Ranking #4 on Google in 9 days, with ZERO backlinks, ZERO site PR, bad domain and ZERO experience

[Bulldozer]

OK, people, the saga continues!

I published a page (a WordPress post, to be precise, even though I'm running a self-hosted WordPress site, not a WordPress blog) with some money-related content on my newly started 3-pages web site 9 days ago.
This was my first experience with kewyord research and SEO.

You may have seen several recent threads, started by me, that were about my site quickly reaching Top 5 ranking on Yahoo and Bing, but not ranking AT ALL in Google.
Yeah, I bitched about this a lot.

Today, ladies and gentlemen, my 9-days old post, residing on my 1 month-old domain, is ranking #4 on Google. Just like that!

What did I do to get to the #4 spot?
Nothing.
I only manually wrote (not spun) a 800-word post with the keyword mentioned in it 3 times, added the KW to the WordPress tags and made a smart title for the post.
And that was it!

Also, the keyword is totally different from the domain name of my site! I started the domain name, targeting a different keyword.
In other words: no exact domain in this case.

I did not build any backlinks and my site has no page rank (my PR is ZERO - can't be otherwise for a brand new 3-page site).

I did not use any bullsh*t link wheels or black hat software to spam articles around the internet or anything like that.

And let's not forget how competitive the money-related market is!

Nine days ago I did not have Market Samurai or Micro Niche Finder. I was doing keyword research only using the Google Keyword Tool.
And I got mislead by it big time.
Now I do have both MS and MNF and guess what - they both reported that my keyword has a truckload of competition! Not a big surprise at all - everything money-related is overloaded these days.

Let me tell you something: if I had these programs 9 days ago, I would have NEVER gone after this keyword. Never.
The comp is just brutal... but I beat them without even knowing it!

Alright, at this point you must have already guessed that this thread is about me bragging about my first SEO success.
I may be a newbie but I gotta be a natural to have such success, right?
Actually, this is a great idea. Call me Mr. Natural.



PS:
I don't mean to say that backlinks or exact domains and page PR are not important! Sure they are. Actually, from what I have read, they are vital.
However, sometimes Google surprises us pleasantly.

[dp40oz]

Is this gonna be another one of those posts when you realize you are only ranked #4 in your browser because you have personalized results from Google.

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by dp40oz

Is this gonna be another one of those posts when you realize you are only ranked #4 in your browser because you have personalized results from Google.

Wrong!
Do you think I did not check my ranking 1000 times from different PCs, places and IPs?
I could not believe it too, so I did a ton of checks.
My #4 is more than legit.

[timpears]

Well all I can say is congratulations. I am jealous as I am doing back linking till I am going crazy and I don't show up anywhere. Oh well, it has to kick in some time.

Anyway, keep up the good work. Now go rinse and repeat.

[Bulldozer]

^ Thanks, appreciated, but I think the most interesting part is still ahead of me.
The #1 spot.

Another thing that's left is to see if I can generate some income.

[Matt Ward]

What is the point of this thread? If you don't mention what the keyword is, this is more than pointless. It could be a keyword without any actual competition or searches for all we know. How many exact searches per month does this keyword have?

What did I do to get to the #4 spot?
Nothing.

It's not exactly an "SEO success" as you put it, if you didn't even do any SEO, which you also admitted. You basically just made a thread about how you didn't do anything.

I'm not trying to be rude, but I don't understand the point of this thread.

[BlakeM]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

^ Thanks, appreciated, but I think the most interesting part is still ahead of me.
The #1 spot.

Another thing that's left is to see if I can generate some income.

Can you post or pm me the keyword and URL? I don't plan on competing, but have a hard believing this is legit. Ive ranked plenty of terms on page 1 w/o back links, but none with crazy competition like yours supposedly has.

[Crystal Love]

Originally Posted by mattward

What is the point of this thread? If you don't mention what the keyword is, this is more than pointless. It could be a keyword without any actual competition or searches for all we know. How many exact searches per month does this keyword have?

It's not exactly an "SEO success" as you put it, if you didn't even do any SEO, which you also admitted. You basically just made a thread about how you didn't do anything.

I'm not trying to be rude, but I don't understand the point of this thread.

Mattward is EXACTLY right!

Anyone can rank first page on Google even overnight for pointless and/or under-searched keywords. You're there because there is no competition.

Go to the Google Adwords Keyword Tool and type your keyword in, check the EXACT MATCH results, and unclick broad match. There is either no competition because it is a worthless keyword, or there is no competition because you're the sole person who discovered a secret goldmine.

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by mattward

It's not exactly an "SEO success" as you put it, if you didn't even do any SEO, which you also admitted. You basically just made a thread about how you didn't do anything.

Read my first post one more time and you will spot the single most important thing that I've done and it's importance for SEO.

When I said that I did nothing to rank my page, I meant nothing off-page.
No backlinks, no chasing a high PR, no domain, etc. - not a single one of the things that 99% of all people focus on.
I did NOTHING of that.

[BlakeM]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

Read my first post one more time and you will spot the single most important thing that I've done and it's importance for SEO.

When I said that I did nothing to rank my page, I meant nothing off-page.
No backlinks, no chasing a high PR, no domain, etc. - not a single one of the things that 99% of all people focus on.
I did NOTHING of that.

How about some proof? I, for one, am 99% sure there is something off here.

[Crystal Love]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

Read my first post one more time and you will spot the single most important thing that I've done and it's importance for SEO.

When I said that I did nothing to rank my page, I meant nothing off-page.
No backlinks, no chasing a high PR, no domain, etc. - not a single one of the things that 99% of all people focus on.
I did NOTHING of that.

If you do proper on page SEO, you don't need ANY backlinks for a keyword that is not competitive. Think of it as a gun fight, if you're going to rob a bank you just need a gun, "on-page SEO" and if you're going to battle with the Colombian Cartel, you'll need more firepower such as backlinks.

This is a good reminder about the importance of onpage SEO, which many people seem not to understand.

[bhuff85]

I agree with the others here, too.

I think it's awesome that you've got to the first page with no extra work and some simple elements of on-page SEO (for the most part, anyway); however, the real test is whether or not this keyword:

- Brings in any traffic
- Is a keyword that is heavily searched for

If it's bringing in a good chunk of traffic and is a keyword that has quite a few searches per month, great. If not, it's more of a keyword that isn't searched much and has low competition in the top 10 results for that specific keyword.

Overall, no matter how competitive your actual niche is, it doesn't apply if it's regarding a keyword that has a small amount of searches and weak competition on the first page for that specific keyword.

For example, let's say you were in the credit niche. It's obvious that it is going to be tough to rank of the keyword "credit cards", but it's entirely possible for you to rank on the 1st page with little to no backlinks for the phrase "where can I find a credit card for bad credit", as this search is more specific and probably a phrase that is not searched for often.

So, yeah - just slapping up a page of content and ranking on the front page for a competitive term that actually gets plenty of searches and generates click-through traffic isn't that simple. If it were, thousands of others would be in the same situation.

[Mike Anthony]

Good Job but theres one thing you can do. Change the title of this thread to

Ranking #4 on Google in 9 days, with ZERO backlinks, ZERO site PR, bad domain, ZERO experience and all for a term that gets almost no traffic

[Bulldozer]

Here is a screenshot from MarketSamurai that I took a few minutes ago.
I will not reveal my keyword but it is related to wealth and money. It is very competitive, just like every single keyword in this niche.
I challenge you to try to find a money niche that has weak competition.

I don't know why Market Samurai shows that I am ranked only on Google and on Bing.
It does not show that I am ranked on Yahoo.
But believe me: I am ranked Top 5 on Yahoo too.

[JSProjects]

I wouldn't get too excited just yet. I've seen plenty of new sites rank high initially. But if you let them sit, their rankings will begin to plummet. You need to start building some backlinks unless your keyword has incredibly poor competition. (Which usually means very little traffic as well.)

[MikeFriedman]

And how many EXACT searches a month does this keyword get? Not broad or phrase, but exact searches.

[BlakeM]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

It is very competitive, just like every single keyword in this niche.
I challenge you to try to find a money niche that has weak competition.

"How to make money online, even if you have purple hair."

I bet you this will be ranked #1 in G pretty soon. And its in the money making niche!!! I guess I'm just a natural like you.

Next time you wanna make a post for the sole purpose of bragging, please be prepared to back it up.

[JamesGw]

You make some strange threads, man.

Congratulations either way, if it's actually a decent keyword. How many allintitle: results are there and what's the average backlink count of the first page?

Originally Posted by dp40oz

Is this gonna be another one of those posts when you realize you are only ranked #4 in your browser because you have personalized results from Google.

I thought this too and got excited. I feel like I'm the personalized search police around here sometimes.

[Mike Anthony]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

H
I challenge you to try to find a money niche that has weak competition.

Okay

this one has almost no competition

give me some bling bling money - Google Search

This one is pretty weak too

http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&q=how+to+make+money+wa shing+dogs&oq=how+to+make+money+washing+dogs&aq=f& aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=2018l16699l0l17535l38l35l 7l14l21l0l263l2376l3.4.7l14l0

as is this

how to be a millionaire before 22 - Google Search

[bhuff85]

Originally Posted by MikeFriedman

And how many EXACT searches a month does this keyword get? Not broad or phrase, but exact searches.

Exactly what Mike said.

The more specific you get (i.e. "how can I make a sausage and cheese sandwich in a microwave"), the easier it is to rank; however, the less traffic you will receive (if any at all).

You can have 10,000 page 1 rankings, but if they rank for keywords that get searched twice per year, it means very little.

[JamesGw]

Originally Posted by bhuff85

Exactly what Mike said.

The more specific you get (i.e. "how can I make a sausage and cheese sandwich in a microwave"), the easier it is to rank; however, the less traffic you will receive (if any at all).

You can have 10,000 page 1 rankings, but if they rank for keywords that get searched twice per year, it means very little.

I'd take 10,000 page 1 rankings for keywords that get searched twice a month, though.

[JumpstartSEO]

Good work. It's a start, but don't expect it to remain that easy. Try targeting a more popular keyword, and see how it goes.

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by Mike Anthony

Okay

this one has almost no competition

give me some bling bling money - Google Search

This one is pretty weak too

http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&q=how+to+make+money+wa shing+dogs&oq=how+to+make+money+washing+dogs&aq=f& aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=2018l16699l0l17535l38l35l 7l14l21l0l263l2376l3.4.7l14l0

as is this

how to be a millionaire before 22 - Google Search

Guys, can't you see my screenshot from Market Samruai?
Did you even had a look at it?
Does it look to you like my keyword is "seven-hundred-words-in-a-line-long-and-thats-why-it-is-ranking-since-theres-no-competition-for-a-long-bullsh*t-word-like-that"?

Just look at the screenshot.

[TolyZ]

If no traffic then what's the point?

[zmorris]

Impressive. Don't you think if you did do some sort of back linking that you could possibly end up in the first spot for your term? The difference between 4th and 1st is a TON of traffic.

[imjustgtd]

Good job Mr Natural, now rinse and repeat

[Mike Anthony]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

Guys, can't you see my screenshot from Market Samruai?
Did you even had a look at it?
Does it look to you like my keyword is "seven-hundred-words-in-a-line-long-and-thats-why-it-is-ranking-since-theres-no-competition-for-a-long-bullsh*t-word-like-that"?

.

okay I'm sorry . Try these

cash pit - Google Search

money tin - Google Search

and

cash porsche - Google Search

[MikeFriedman]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

Guys, can't you see my screenshot from Market Samruai?
Did you even had a look at it?
Does it look to you like my keyword is "seven-hundred-words-in-a-line-long-and-thats-why-it-is-ranking-since-theres-no-competition-for-a-long-bullsh*t-word-like-that"?

Just look at the screenshot.

How about the screenshot showing the number of searches per month?

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by zmorris

Impressive. Don't you think if you did do some sort of back linking that you could possibly end up in the first spot for your term? The difference between 4th and 1st is a TON of traffic.

Well, no, I did not do backlinking for this page. But I think that my domain has one backlink on some sort of a very generic public directory - it came like that when I bought it. I think all domains from this provider come backlinked to this dir. So, theoretically my main URL (but not the URL of the page with the keyword) exists on one dir on the internet.

I did not know that the difference betwenn #4 and #1 was big. Damn... I hoped that my site would just keep climbing in ranks and would reach #1 after a week or so.

I will start building backlinks for sure but before I do that I will let it sit and monitor how it behaves on the rankings.
Will start backlinking it only after it starts declining.

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by Mike Anthony

okay I'm sorry . Try these

cash pit - Google Search

money tin - Google Search

and

cash porsche - Google Search

OK, another clarification: my keyword is something that actually makes sense.
Your example with "Cash Porche" sounds cool, though. It's almost a believable niche keyword.

[MikeFriedman]

Ok, I've asked 3 times now. How many exact searches is this keyword getting?

[oogyboogawa]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

OK, another clarification: my keyword is something that actually makes sense.
Your example with "Cash Porche" sounds cool, though. It's almost a believable niche keyword.

If that's the case then why do you keep responding to everyone except those who directly ask for the number of EXACT searches the term receives?

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by MikeFriedman

Ok, I've asked 3 times now. How many exact searches is this keyword getting?

The keyword has around 11,000 exact monthly searches.

I need to make a major correction.

I just remembered that the first hours after I published the page I farted around with the backlinks idea and I submitted 8 or 10 backlinks to blogs.

However, Market Samurai and the other tools show that there are currently Zero backlinks pointing to my site.

I have two theories about this:

The first theory is that the backlinks that I submitted were immediately deleted by the blog moderators as spam (I tried to make them informational and non-spammy but in the end of the day it's just that - spam). This is actually the reason why I abandoned the idea of building backlinks. I did not want to spam people's blogs.

The second theory is that those blogs were nofollow and with or without those links, my site is not getting any link juice anyway.So my statement in the title that my page ranked #4 with Zero backlinks stands true.

[MikeFriedman]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

So my statement in the title that there are no back links stands true.

Not really. Market Samurai and other backlinking tools do not show you all the backlinks that search engines have indexed. The only way to know if those backlinks exist would be to go back to the blogs and check if your comments are still there.

Market Samurai, especially, is really bad at giving backlink data.

[mesmerist]

Originally Posted by BlakeM

"How to make money online, even if you have purple hair."

LOL! Gotta love this one!

[warriorjohn1444]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

OK, people, the saga continues!

I published a page (a WordPress post, to be precise, even though I'm running a self-hosted WordPress site, not a WordPress blog) with some money-related content on my newly started 3-pages web site 9 days ago.
This was my first experience with kewyord research and SEO.

You may have seen several recent threads, started by me, that were about my site quickly reaching Top 5 ranking on Yahoo and Bing, but not ranking AT ALL in Google.
Yeah, I bitched about this a lot.

Today, ladies and gentlemen, my 9-days old post, residing on my 1 month-old domain, is ranking #4 on Google. Just like that!

What did I do to get to the #4 spot?
Nothing.
I only manually wrote (not spun) a 800-word post with the keyword mentioned in it 3 times, added the KW to the WordPress tags and made a smart title for the post.
And that was it!

Also, the keyword is totally different from the domain name of my site! I started the domain name, targeting a different keyword.
In other words: no exact domain in this case.

I did not build any backlinks and my site has no page rank (my PR is ZERO - can't be otherwise for a brand new 3-page site).

I did not use any bullsh*t link wheels or black hat software to spam articles around the internet or anything like that.

And let's not forget how competitive the money-related market is!

Nine days ago I did not have Market Samurai or Micro Niche Finder. I was doing keyword research only using the Google Keyword Tool.
And I got mislead by it big time.
Now I do have both MS and MNF and guess what - they both reported that my keyword has a truckload of competition! Not a big surprise at all - everything money-related is overloaded these days.

Let me tell you something: if I had these programs 9 days ago, I would have NEVER gone after this keyword. Never.
The comp is just brutal... but I beat them without even knowing it!

Alright, at this point you must have already guessed that this thread is about me bragging about my first SEO success.
I may be a newbie but I gotta be a natural to have such success, right?
Actually, this is a great idea. Call me Mr. Natural.



PS:
I don't mean to say that backlinks or exact domains and page PR are not important! Sure they are. Actually, from what I have read, they are vital.
However, sometimes Google surprises us pleasantly.

Common guys, we should know that such things happen in Yahoo and MSN. One of my site also went up the first page of Yahoo the first week i launched it. I had the keywords complete in the domain and was on the first spot for Yahoo just like within 7 days. I only lasted there for a week before going deep in the serp, certainly because i don't deserve that position at that time.

Yahoo is just getting use to you and welcoming you on board.

[intelinside]

I think this happened because of the QDF algo of Google and it is normal. You need to wait for a week or so and if you are still there then that is something commendable.

Learn more about QDF at SeoMoz here:
Query Deserves Freshness - Whiteboard Friday | SEOmoz

[gtk29]

All I can say is that you are very lucky And here people are working so hard trying to come on the first page in Google search results LOL

[paulgl]

It's not luck. It's very common. When SEO pros promote this,
I call it a parlor trick.

I guess we're waiting for a WSO...

Here's the thing... this thread ranks #1 for
OK, people, the saga continues

With
No PR (of course there's no PR, as PR is updated every few months)
No backlinks (Well, not really true here or there, as internal links do count)
And the domain has nothing to do with: OK, people, the saga continues

The point is?

OK, people, the saga continues...

Paul

[paulgl]

Originally Posted by BlakeM

"How to make money online, even if you have purple hair."

I bet you this will be ranked #1 in G pretty soon. And its in the money making niche!!! I guess I'm just a natural like you.

Sorry I missed this. You are stealing some of my ooooooooooolld material..

This thread ranks #2, no quotes, for that phrase.

Paul

[Andrew S]

this is called the honeymoon period

most new sites have one, the only exception maybe very aggressively linked sites

OP you're early to toot the victory horn, the battle has only just begun for your site

[Vlad Romanov]

I can rank my site for the keyword gwerg2f52v on first page, then post a screenshot with that keyword blurred out. True story

[trustumar]

Has your site received any traffic from this keyword and has it produced any revenue?

[StoneWilson]

Originally Posted by Mike Anthony

Good Job but theres one thing you can do. Change the title of this thread to

Ranking #4 on Google in 9 days, with ZERO backlinks, ZERO site PR, bad domain, ZERO experience and all for a term that gets almost no traffic

Don't be so mean, maybe it's because the website is in "Presentation Period" which Google always gives to new-indexed website.

[JustFelix]

Better start adding new content daily to your website. Usually what happen is if you get lucky and get near close to first page of google when your site is new. They will end up kicking you back to the end of the line.

I honestly don't have any idea what you should do. Should you add backlinks to get first page and have google spot you instantly or should you add content daily letting google know you're not ditching the website or what.

Just be careful and think of a strategy. Right now you're playing a game, see if you can beat the level.

I had this happen to me a few times, I just let the site alone and focus on my main ones until a month after. My new site then decrease in rank by a lot because I ignored it.

[jtotani]

Congrats on the quick ranking. While I don't care what keyword you used to do this accomplishment, I'm curious if your site is converting? Do you have any affiliate offers or adsense for monetization?

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by trustumar

Has your site received any traffic from this keyword and has it produced any revenue?

In the last 24 hours I got 14 hits for the keyword. I have been receiving hits for this keyword before I reached #4 on Google. Maybe those hits came from Yahoo and Bing.
No revenue so far.
It's been only one day since it reached #4 on Big G.

Originally Posted by Andrew S

this is called the honeymoon period

most new sites have one, the only exception maybe very aggressively linked sites

OP you're early to toot the victory horn, the battle has only just begun for your site

I think that this is the reason too. I guess Google and the others gave me some free rankings in the beginning to celebrate the start of my web site or some sh*t like that.

People on this board think that I am trying to fool them or to trick them or whatever.
I have no interest to bullsh*t you, chaps. I'm just a SEO beginner who is sharing his experience. I don't need to convince you of anything. My campaign is going good so far and I received a confirmation for myself that SEO is for real and that I can do it.

I am just a beginner who just had his first SEO success and I will continue to ask beginner questions on this board.
Not pretending to be anything more than that.
And just like you, I would be more than glad to find out why my site is ranking #4 without any off-page SEO work.
At this stage I have three theories:

1. I have 800 words of original content, written by me. I did not use any software and I did not spin people's articles.
I believe Google understands when content is being stolen and spun and this results in lower ranking.

2. Google dance - not a likely reason for my high ranking, because if this was the case, then Google must be dancing in a sweet harmony with Yahoo and Bing.
I'm Top 5 on all of them.

3. Honey moon period - if all three major search engines (Google, Yahoo & Bing) give new sites a honey moon period and rank them high, then this must be the case. This is why I will leave my site on auto pilot - will not do any off-page SEO until it starts dropping in rankings.
Let's see how long it will last on the top.

And let's see if it can reach #1 without any further work.
Not likely, I know, but I'm just experimenting for myself, so feel free to flame.

[katied772]

Originally Posted by Bulldozer

Read my first post one more time and you will spot the single most important thing that I've done and it's importance for SEO.

When I said that I did nothing to rank my page, I meant nothing off-page.
No backlinks, no chasing a high PR, no domain, etc. - not a single one of the things that 99% of all people focus on.
I did NOTHING of that.

Maybe your on-page SEO is good and you wrote a quality post of good length, which is what it really should all be about anyway. Congrats. Hope it continues for you. Move forward and keep it going. Probably will have to add some off-page though to stay there or move up.

[seobirk]

Well, congrats bro!

Let's hope that this wasn't just the Google popularity algorithm, so that it pushed it in front at first and then falls in the back.

[Bulldozer]

Originally Posted by seobirk

Well, congrats bro!

Let's hope that this wasn't just the Google popularity algorithm, so that it pushed it in front at first and then falls in the back.

Yeah, could be the case indeed.
I will be monitoring the ranking of this page and will be posting updates about it.