4 Ways To Avoid Being Labeled A “Content Farm” By Google

Google Farmer Algorithm Guide

Late last week I sent out an update on Google’s Farmer algorithm change, and while the change comes as a pleasant change for websites being plagiarized by content farms, there is some concern by websites that churn out daily content. Web owners are concerned they might be labeled “the farmer” should another site copy their work or house similar content.  So how does one avoid being considered a low-quality publisher in the eyes of the search giant?

1. Don’t Stress Over every Single Piece of Content
   Google wont just label you a farm based on one piece of content, so if you have one article extremely similar to twenty other sites in a particular week I wouldn’t worry too much. If this is happening on a daily basis, however, then you might want to have a word with your editorial team and consider some drastic changes.
2. Google Loves “Useful”
   Google want “useful” information, sounds ambiguous I know. But in a nutshell, in the eyes of Google, useful is something readable, well structured, grammatically sound, often accompanied by supporting images, and well researched using quotes and references. Okay, not every piece you write needs that much depth, but useful isn’t two paragraphs sitting like a pea surrounded by adverts galore.
3. Lower Your Bounce Rate
   Good content doesn’t have a near on 100% bounce rate followed by a click straight though to another related search in the same search listing page. Check your analytics, and if you see consistently high bounce rates and very low visitor page time, then you need to work harder on your content.
4. Sharing isn’t Farming
   Don’t worry yourself by confusing the two – sharing isn’t farming. Sharing a video from YouTube or sharing a link from an interesting blog isn’t farming. Spinning articles everyday from other sites is, and so is republishing other websites’ content for the purpose of attracting a high volume of visitors to spike your rate of ad clicks.

The golden rule is this: if it feels like farming then it probably is. Copying is never cool, well-executed rewrites on the other hand…well, there are few writings in the world that are entirely original….