Webform spam, drop in rankings

8 replies
  • SEO
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Hello,

This is a bit of a long shot and possibly wishful thinking on my part but I've seen my search rankings drop from position 19 to 64 in the last 3 weeks. At the same time the webform to contact us on the same page has been spammed like mad, over 100 times a day - could the two connected in anyway?

I am working on the backlinks to the site, there's nothing spammy in there.

Thanks for your help.

Michelle
#drop #rankings #spam #webform
  • Profile picture of the author Icematikx
    Hi Michelle,

    I gave you some good advice in your previous thread. Web form spam has nothing to do with your rankings at all.

    You're over complicating things quite a lot. Focus on what works - publicity, media and backlinks.
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  • Profile picture of the author Wright Hassall
    and I am building links etc daily, we had some great coverage this week but no harm in asking a further question because I didn't know the answer, it just seemed odd the drop in rankings all happened at the same time.
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    • Profile picture of the author Icematikx
      Originally Posted by Wright Hassall View Post

      and I am building links etc daily, we had some great coverage this week but no harm in asking a further question because I didn't know the answer, it just seemed odd the drop in rankings all happened at the same time.
      In reality, a sudden drop of rankings could be attributed to absolutely anything. You could have tag pages causing 1,000 pages of duplicate content. You could be keyword stuffing, or scraping external content. You could have lost links thus dropping your position.

      There's a whole host of reasons why, and unfortunately, nobody here is going to evaluate and siphon through a whole site, free of charge, and return back with a guide on how to rectify the situation.

      I can see you work for quite a large company in the UK (actually quite close to where I live). If their web assets mean a lot to them (which I assume it does), it may be time to bring in a professional to evaluate why it isn't working, and why performance is dropping. In an ideal world, rankings should only slightly fluctuate - and that should be upwards for the majority.

      If I noticed a steep drop in rankings, I would suspect it's something quite important that can't be rectified with a few extra links. If you've noticed stable rankings for months followed by a steep drop down multiple pages, it's an underlying problem that needs to be identified and resolved. If we're talking dropping 2-3 places on page one, then I wouldn't be worrying.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Add a captcha or verification question to the form submit.

    It's not an end all solution but I bet it drops the spam down to the point you don't even care.

    Like already said the contact spam has nothing to do with a SERP position.
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  • Profile picture of the author DizenSounds
    Check your links and more importantly check your sites uptime. Use an uptime monitor that will check your site regularly for any downtime.

    If a site is regularly down then Google can and will penalize it. Maybe the mass spam is causing your host to temporarily suspend your domain for over using resources.

    But while analyzing be sure to check your links as well.
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  • Profile picture of the author online only
    You said you were building links. But what type of links?
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  • Profile picture of the author LuckyIMer
    It could be related to the back links or something else, without knowing your website address, no one can evaluate your website.
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  • Originally Posted by Wright Hassall View Post

    Hello,

    This is a bit of a long shot and possibly wishful thinking on my part but I've seen my search rankings drop from position 19 to 64 in the last 3 weeks. At the same time the webform to contact us on the same page has been spammed like mad, over 100 times a day - could the two connected in anyway?

    I am working on the backlinks to the site, there's nothing spammy in there.

    Thanks for your help.

    Michelle
    Why don't you have a captcha in place to prevent spam? You need to add one asap and hope to the google gods you get your old position back.
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