Google ranking completely different page??

[StevieJK]

Hi all,

I am link building for a particular page on my website, however Google is ranking a completely different page for that keyword - anyone know why this is happening?

This other page does mention this keyword on it, but it is not as optimized as the page I am link building for, nor am I building backlinks to it.

So why is this one ranking and my intended page isn't?

Thanks.

[powerslave]

Has happened to me a few times, especially with new sites. Seems google needs time to work out what page should rank for what k/w and such. It should sort itself out in a few days and the correct page will start to rank.

[StevieJK]

Thanks!

It's really weird, and it's not even a new site.

The incorrect page that is ranking, is not very well optimised for the keywordsit's ranking for, and it has 0 external blacklinks to it.

The page that I would like to rank but isn't - is much more optimised and has 392 external backlinks to it, a lot of them with relevent anchor text too.

Weird!?

[JamesGw]

You're probably penalized on the page you're linking to due to too much exact match anchor text. Mix it up man.

[StevieJK]

Thanks, but I have mixed up the anchor text. It is a mixture of:

'keyword phrase'
'myurl.com keyword phrase'
'myurl.com'

Is this not enough variation?

[JSProjects]

Originally Posted by StevieJK

Hi all,

I am link building for a particular page on my website, however Google is ranking a completely different page for that keyword - anyone know why this is happening?

This other page does mention this keyword on it, but it is not as optimized as the page I am link building for, nor am I building backlinks to it.

So why is this one ranking and my intended page isn't?

Thanks.

Not uncommon. I've seen this happen on new(ish) sites while they stabilize in Google. Just keep plugging away and Google should eventually straighten things out.

[powerslave]

I would certainly throw in a few completely random anchor text links, although that doesn't mean this is definitely the cause of the problem. Another reason could be if you have recently thrown a bunch of spammy links at the page. In any case, if it has only just happened I would just wait and keep an eye on it for now.

[kaedus]

Don't worry too much about it at the moment. You could do something like a rel canonical from the page that is currently ranking to the page you want to rank, or even just throw a backlink from the page that is ranking to the page you would like to rank with the appropriate anchor. That could help Google sort things out faster.

[RevSEO]

I've seen that happen before, sometimes its where your getting internal links to that page from on your site. For example if you have the link to that page from several powerful internal pages and offsite links, it can rank for it because the content on the page that is ranking includes a link to your other page and thus has the keyword on it, which is why its ranking.

Othertimes that can happen as a result of over anchor text optimization which is why I recommend to diversify your anchor text for links to the page that you want to have ranked.

[Ken Durham]

Be sure you didn't over optimize the page, that will cause this happen. Too many keyword instances? Not enough LSI? Too much?

[akasheg]

Sometimes the new results take some time to show. So wait for sometime and check whether you still have the same problem.

[StevieJK]

Thanks all for the advice.

I am planning to vary my anchor text and throw in some more random variations like 'click here' etc.

However, I still find it hard to believe that Google would 'penalize' your ranking due to anchor text in backlinks all being too similar and un-natural.

I mean, if this was the case - then surely Google itself would just be an uncontrollable battlefield of people throwin thousands of same anchor text backlinks to their competitor's sites to get them penalized and drop in rankings??

Surely Google is smarter than this and will just not give any weight to suspected un-natural backlinks instead of penalizing you?

[frogman]

Originally Posted by StevieJK

Thanks all for the advice.

I am planning to vary my anchor text and throw in some more random variations like 'click here' etc.

However, I still find it hard to believe that Google would 'penalize' your ranking due to anchor text in backlinks all being too similar and un-natural.

I mean, if this was the case - then surely Google itself would just be an uncontrollable battlefield of people throwin thousands of same anchor text backlinks to their competitor's sites to get them penalized and drop in rankings??

Surely Google is smarter than this and will just not give any weight to suspected un-natural backlinks instead of penalizing you?

Agreed.
Don't sweat the page that is ranking, build links to your target page and you might end up with a double listing.