Google announced they have updated their ranking algorithm to detect a larger and better set of doorway pages and thus wipe them out of the search results, as to improve search quality within Google’s search results.

Brian White from Google’s search quality team said:

Truth is, I have not heard many complaints about doorway pages ranking well in Google. But I guess they were for Google to improve their algorithm for that.

With that, Google quietly updated their doorway pages guidelines page. Now it read:

The previous day it read:

It seems Google’s definition has shrunk a bit around this.

So how do you know if your pages are at risk? Google said ask yourself these questions:

Is the purpose to optimize for search engines and funnel visitors into the actual usable or relevant portion of your site, or are they an integral part of your site’s user experience?
Are the pages intended to rank on generic terms yet the content presented on the page is very specific?
Do the pages duplicate useful aggregations of items (locations, products, etc.) that already exist on the site for the purpose of capturing more search traffic?
Are these pages made solely for drawing affiliate traffic and sending users along without creating unique value in content or functionality?
Do these pages exist as an “island?” Are they difficult or impossible to navigate to from other parts of your site? Are links to such pages from other pages within the site or network of sites created just for search engines?

As of now, I have yet to see mass scale complaints about sites that have doorway pages no longer ranking too well. This includes my monitoring of more “black hat” forums and social discussions. I’ll keep an eye out.

Forum discussion at Twitter & Google+ & Black Hat Forums.