Google has confirmed the details of its latest algorithm update; this one is targeting websites that are deemed to be too reliant on adverts.
The change is in reaction to user comments about how their experience is worsened by pages where finding readable content is hard. As such, it will impact those sites where there is only a
“…small amount of visible content above-the-fold or relevant content persistently (being) pushed down by ads.”
Though the volume of adverts a site has will be the most determining factor for those affected, how a site looks overall will be important too, with the statement also warning about other ways in which content is obscured.
As such, strong page construction and flow could also be counted towards its user value.
It is yet another move to make things more enjoyable for the user and comes on the back of similar updates. It all means that those with modern day SEO careers have a good deal more to focus their efforts on.
The way an entire page is laid out will be evermore important; not as critical as the content and its relevancy, but certainly a bigger concern than ever before.
Google state that somewhere in the region of just one percent of sites will be affected and that there will be a number of weeks for webmasters and SEO marketers to enact changes.
It is likely to be a very busy year for such work though, as this latest update is apparently just the first of more than five hundred such changes to be introduced in 2012.
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