How Can I Tell If My Site Is Damaged (and should I quit SEO)?

by rimam1
14 replies
  • SEO
  • |
My site was hacked a few months ago. I think I've gotten it all cleaned up, but when I search "site:thescienceofgettingripped.com" I see a page that says "Owned". And I can't figure out where that page resides.

And yes, I have paid to clean up my site, checked Google Webmaster Tools, and even posted a few threads on Google's support forum. No one has been able to help figure out what's going on.

I've built some links to a few posts and they haven't budged in the SERP's, which makes me think that my site has been permanently damaged by the hack. (yes, I know I should have had a backup; lesson learned)

The question is this: is my site irreparably damaged? If so, should I quit SEO and focus on guest posting, etc. or is there chance of still ranking again.

Thanks
#damaged #quit #seo #site
  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

    My site was hacked a few months ago. I think I've gotten it all cleaned up, but when I search "site:thescienceofgettingripped.com" I see a page that says "Owned". And I can't figure out where that page resides.
    You have 2 versions of the Home page (http + https), the https is the problem page (owned) on the site: search.

    Reindex the page to update the SERP title/description, there's also no Google cache.
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    • Profile picture of the author rimam1
      Thank you Yukon. I think that's what I just did in GWMT, but I'm not sure if it worked correctly.

      I'd post an image here, but I can't figure out how.
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      • Profile picture of the author rimam1
        Figured it out. Here's a screenshot of what I did in GWMT:



        Here's a screenshot of my site: search. I can't figure out why one "www" link appears and the rest are the "https" version.

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        • Profile picture of the author yukon
          Banned
          Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

          I can't figure out why one "www" link appears and the rest are the "https" version.
          That URL is showing on the SERPs because the http URL exist (right now) on your website.

          Code:
          http://www.thescienceofgettingripped.com/manual/

          Notice the other URLs on the site: search are https.

          Google will keep showing that old http URL until you fix the issue.
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          • Profile picture of the author rimam1
            Yukon,

            My permalink for that post in Wordpress is set to "https" so I can't figure out why Google keeps indexing the "http" version.

            As for my other problem with the "Owned" title tag on my "https" version, the Google index is still showing that, even though I re-submitted it to the index in WMT yesterday (I've done it before too to no avail)

            What can I do to fix it?

            Thanks
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            • Profile picture of the author yukon
              Banned
              Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

              Yukon,

              My permalink for that post in Wordpress is set to "https" so I can't figure out why Google keeps indexing the "http" version.

              As for my other problem with the "Owned" title tag on my "https" version, the Google index is still showing that, even though I re-submitted it to the index in WMT yesterday (I've done it before too to no avail)

              What can I do to fix it?

              Thanks


              Like I said, the http URL/page still exist that's why it keeps getting indexed/reindexed.

              Code:
              http://www.thescienceofgettingripped.com/manual/


              Do a manual 301 redirect in your htaccess file so the http redirects to the https URL. Right now both the URLs below are working duplicate pages with no redirects.

              Code:
              http://www.thescienceofgettingripped.com/manual/
              https://www.thescienceofgettingripped.com/manual/
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            • Profile picture of the author LiftMyRank
              Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

              Yukon,

              My permalink for that post in Wordpress is set to "https" so I can't figure out why Google keeps indexing the "http" version.

              As for my other problem with the "Owned" title tag on my "https" version, the Google index is still showing that, even though I re-submitted it to the index in WMT yesterday (I've done it before too to no avail)

              What can I do to fix it?

              Thanks
              Another option to a 301 re-direct is you can add the rel=canonical tag to your HTML header code of the http page to tell google that the https version is the one you want to show, you get the same amount of link juice flowing through as a 301 re-direct and it's easy to implement.
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              • Profile picture of the author yukon
                Banned
                Originally Posted by LiftMyRank View Post

                Another option to a 301 re-direct is you can add the rel=canonical tag to your HTML header code of the http page to tell google that the https version is the one you want to show, you get the same amount of link juice flowing through as a 301 re-direct and it's easy to implement.

                That defeats the whole point of ever setting up https.

                Two duplicate pages is a fail.
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                • Profile picture of the author rimam1
                  Ok, so I went into my CPanel and performed the following 301 redirect:

                  thescienceofgettingripped.com to https://www.thescienceofgettingripped.com

                  When I try to redirect http:/manual to https:/manual it gives me the following error:

                  The system failed to add the redirect because of the following errors:

                  You cannot redirect "manual" to "https://www.thescienceofgettingripped.com/manual" as this will cause a redirection loop because "/home3/razaimam/public_html/manual" is at the same place as "/home3/razaimam/public_html/manual".


                  It seems like I can't get rid of that "http" version. Also, the "Owned" still appears in my title under the "https" version of my homepage.
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                  • Profile picture of the author rimam1
                    For some reason my homepage still says "Owned" in the title tag, and that one page STILL won't display as "https" in the SERP's.

                    So then I tried to revert back to just the "http" version but Google is still showing my "https" pages.

                    Then someone told me to insert this code in my htaccess file:

                    RewriteEngine on RewriteCond %{HTTPS} !=on RewriteRule ^ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [L,R=301

                    I'm not sure if I should try to force all URL's to "https" again using the above script, or to change them back to "http"

                    Can anyone give any advice?
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                    • Profile picture of the author yukon
                      Banned
                      Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

                      For some reason my homepage still says "Owned" in the title tag, and that one page STILL won't display as "https" in the SERP's.

                      So then I tried to revert back to just the "http" version but Google is still showing my "https" pages.

                      Then someone told me to insert this code in my htaccess file:

                      RewriteEngine on RewriteCond %{HTTPS} !=on RewriteRule ^ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [L,R=301

                      I'm not sure if I should try to force all URL's to "https" again using the above script, or to change them back to "http"

                      Can anyone give any advice?


                      You're killing any SERP positions If you have pages already ranked by switching back & forth between http & htpps across the entire site.

                      Looks like you're being impatient with Googlebot, making changes, not waiting for Googlebot to reindex pages, making more changes, not waiting for Googlebot to reindex pages, over & over...

                      You have to prove Google reindexed a webpage before making additional edits to a problem page (watch the before/after cache dates/times between edits), you can't be impatient. SEO can be a slow process waiting for pages to get reindexed.

                      All you had to do was 301 redirect a single http URL back to an https URL & wait for the page/URL to get reindexed which could have most likely been reindexed in less than a minute by submitting the old problem http URL to Google Fetch inside Webmaster Tools so Google would see the old URL was being redirected to a new https URL.

                      The whole job should have taken less than a half hour.

                      My advice is just stop. Fallback & regroup.

                      Figure out what you want to use (http vs https) & never change it again for all of eternity. Seriously, URLs are the single most important thing for SEO. Break a URL & you might as well delete the webpage because it's going to drop like a brick in the SERPs.
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  • Profile picture of the author irawr
    Banned
    Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

    The question is this: is my site irreparably damaged? If so, should I quit SEO and focus on guest posting, etc. or is there chance of still ranking again.
    No it doesn't appear to be.

    As far as your "SEO" I'm only seeing 6 do follow links in SR (I'm sure there's more) and they're all comments and a forum profile. Once you completely fix the issue you're having with your site try to get some high quality followed links, the links you have are all pretty weak. I would definitely suggest some guest posting if you're interested in doing that.

    You're asking should you quit SEO? Comments and profiles are not really SEO. The only way that stuff is going to do anything significant is if you do it to a bunch of web 2.0s and then use those properties to build really great links to your site. So no you shouldn't stop doing SEO, you should start doing SEO.
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