Micro Niche Sites Hit

[Adsman68]

I have a portfolio of micro niche sites which are all Exact Match Domains. They are between 6-9 months old and have all been ranking very highly for the the main keyword and a lot of long-tail keywords.

Overnight, most sites dropped for all keywords. About 4 sites have retained their rankings. Strangely all the keywords are now in postions anything from page 4 to 7 which obviously has impacted traffic and therefore adsense earnings. They have not disappeared or been de-indexed.

Any suggestions how i can regain these positions ?

ps: all sites have original content (500 words approx) of about 4/5 articles per site.

Cheers, Adam

[rob1123]

It could be any number things that have caused this? Most likely the 'honey moon period' has finished.

Are they on the same hosting account? If so you may have mistakenly broken googles tos on one of your sites & the backlash has spread to the others.

If you can figure out what (if anything) you have done wrong then you can correct the problems and get your ranking back, other wise build some more backlinks

[yukon]

The pages dropped in the SERPs not the sites.

Most likely each MFA Index page was the only pages per site that was ranking on page #1 for your target keywords, am I right?

Build more internal supporting pages with keyword anchor-text pointing at the page you want ranked, then build external links pointing at the new internal pages.

[linkbuildr]

they sound like ultra thin affiliate sites to me! 5 pages...that's it? I imagine the content blows pretty hard then.

[bnetwork]

Same IP, Adsense account, Analytics account, Webmaster Tools?

It's most likely a manual penalty on all of your sites. This has been happening a lot lately. Sounds like a ~-50 applied across all linked domains (or most). Happened to some of my sites on one Analytics account. All other sites without analytics, different IPs, etc (identical quality though) are fine.

Also: some people will argue to death that no such thing exists, that all penalties are automated (most are), etc... whatever.

[jinx1221]

Yes, same ip, adsense acct, analytics, etc will get ferreted out eventually.

Google also is starting to hate thin affiliate/mfa sites.. its like, you can feed a toddler little jars of baby food.. carrot mush, peas mush, squash mush, and eventually, it doesnt want these things.. it wants a bigger, more 'robust' variety of suppers. A new site is like a baby. Google waits and sees if it shows signs of growth, and if it doesn't after awhile, it figures that it's not contributing to their collective, and as other sites start to rank better, your sites de-rank.

You need to keep adding fresh content to these sites, as well as pouring quality backlinks to them. Sometimes it's much easier to focus on just a handful of ones that are (or have been) profiting for you, and let the rest go. Keep your interest in the ones you like, and focus on their growth, rather than constantly collecting and setting up micro niche sites. Thats my 2.5c

[Adsman68]

Originally Posted by rob1123

It could be any number things that have caused this? Most likely the 'honey moon period' has finished.

Are they on the same hosting account? If so you may have mistakenly broken googles tos on one of your sites & the backlash has spread to the others.

If you can figure out what (if anything) you have done wrong then you can correct the problems and get your ranking back, other wise build some more backlinks

Same Hosting yes but not all sites on the hosting have been hit. Not aware of any TOS i would have broken.

[yukon]

Originally Posted by bnetwork

Same IP, Adsense account, Analytics account, Webmaster Tools?

Anyone that runs Adsense doesn't need to worry about the above.

Google is a billion dollar business, I'm sure they share data across multiple Google products. They would be a fool not to share that data with multiple Google products, I'm sure their smarter than that.

Doesn't matter If you have 2 sites or 500 sites all on seperate IPs, Analytics accounts, or whatever else. That Adsense Pub-ID will follow you around the net as long as you post it on any of your pages.

Why anyone running Adsense would be paranoid about other Google products is beyond me. Heck your already showing Google everything by running Adsense.

Anyone running quality Adsense sites doesn't worry about things like this.

A manual review is different & obviously they exist considering the latest leaked Google outsource training pdf. Still a quality site is less likely to have a manual slap.

Looks like OP is banking on only ranking their Index page, which is a single ranked page & has nothing to do with anything other than that's how the SERPs work, they are not static SERPs.

Three to four supporting pages is not much help.

[Adsman68]

Same IP and Adsense but no analytics on any nor webmaster tools.

Originally Posted by bnetwork

Same IP, Adsense account, Analytics account, Webmaster Tools?

It's most likely a manual penalty on all of your sites. This has been happening a lot lately. Sounds like a ~-50 applied across all linked domains (or most). Happened to some of my sites on one Analytics account. All other sites without analytics, different IPs, etc (identical quality though) are fine.

Also: some people will argue to death that no such thing exists, that all penalties are automated (most are), etc... whatever.

[Adsman68]

Good points. I havn't added new content for ages. I definitely have 4 sites which were the top earners, so i guess i need to add content and continue to backlink to them.

Originally Posted by jinx1221

Yes, same ip, adsense acct, analytics, etc will get ferreted out eventually.

Google also is starting to hate thin affiliate/mfa sites.. its like, you can feed a toddler little jars of baby food.. carrot mush, peas mush, squash mush, and eventually, it doesnt want these things.. it wants a bigger, more 'robust' variety of suppers. A new site is like a baby. Google waits and sees if it shows signs of growth, and if it doesn't after awhile, it figures that it's not contributing to their collective, and as other sites start to rank better, your sites de-rank.

You need to keep adding fresh content to these sites, as well as pouring quality backlinks to them. Sometimes it's much easier to focus on just a handful of ones that are (or have been) profiting for you, and let the rest go. Keep your interest in the ones you like, and focus on their growth, rather than constantly collecting and setting up micro niche sites. Thats my 2.5c

[bfas]

As Yukon points out, all that is irrelevant. Your sites share your Adsense publisher ID; Google sees all those sites under your account.

Regardless; micro-niche sites are a specific target of the Panda updates, particularly single-keyword-focused sites. There are patterns to these sites that will almost certainly get you dropped: EMD, single-keyword focus, weak keyword-focused content, 'unnatural' keyword group (keywords that are variations and 'ranking targets' rather than keywords that would be natural off-shoots of the site focus), and 'rank manipulation' backlink profile (lots of low-value backlinks from common low-value sites i.e. lots of forum profile links, irrelevant blog comment links, etc, particularly if they comprise the majority of your links, and were done during narrow time frames).

If your sites dropped en masse, it is a penalty application. Those can come in two ways: applied after a manual review, or a Panda hit. If it's a Panda hit, that means you met some Panda thresholds, and a hit was applied to your 'regular' algo ranking. In that case, you will have a very difficult time regaining your rankings. You'll have to look at and address your content, your backlink profile, your user metrics (time on page, bounce rate, etc), and get rid of any sub-standard pages.

If it's a manual review penalty, you'll need to figure out what the hit was for and fix it.

Michael

[lovboa]

Just stop making micro niche sites. All my competitors with micro sites in my niche have been thrown way back after Panda, after being on pages 1-2 for as long as I can remember.
Panda finally put them where they belong.

[vansterdam420]

This thread sounds like what happened to my websites. Most of my websites got penalized on August 2nd. With the timing I suspect it may have been a manual review. Each site was focused on a specific keyword phrase to the point that it probably is unnatural.

Has someone had success with fixing a situation like this? I am willing to pay a generous price to anyone who can help fix my websites.

[Adsman68]

What type of positions did they fall to ? Where are they now ? My sites and keywords seem to be now between position 40 and 70. Bing & yahoo rankings unaffected though, lol.

Also 4 sites are unaffected on google rankings. Same host, ip etc

Originally Posted by vansterdam420

This thread sounds like what happened to my websites. Most of my websites got penalized on August 2nd. With the timing I suspect it may have been a manual review. Each site was focused on a specific keyword phrase to the point that it probably is unnatural.

Has someone had success with fixing a situation like this? I am willing to pay a generous price to anyone who can help fix my websites.

[vansterdam420]

Some of my sites had top 5 rankings for very valuable keywords. This may have helped trigger a manual review combined with onpage red flags. After the penalty, all keywords were page 5+. I haven't been checking recently, but usually I find them anywhere between page 5 and 7.

I also had another site on this same analytics, gwt, ip, etc. It kept its high rankings, but it was in a different niche and it had much more unique content and a less spammy link profile.

[jameswatson2002]

Google has been cracking down on thin affiliate websites, especially recently (as well as on AdWords). This is bad news with marketers whose sites do not offer much value (VAS).

[bnetwork]

Originally Posted by yukon

Doesn't matter If you have 2 sites or 500 sites all on seperate IPs, Analytics accounts, or whatever else. That Adsense Pub-ID will follow you around the net as long as you post it on any of your pages.

Why anyone running Adsense would be paranoid about other Google products is beyond me. Heck your already showing Google everything by running Adsense.

Anyone running quality Adsense sites doesn't worry about things like this.

A manual review is different & obviously they exist considering the latest leaked Google outsource training pdf. Still a quality site is less likely to have a manual slap.

Looks like OP is banking on only ranking their Index page, which is a single ranked page & has nothing to do with anything other than that's how the SERPs work, they are not static SERPs.

Three to four supporting pages is not much help.

I meant any of the things listed in my previous post. Don't have to be all of them. There are MANY ways to trigger a manual review.

About quality - not always true. In many cases website quality has very little to do with these penalties. Note I said many cases. Not all of them.

Agree with you about OP's sites - he got reviewed. Then slapped. Not much he can do to recover tbh.

[bnetwork]

Just a note before I log off... this has been happening A LOT lately. Very high quality sites get this penalty as well. In many cases it has nothing to do with website quality.

Building better, higher quality websites and doing everything else the same way you used to is NOT a good option any more.

[syedakramreviews]

I think so many people faces same experience nowadays with Google make so may changes with their search result, me too. As long you create a good content that valuable to your visitor and not only to make money you'll find.

My only suggestion here is go fwd build more sites and try to fulfill Google new guideline and don't give up.

[outwest]

seems ur having a bad week

[Adsman68]

Lol, had better. Just need to learn from mistakes. Seemingly a -40 google penalty i believe for paid cheap backlinks. Will wait for penalty to expire. When that is, god knows

Originally Posted by outwest

seems ur having a bad week

[Bryan V]

What kind of links did you use? How many were sent to each site?

[Adsman68]

I was using the ALN Network, which on its own for backlinking was a big mistake i think. Im not blaming ALN, i should have had a wider link diversity.

[imdomination]

Start adding more content of at least 500 words, add content to your main page until it's at least 1200 words, and build high-quality links. They'll probably eventually come back, but it might take a little time.

[InTheMaking]

Sorry for my friend, but you have yourself a penalty on every site sitting on page 4-7.

Happens lots, they track down your websites via your analytics account, Adsense ID, etc.

Start rebuilding.

[Cash37]

Ive had a site that didnt do well for a long time, I simply stopped backlinking and it rose in the rankings

[Josh MacDonald]

Research some more sub keywords and write articles on them.

[TryBPO]

Feel for you, OP. We got hit with a similar situation in September. We lost Google rankings on around 100 sites which was consistent with what people call a -50 penalty. Some of the sites have continued to climb on Yahoo/Bing so they're still earning. We put quite a bit of time/energy into fixing the sites by editing/improving the content, adding content, adding links, etc. Some of the sites were "fixed" and some were not...the time and money invested (we think) was a wash.

No real help for you here, unfortunately. Make sure to vary your anchor text when linkbuilding...

[arshavin]

did you ever recover these sites?

[TryBPO]

We had SOME of our sites recover, but some of the larger earners never did come back. They still ended up pulling in some income from Yahoo/Bing...but not as much as they were in their glory days. Ultimately, the work/time/$$ we put into getting the sites recovered was a wash with the income coming back in from the sites that did recover.

[outwest]

Originally Posted by TryBPO

We had SOME of our sites recover, but some of the larger earners never did come back. They still ended up pulling in some income from Yahoo/Bing...but not as much as they were in their glory days. Ultimately, the work/time/$$ we put into getting the sites recovered was a wash with the income coming back in from the sites that did recover.

those were small MFA sites?