If you run a website and have basic interest in SEO, you probably heard that Google recently released their so-called Panda update, a change in algorithm aimed at getting rid of the shitty sites such as eHow.com and similar content farms.
The change in the algorithm came in 2 iterations. The first one came out on February 24th, in the US only, affecting about 10% of search queries. The second one was released on April 11th and was rolled out in the rest of English-speaking countries, also making a slight change to the US algo, which supposedly affects an additional 2% of US queries.
On the morning of February 25th, I was glad to see that my iPhone blog had gone through the update and came out unhurt. Even better than that, it seemed I was doing even better in search engines. It was nice to see Google recognizing me as a good resource. Then on April 12, everything changed when I realized the second iteration of the Panda update had slapped me in the face. Big time!
Something that freaks me out more than anything online is seeing some of my websites or pages disappearing from Google’s index from time to time. There is generally a good reason for that to happen and troubleshooting the issue quickly and thoroughly can help you save tons of “leaking traffic”. I had a similar problem over the weekend. Let me tell you what happened and how I fixed it. 
We all have a vague idea of how Google Adwords works. You give them a list of keywords, create your ad and and set a maximum bid. But do you really know how the ad auction work? It’s all based on 3 simple criteria: your max bid, other advertisers max bid, and ad quality (CTR, relevance, landing page). Taking all these criteria into account, Google will then give you an ad rank, which will eventually determine your actual CPC. Sounds confusing? Then read on… 
