A bit about Penguin
The basic idea is to bring up quality content on SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) rather than content that has good SEO. Penguin
is conceptually focused on removing webspam and sites that use 'black
hat' SEO techniques, such as cloaking, keyword stuffing, hidden texts,
etc. Unethical tricks, in other words.
If you got hit by Penguin, then you are in trouble. It means Google
doesn't like your site! And it's that serious. You seriously need to
think over some things, because chances are, you are spamming or
tricking users in some way even you might not realize. Don't worry
though. While difficult, recovery is possible.
Google Penguin - Roadmap
This update is the third major update, but the sixth overall in the
Penguin line. The 3.0 number isn't official, rather something SEOs have
come up with. The first Penguin, the 1.0, was rolled out on 24th April
2012, and it impacted about 3.1% of all search queries.
After two small updates, Penguin 2.0 was released in May 2013 which
impacted about 2.3% queries. A 2.1update followed in October, and this
was the last update in the Penguin lineup until now, with the rollout of
Penguin 3.0.
This latest Penguin release is one of the most anticipated algorithm
updates in Google’s history. Some publishers have been desperately
waiting for the refresh that arrives just over a year since the last.
Why is this a big deal?
Improved algorithmic efficiency aside, this is good news for publishers.
If you’re hit by it, even if you make changes, you have to wait until
the next release to see if your changes have done what Google wanted. So
publishers hit by the last version of Penguin — back in October 2013 —
have been waiting until now to see if actions they’re tried such as
removing spammy links have worked. If so, they’re likely to see an
increase in traffic soon.
Some people may see ranking drops but not actually be hit by Penguin.
That’s because if Penguin causes a wide range of links to be discounted,
those links will no longer pass along the credit or act as “votes” as
they once might have. Sites that gained from these fake votes — as
Google would consider them — lose that credit and thus potentially
visibility, even though they weren’t penalized by Google directly.
Google has suggested that with the latest version of Penguin, it also
would have a new system allowing for refreshes to happen more
frequently. Time will tell on that — the count starts now.
If you're looking to undo the damages done by Penguin, here are posts that contain all that you need to lift the penalty.