Throughout the years, we’ve witnessed Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) actively go through both minor and major growth spurts. The shift here is not only probable, but inevitable. Nevertheless, we have adapted to each one as best we could.

Over the past couple of weeks, Google introduced a major update which has unofficially and jokingly been named ‘Fred’.
Fred, “an unconfirmed Google algorithm update related to quality and targeting low value sites by way of content, links, affiliates and ads” has led to reports of widespread impacts across the SEO Community. 

How Does the ‘Fred’ Change Affect You?

Essentially, websites are ranked by two things: relevance and authority. Relevance is determined by keywords and their placement while authority is determined by the number of quality links that point to that content.

What’s Changed?

- Fred penalizes content driven sites that are overrun with ads and motivated by driving ad revenue where they become troublesome for users trying to view content.

- Weeding out sites that use unethical keyword stuffing.

- Overall, the Google ranking update has focused on outbound links and link quality – meaning it measures a website per the other sites that point back to it.

SEO specialists are observing a decrease in web traffic, which is consequently corresponding to a decrease in ranking - “sites reported being impacted by this update experienced a dramatic drop in search traffic, by more than 50%.” Therefore, this can signal an upsurge of great brands and contribute to the downfall of some of the largest in the world.

Without the right help, reviewing your existing SEO strategy is both time-consuming and difficult. Here at Webmaster Studio, our team consists of some the most knowledgeable professionals, specializing in effectively optimizing your search engine results, page rank and expanding page traffic. Thanks to Google’s ongoing evolution, adaptation has become one of our most prized skills. Let us help review your existing strategies!