The Payday Loan update is a Google webspam update that, according to reports, began in June 2013 and affected queries with heavy spam, named after the loan queries it targeted. The term is historical.
At a glance
- Type
- Webspam update for heavily spammed queries (unofficial name)
- Started
- June 2013, according to reports
- Completed
- not documented
- Confirmed by
- no, according to reports; not in Google’s current documentation
- Status
- historical
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What was the goal?
Google wanted to improve results for queries where a lot of spam shows up. Search Engine Journal lists payday loans, casinos, debt consolidation, pharmaceuticals, mortgages, insurance and adult content. According to reports, about 0.3 percent of US queries were affected, and about 4 percent in Turkey. According to the same reports, Matt Cutts said the update goes after link schemes, many of them illegal.
Later versions
Version 2.0 followed in May 2014. Reports describe it as aimed at spammy sites, using link-based signals.
What applies today?
Google’s spam policies describe violations such as link schemes and keyword stuffing, which Google detects through automated systems and, as needed, human review. Sites that violate the policies may rank lower or not appear at all. Spam updates are the current form of such measures.
Example
A domain for quick loans with thousands of bought links to a few target pages is the pattern the update was reported to go after.
Sources
- Spam policies for Google web search – Google Search Centraldevelopers.google.com
- Google Payday Loan Algorithm Update – Search Engine Journal (secondary source)searchenginejournal.com
- Google Payday Loan Update – SISTRIX (secondary source)sistrix.com
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