A recent poll over at SEORoundTable.com has determined that 65% of over 1,000 respondents reported traffic losses thanks to the Google Penguin update back in April.

For those of you unaware, Penguin is what Google’s major Web Spam update is popularly known as. Essentially it was an update to Google’s search algorithm that went after (and often penalized) websites that had unnatural links pointing to them or were linking out unnaturally to other websites.

In Google’s eyes (and according to their Webmaster Guidelines) links that appear to be paid for, come from bad neighborhoods (gambling sites, pharmaceutical sites, link farms, etc.) or seem like they are trying to “game the system” rather than provide true value to users, are unnatural, and thus a site is called out for it.

Thus far, people who have suffered after the Penguin update have reported rankings disappearances and severe losses of traffic. While others have reported traffic increases or no change at all.

Read more about this recent poll over at SEO Round Table…