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Google rolled out their latest algorithm refresh, Panda 4.2, during the end of July – and it has left many SEOs waiting for results. Representatives from Google suggested that it could take months for the rollout to wrap up, and in the end, it will affect between 2 and 3 percent of English-language searches.

In order to understand whether Panda 4.2 will affect your law firm’s website, you need to know what it is, what it does, and why Google created it.

What is Google’s Panda?

Google’s Panda algorithm weeds out low-quality sites, and it made a huge impact on the search engine results pages, or SERPs, when they introduced it in February 2011.

The targets were websites that had copied content directly from others and sites that had what they consider “thin” content.

Remember that Google is in the business of delivering high-quality results – so it’s no wonder that they want website owners to provide great content that gives users plenty of information. (It’s also why you need to have plenty of content on your site, which we’ll get to in a moment.)

Refresh vs. Update: Panda 4.2 is a Refresh

When Google “refreshes” the algorithms, they sometimes add a few new features. However, they also reapply most of the signals the original Panda rollout used; this way, they’ll catch low-quality websites that have slipped through the cracks or are teetering on the razor’s edge.

An update is more like an overhaul. Panda itself – the original Panda, that is – was an update to Google’s algorithm. So was Mobilegeddon, and so was Penguin.

How Does Google’s Panda Affect Law Firms?

Panda 4.2 is another “quality” update. If your website is low quality or doesn’t have enough text to answer users’ questions, you could be affected by the latest refresh.

If Panda 4.2 is going to affect your law firm’s website, keep in mind that Google continually refreshes and updates their algorithms. You can still make your site better, ensure that you’re following the latest best practices and keep updating it with great content.

How Do I Make My Site Better?

Most law firms know that they need an Internet presence, but beyond that, things get a little fuzzy. The first step is to claim your free 20-minute site audit, where we’ll go over your site and point out its strengths and weaknesses. We’ll analyze your competitors, too, and then we’ll provide you with a clear plan of action that you can begin using immediately.

Keyword density is an old search engine optimization method that is no longer effective. It involved using a certain keyword – or multiple keywords – a certain number of times on one webpage.

In the late 1990s and the early 2000s, keyword density was a viable SEO strategy. Many people wanted to use between 4 and 6 percent keyword density on each page. If your keyword was law firm marketing, for example, and you wrote a 200 word-article, that phrase would have to appear eight to 12 times. (For the record, this definition clocks in at 220 words. You can imagine how awkward it would be to read that same phrase repeatedly in a piece of this length.)

Misuse of keyword density was rampant. Webmasters were able to “game” the search engines and unfairly get clicks. Users were unhappy, so Google and other major search providers began to penalize websites that used keyword stuffing as an SEO technique.

With the development of smarter search engine crawling technology – particularly latent semantic indexing, which can interpret a page’s content in context – it is no longer necessary to use a certain keyword a certain number of times on a webpage.

In fact, attempting to reach a certain keyword density can trip a flag with the search engine’s crawlers that triggers a penalty for your website.

Keyword cannibalization.

It sounds terrifying, doesn’t it?

It is.

What is Keyword Cannibalization?

Keyword cannibalization is the process of using the same keyword so much on one website that it dilutes its power, confuses the search engine crawlers and makes your site seem repetitive and unusable.

Essentially, what it causes you to do is compete with yourself.

If you’re like most lawyers, you don’t want to compete with yourself and watch your rankings dip – you want the other firms’ rankings to dip so that yours can replace them in the search engine results pages, or SERPs.

Why it’s Important Not to Compete with Yourself

Search engine spiders will try to find one page on your website that’s going to be relevant to searchers for a particular query.

When you have multiple pages on your website optimized for the term personal injury lawyer Des Moines, what kind of value are you really providing searchers? That’s what Google looks for now – value – and if one page eats the popularity of another, your site is cannibalizing the keyword and making it pages seem less valuable than they really are.

How Can You Avoid Keyword Cannibalization?

Keywords are important. They always will be, to some extent, because they’re what lets a search engine crawler know what your page is about.

That doesn’t mean that you should splatter them indiscriminately all over your pages.

Google’s Hummingbird update turned what now looks like rudimentary search technology into remarkably smart, innovative technology. Since Hummingbird, the crawlers can see what your pages are about and, for the most part, they can tell whether searchers will find them useful… no keyword stuffing necessary.

The key to avoiding (or recovering from) keyword cannibalization is to only put up hyper-targeted, specific pages on your website. That goes for blog posts, website copy and all the other content you use; you don’t need several generic pages – you need specific, relevant content.

What Can a Law Firm Do to Rank Well?

You’re already competing against every other law firm in town, so why would you want to add yourself to that list? Most law firms find that it’s best to work with SEO professionals instead of accidentally making mistakes like this.

(Have you claimed your free, custom 20-minute website audit yet?)

Organic search engine results – those that appear naturally on search engine results pages, or SERPs – are incredibly important for law firms. Unlike paid results, which are what you’ll see in the top three spots on a page, organic results come naturally because Google (or any other search engine) recognizes the value in the pages you have to offer.

What’s the Difference Between Paid Search and Organic Results?

Pay-per-click advertising can buy you a spot at the top of the SERPs, but you have to earn a spot in the organic rankings. On Google, you’ll see a yellow box that says “Ad” near paid results.

Organic search results generate a high click-through rate, which means people choose to visit sites that show up below the ads rather than to click on the ads.

Let’s just be clear, though: 71.33 percent of all searches result in a page one Google organic click. Most people don’t bother to visit the second or subsequent pages.

The first five organic (not paid) results on the first page account for 67.6 percent of all the clicks. After the fifth result, the clicks drop dramatically; combined, they total only 3.73 percent of the clicks.

The average click-through rates are as follows, based on a website’s position on the first page of Google search results:

1. 32%
2. 14%
3. 10%
4. 7%
5. 6%

Positions 6 through 10 combined: 3.7 percent

With statistics like those, it’s important that you earn that coveted top spot on the first page – and that you want to rank for organic keywords.

How Can Law Firms Earn a Top Spot in the SERPs?

Earning a top spot in the SERPs is complicated, and it takes quite a bit of work. In fact, it takes more work than many attorneys have the time to put in – and it takes specialized knowledge, just like practicing law does.

One of the first things you need to have is a responsive website. From there, you need serious SEO work. That takes powerful content, a great design that’s easy to navigate and plenty of legwork to stay ahead of search engine.

Have you claimed your free 20-minute website audit? If you haven’t, now is a great time to find out how you stack up against the competition – and we will help you take charge of your Internet presence so you can earn your stripes with Google.

A link exchange is a reciprocal linking scheme that can harm your website’s ranking. Unfortunately, many law firm websites participated in link exchanges when they were a still viable search engine optimization strategy – and they’re still trying to recover.

Examples of link exchanges include directory websites that allow users to submit links and sites that require you to put a link on your website in order to get a link from them.

Other examples of link schemes include:

• Buying or selling links that pass “link juice” or authority
• Guest posts and article marketing strategies that rely on keyword-rich anchor text links
• Using automated programs to create links

Any link that Google considers to be part of a link scheme can result in a penalty.

It’s important to note that link exchanges are not the same as high-quality backlinks that increase your website’s standing in the search engines.

Because link exchanges used to increase a page’s ranking on the search engine results pages, or SERPs, many lawyers paid for services that advertised numerous backlinks. Many of those law firm sites are still trying to bounce back after Google’s search engine algorithm updates began penalizing low-quality links.