Search Engine Land
  • SEO
    • > All SEO
    • > What Is SEO?
    • > SEO Periodic Table
    • > Google: SEO
    • > Bing SEO
    • > Google Algorithm Updates
  • PPC
    • > All PPC
    • > What is PPC?
    • > Google Ads
    • > Microsoft Ads
    • > The Periodic Tables of PPC
  • Focuses
    • > Local
    • > Commerce
    • > Shopify SEO Guide
    • > Content
    • > Email Marketing Periodic Table
    • > Social Media Marketing
    • > Analytics
    • > Search Engine Land Awards
    • > All Focuses
  • SMX
  • Webinars
  • Intelligence Reports
  • White Papers
  • About
    • > About Search Engine Land
    • > Newsletter
    • > Third Door Media
    • > Advertise

Processing...Please wait.

Search Engine Land » Google » Google Algorithm Updates » Google Penguin 3.0: Worldwide Rollout Still In Process, Impacting 1% Of English Queries

Google Penguin 3.0: Worldwide Rollout Still In Process, Impacting 1% Of English Queries

Google updated their Penguin algorithm with version Penguin 3.0 late Friday night. The Penguin algorithm primarily looks at a site’s backlink profile and may demote a site that appears to have a poor backlink profile. The Penguin 3.0 release was communicated very poorly by Google. With Google only confirming the update 24-hours after the update […]

Barry Schwartz on October 21, 2014 at 9:39 am

penguins-ss-1920

Google updated their Penguin algorithm with version Penguin 3.0 late Friday night. The Penguin algorithm primarily looks at a site’s backlink profile and may demote a site that appears to have a poor backlink profile.

The Penguin 3.0 release was communicated very poorly by Google. With Google only confirming the update 24-hours after the update was release and not giving us the details they would typically give when we ask them. But this morning at 3:50am EDT, Google’s Pierre Far shared more details on Google+.

Here is the summary:

(1) This is a worldwide update, impacting all versions of Google
(2) The rollout is not complete yet, it will continue for the “next few weeks.”
(3) It impacts less than 1% of English queries but may impact other languages more or less
(4) Google confirmed the roll out began on Friday
(5) Pierre Far specifically called this a “refresh”
(6) It should demote sites with bad link profiles and help sites that were previously hit that cleaned up their link profiles

Worldwide Penguin Rollout

Unlike some of Google’s other algorithm updates, such as the Panda algorithm, the Penguin update typically launches globally. So sites in any language, any region, are all open to the potential impact of this algorithm.

Why? Since Penguin is mostly about link profiles, language doesn’t really need to be looked at by the algorithm. Panda looks more at content and language, thus those algorithms roll out different by region or language. Penguin doesn’t need to worry about language, for the most part.

Penguin Still Rolling Out

There was some confusion if the Penguin refresh was done rolling out or not. SEOs were wondering why not all sites were impacted yet, they felt the roll out was halted or not complete. But yesterday Google’s John Mueller felt it was complete but then retracted that a few hours later. Pierre Far this morning said the roll out is not complete and will likely last for a “few weeks.”

So when analyzing if a site was impacted, it may be hard to nail down the issue to Penguin or another algorithm, since this is a multi-week roll out.

Penguin 3.0 Impacts Less Than 1% Of English Search Queries

When gauging how large an update was and how much of the webmaster community felt it, Google sometimes tells us how significant it was by measuring the percentage of queries impacted.

Penguin 1.0 impacted ~3.1% of queries, 1.1 was 0.1% and 1.2 was 0.3% of queries. Then 2.0 was 2.3% of queries and 2.1 was about 1%. Penguin 3.0, which some may argue is 2.2 and not 3.0, impacted less than 1% of queries.

Now, it may be higher in other languages, but Google’s measurement was English queries.

Penguin 3.0 Launched Friday

Google confirmed that Penguin 3.0 launched Friday, October 17, 2014. Keep in mind, the rollout will continue for a few weeks as we said above.

Penguin 3.0 – A Refresh

Google’s Pierre Far called this update a “refresh,” he didn’t mention that any new signals were added or the algorithm was changed in any way. A refresh in Google’s terminology around algorithms means they just re-ran the algorithm to release sites that fixed their issues and demote sites that had issues they didn’t pick up on. They did not add any new signals to the algorithm to find Penguin related sites, it was just a refresh.

Just a refresh even after waiting over a year? Indeed and this is pretty shocking to most of those in the SEO industry. Many expected a refresh could have happened way earlier and that Google was laying the ground work for a new Penguin algorithm.

Again, this is why some want to rename this update to Penguin 2.2 versus 3.0.

Helps Some Sites & Hurts Other Sites

Like any algorithm refresh, some sites that were previously hit would see a ranking increase because they are no longer negatively impacted by the algorithm. While other sites may see a ranking drop in the search results because they were just picked up as sites that should be impacted by the Penguin algorithm.

Past Penguin Updates:

Here are dates of all Penguin releases:

  • Penguin 1.0 on April 24, 2012 (impacting ~3.1% of queries)
  • Penguin 1.1 on May 26, 2012 (impacting less than 0.1%)
  • Penguin 1.2 on October 5, 2012 (impacting ~0.3% of queries)
  • Penguin 2.0 on May 22, 2013 (impacting 2.3% of queries)
  • Penguin 2.1 on Oct. 4, 2013 (impacting around 1% of queries)
  • Penguin 3.0 on October 17, 2014 (impacting around 1% of queries)

New on Search Engine Land

    Webinar: Dominate your competition with Google auction insights and search intelligence

    Vimeo adds structured data to all public videos to improve Google Search visibility

    How to manage and edit your Google Business Profile from Google search

    Google Search Console page experience report now tracks more desktop search features

    What’s your SEO learning style?

About The Author

Barry Schwartz
Barry Schwartz a Contributing Editor to Search Engine Land and a member of the programming team for SMX events. He owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry can be followed on Twitter here.

Related Topics

GoogleGoogle Algorithm UpdatesGoogle: SEOSEO

Get the daily newsletter search marketers rely on.

Processing...Please wait.

See terms.

ATTEND OUR EVENTS

Learn actionable search marketing tactics that can help you drive more traffic, leads, and revenue.

March 8-9, 2022: Master Classes (virtual)

June 14-15, 2022: SMX Advanced (virtual)

November 15-16, 2022: SMX Next (virtual)

Learn More About Our SMX Events

Discover time-saving technologies and actionable tactics that can help you overcome crucial marketing challenges.

Start Discovering Now: Spring (virtual)

September 28-29, 2022: Fall (virtual)

Learn More About Our MarTech Events

Webinars

Data-Driven Answers to Achieve Omnichannel Success

Is Your Marketing Stack Ready for Omnichannel CX?

Outrank in Organic Search with These 5 Core Tactics

See More Webinars

Intelligence Reports

Enterprise SEO Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide

Enterprise Identity Resolution Platforms

Email Marketing Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide

Enterprise Sales Enablement Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide

Enterprise Digital Experience Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide

Enterprise Call Analytics Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide

See More Intelligence Reports

White Papers

Realising the power of virtual events for demand generation

The Progressive Marketer’s Ultimate Events Strategy 2022 Worksheet

CMO Guide: How to Plan Smart and Pivot Fast

The Retail Renaissance Report, USA Edition: 4 Keys to Predicting Online & In-Store Demand Across Global Markets

Thinking Bigger About Marketing Budgets

See More Whitepapers

Receive daily search news and analysis.

Processing...Please wait.

Topics

  • SEO
  • PPC

Our Events

  • Search Marketing Expo - SMX
  • MarTech

About

  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Privacy
  • Marketing Opportunities
  • Staff

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Newsletters
  • RSS
  • Youtube

© 2022 Third Door Media, Inc. All rights reserved.