Image MisMatch Penalty
Google have launched a new penalty called image mismatch. This is where you have images being indexed in the search results as being from your website but those on your site display different. It is a form of image cloaking, one where you can get rankings for images but in actual fact fooling Google because they are not actually the images on your website.
Google will therefore apply a partial penalty to the parts of the sites that are affected, and the penalty will be listed under the Manual Actions section in your webmaster tools account.
The steps to follow if you have this penalty is to firstly look through the code on the website to ensure nothing is un-towards. Google have warned that some sites are using anti-hotlinking tools. Once the issue is fixed, submit a reconsideration request.
No Downside to Mobile SEO Using Responsive Design
Google’s Matt Cutts confirmed yesterday that there was no downside to your SEO efforts if you use responsive designs to optimise your website content for mobile users.
Matt Cutts also went on to explain that in fact there are no duplication of efforts when it comes to linking and PageRank, plus the managing of content for the mobile website that you would have to do for a dedicated mobile URL.
Google Testing the Yellow “Ad” Icon in the UK
Some people have recently seen adverts appearing on Google with the yellow box icon stating “Ad” in it. A yellow icon will also appear above the sponsored links on the right hand side that says “Ads”. This appears to be Google testing the icon as it has not been rolled out as a change as yet. However it can be said over recent years the coloured box that usually goes behind Google sponsored link adverts has become increasingly difficult to distinguish.
Google first started testing this on mobile phone ads in September but it is now testing them on desktops.
Google Webmaster Tools issues Security Issues Section
Google have announced a new section in webmaster tools called Security Issues. Within here you will see any issues with malware, error template injection, SQL injection and Content injection.
You can then drill down into each issue so you can quickly see the issue with the code or the content.
Once you have fixed the issue you can then tick the box for “I have fixed these issues” and then “request a review” for Google to review. This will speed up the process of getting your website re-indexed if you have been dropped following a malware issue.
