Was Google’s October 2 Search Ranking Algorithm Update the Month’s Biggest?

October has come and gone in the blink of an eye, but it has certainly made its presence felt; a month to remember in more ways than one, particularly where Google’s non-stop algorithm updates have been concerned.

SEO trackers and online chatter suggest that at least half a dozen major tweaks have taken place this month. Though perhaps, not quite as monumental as that of October 2.

This was the day when most tracking tools went ballistic; as did the web masters and SEOs are affected. Semrush spiked to 9.2, RankRanger hit a rarely seen peak, Advanced Web Ranking shot up and Moz reported big things happening.

Suffice to say, something huge took place behind the scenes, all with no confirmation or comment from Google.

Consequently, it is hard to know exactly what Google is up to, or what the purpose of the update was. But what seems clear is how most of those affected seem to have suffered negative consequences.

Around the time of the update itself, plenty of publishers took to Webmaster World to vent their frustrations.

“USA Publisher here. USA traffic is awful Sept 30 and Oct 1. It’s strange because, for example, semrush doesn’t seem to picking it up. Which makes me wonder, is USA just sleeping? of course, that’d be best-case scenario seeing a 30% drop,” wrote one disgruntled website owner.

Meanwhile, others indicated that the majority of the negative performance seemed to be confined to the USA.

“USA traffic is atrocious today, -36% and getting worse today. AU has joined the party, but has been down for most of September…UK and elsewhere remains strong,” wrote an SEO on Webmaster World.

Some also indicated that the struggles they were facing were nothing new, having seen nothing but turbulence from Google for some time.

“Continued decline of top 3 ranking, but recovery in top 10+…I am dropping out of top 3 ranking for high volume searches for a month, so back to where I was during the June mess. USA traffic still way down and my home page is down 73% this morning,” commented another Webmaster World user. Whether more updates are on the cards for November remains to be seen, but chances are Google has little to no intention of keeping any of us in the loop