Website Will Not Rank

6 replies
  • SEO
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I've been given a 8 year old site that I've been trying to rank for 8 months now. Per the SERP book....their rankings are miserable (pos 50 is the highest) and I've been drip feeding links (with an exact same system for other sites that all reside on page 1 of Google) and this sucker wont budge.

They even have a blog section and original content is added each week.

They are on the first page of Yahoo! for many key phrases but we can't make a dent in Google.

PLUS....when I add them to Google Places (and Ive done this twice) they keep the site "under review" and will not set the listing live. Every other site I've added comes up in a short amount of time.....

I'm worried that this site did bad things in the past and Google will not allow it to rank. YES...it is in Google's Index....but it just won't rank anything past like page 5 or 7.

Do we create a new site? Do we start fresh with a new domain name and new site?

Thanks Warriors....I need help.....anyone

Slap

PS. Important....the business is in a suburb of major city.....but the entire site is geared towards the city. Indianapolis Remodeling contractor as an example.
#rank #website
  • Profile picture of the author nettiapina
    Unfortunately it's really hard to offer anything constructive because there's so little actual information here. Niche or example keyword would help a bit, site URL quite a lot.

    I see the PS, but I don't understand the meaning of that. Is the site for a business competing for local traffic?

    I'd start by checking Google Webmaster Tools - or authorizing the site in GWT if you haven't already. Then Ahrefhs and/or Majestic SEO to see the backlink profile, which usually speaks volumes about the past of the site. If you do this you've got some information, and you can perhaps ask a bit more specific questions.
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    Links in signature will not help your SEO. Not on this site, and not on any other forum.
    Who told me this? An ex Google web spam engineer.

    What's your excuse?
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  • Profile picture of the author gsinfovision
    Banned
    Originally Posted by slappytheking View Post

    I've been given a 8 year old site that I've been trying to rank for 8 months now. Per the SERP book....their rankings are miserable (pos 50 is the highest) and I've been drip feeding links (with an exact same system for other sites that all reside on page 1 of Google) and this sucker wont budge.

    They even have a blog section and original content is added each week.

    They are on the first page of Yahoo! for many key phrases but we can't make a dent in Google.

    PLUS....when I add them to Google Places (and Ive done this twice) they keep the site "under review" and will not set the listing live. Every other site I've added comes up in a short amount of time.....

    I'm worried that this site did bad things in the past and Google will not allow it to rank. YES...it is in Google's Index....but it just won't rank anything past like page 5 or 7.

    Do we create a new site? Do we start fresh with a new domain name and new site?

    Thanks Warriors....I need help.....anyone

    Slap

    PS. Important....the business is in a suburb of major city.....but the entire site is geared towards the city. Indianapolis Remodeling contractor as an example.
    "Bad things in the past" - how long back and how bad? If they've been taken care of before the last update, you should be seeing results now. Also check to see if you've received any messages in your webmaster inbox.
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  • Profile picture of the author nettiapina
    slappytheking PM'd me the site URL for a quick check, and yes - there's some work to be done. Directory backlinks, keyword stuffing, city name stuffing, too long and confusing title tags, dubious use of microdata - just to name a few. Mostly quite basic stuff that can be fixed.

    If someone wants to throw in tips on how to compete in search for major US city I'm sure that'd be appreciated. I've seen threads on that, but fortunately for me I don't have to do that myself.
    Signature
    Links in signature will not help your SEO. Not on this site, and not on any other forum.
    Who told me this? An ex Google web spam engineer.

    What's your excuse?
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  • Profile picture of the author johnben1444
    So long as it's ranking, you should be good to go.

    Another thing to consider is the quality of your links against the competition of your keywords.

    I wouldn't want you to assume that ranking for A will be the same as ranking for B, the drip feeding told me so.
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  • Profile picture of the author netanel23
    Just be sure that the links you are building are high quality and that you haven't been affected by a penalty or algorithm update.

    Also keep in mind that just because your competitors built a certain kind of links doesn't mean you can replicate everything exactly.

    They could have links that are blocked by popular backlink checkers, 301 redirects or other techniques that won't show up in the BL checkers.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Always start with the link profile (is it spammy) & the Google Cache (text version) is it spammy?

    Also run Screaming Frog to get an idea about the entire site (any 404s, etc...).

    When all else fails build a 2nd page & try to rank it for the exact same keyword, tone down the original page If the Cache (text version) looks spammy.
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