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Google: No comment on possibility of a Feb. 7 algorithm update

Did your rankings in Google get better or worse over the past week? Many webmasters and SEOs are noticing some significant changes in Google's search rankings algorithm.

Barry Schwartz on February 13, 2017 at 2:18 pm

Last Tuesday, Feb. 7, there seems to have been a Google algorithm change that adjusted how many sites rank — both for good and bad. I’ve been tracking the update since Feb. 8, and over time, more and more webmasters and SEOs have been taking notice of the ranking changes at Google.

This seems to be unrelated to the unconfirmed link algorithm change from earlier in February. This new update seems to be more related to Panda, based on such things as content and site quality, versus link factors.

Google has not confirmed the update and would not comment on what webmasters and SEOs have been noticing over the past week in the search results. So we cannot confirm if this was a content quality shift, link quality change or something else. But what we can say is that webmasters and SEOs are very busy noticing these ranking changes, through looking at ranking reports or their traffic from Google in their analytics, or using tracking tools that track visibility and other means.

The automated tracking tools from Mozcast, RankRanger, Accuranker and others also all showed evidence of an algorithm update on Feb. 7.

This update seems to have been somewhat significant, which is why we reached out to Google for a comment. If we hear more from Google, we will update you. But for now, this is all based on the conversation and chatter that I track closely within the industry.

About The Author

Barry Schwartz

Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on SEM topics.