily reach the top positions in search results.
The reason was quite straightforward. From the start, Google believed that web spam should be combated primarily through algorithms. Although they imposed manual penalties on some of the worst violations, they placed the most emphasis on algorithmically combating spam. The overwhelming number of websites and data made it simply impossible to control every single page manually—it would have required an unreasonably large staff.
Therefore, instead of punishing every single violation manually, Google chose a gentler approach with link devaluation. This method was seen as the fairest and most effective as it ensured that websites with good content that truly deserved a high ranking received it without being wrongly penalized.
Google Penguin: A Shift in Google’s Approach to Link Building
Google Penguin was the codename for an algorithm update first announced on April 24, 2012. The purpose of this update was to downgrade the rankings of websites in search results that violated Google’s webmaster guidelines by manipulating their link popularity analyses.
According to John Mueller from Google, Google announced all updates related to the Penguin filter to the public from 2013 onwards.
According to Google’s own estimates, Penguin affected about 31% of search queries in English, around 3% of queries in languages such as German, Chinese, and Arabic, and an even larger percentage of those in “heavily spammed” languages. Here, think of countries like China, India, and Russia among others.
On May 25, 2012, Google introduced another Penguin update called Penguin 1.1. According to Matt Cutts, former head of webspam at Google, this update was supposed to affect less than a tenth of a percent of English searches. The overarching principle of the update was to punish websites that used manipulative techniques to achieve high rankings.
After the launch of Penguin 3 on October 5, 2012, which affected 0.3% of searches, several important updates followed. On May 22, 2013, Penguin 4, also known as Penguin 2.0, was introduced. This change affected 2.3% of searches. Later, on October 4, 2013, Penguin 5, or as some call it Penguin 2.1, was introduced. This affected about 1% of queries and was considered the latest major addition to the Google Penguin algorithm for some time.
However, in 2016, something remarkable happened. On September 23, Google announced a significant change. Penguin became an integrated part of Google’s core algorithm. This meant that updates would take place in real time. For webmasters, this meant that they no longer had to wait in suspense for the next major update rollout to see if they had emerged from a Penguin penalty. In practice, this meant that website rankings could change instantly based on their content and backlinks.
SpamBrain and Google’s Evolution in Link Handling
In recent years, Google has significantly advanced its ability to manage spammy and low-quality links. One of the key innovations behind this shift is SpamBrain, an AI-driven spam prevention system that can automatically detect and nullify the impact of manipulative or unnatural links. Instead of relying solely on penalties, Google now focuses more on devaluing such links rather than actively punishing websites with ranking drops.
No More Penalties for Links, Just Ignoring Them
With the introduction of SpamBrain and ongoing refinements to their algorithms, Google’s approach to handling bad links has evolved. Today, Google rarely issues penalties for poor-quality or manipulative links. Instead, they simply ignore these links, rendering them ineffective. This means that spammy or low-quality links won’t harm a website’s ranking as severely as they once might have. Google’s primary focus is on devaluing links that don’t meet their quality standards, rather than penalizing sites for having them.
