Is Google trying to tell me something?!

by 24 replies
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Hmm, I know this type of question gets asked a lot round here, but it's the first time it's happened to me!

A month-old mini-niche site went from it's initial ranking of about #75 to the #3 spot. Sat there on page one for a few days (made me some pennies) and then disappeared off the face of the earth, or rather to the very bottom spot in the SERPS - Google.co.uk only lists 500 sites for the keyword, and my pages are at, like 498, 499 and 500, apart from the legal page, which is at #250 somewhere! Been like that for about 5 days now.

I only dripped about 30 backlinks on it via a blog network a few weeks before that.

Anyone seen this happen? It's almost like the 'G' trying to make a point putting me at the very bottom of the SERPS!

More to the point, is it worth trying to get it back?! I know people talk about the Google Dance, but I am sceptical in this case!

P.S. Hmmm, I just realised this sounds a LOT like the famous "Minus 50 penalty". People don't seem to talk about that so much anymore, is that still a known phenomenon? I dunno why my little mininiche would get that just for a couple of dozen links on blog networks. I mean there are people round here throwing THOUSANDS of low-quality links at their sites and not getting penalised. Unless my site got linked from some really bad neighbourhood I guess...
#search engine optimization #google
  • Sites with penalties tend to behave like this by bouncing around all over the place. It can be that or your links aren't good enough. Ask yourself if your backlink profile looks spammy.

    Drop the spammy backlink profile and it may come back. Although you might need to file a resubmission request.
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
    • [2] replies
    • Thanks for the suggestions. I dunno really what classes as a spammy BL profile. I think blog networks are one of the better types of backlinks. I don't do comment spamming (just a few legit comments on blogs), or forum profile backlinking or any of that automated stuff really. Well, apart from the blog network - those articles are spun, but I am not really paranoid about that sort of thing (and they are WELL spun - not that Google knows the difference)... Oh, a few duplicate articles on the main article sites. I dunno, all this is overthinking to me, I just don't believe Google is THAT sophisticated. Maybe I am very wrong about that! But there's a whole bunch of crap on page one for every KWP imaginable that proves I'm not!

      Maybe the links aren't good enough, but the brief appearance on page one, followed by the unceremonious dumping to the bottom of the SERPS is a bit weird! It IS an EMD, and a fairly boring Adsense-monetised site (a LITTLE bit better than an Xfactor). No different to a gazillion others out there...
    • SEOgoat explained more then you need to know ^^

      Anyway, a few more tips :
      Try to get higher quality backlinks on authority websites.
      Also, keep the tracks of your backlinks and check if they are indexed. If not, build an rss feed and submit it to rss aggregators.

      Good luck !
  • I really think google is just finding a spot to place you. I think you will come back in the #1 or 2 spot.
    • [1] reply
    • I totally agree, I've been doing the google dance for over a month, it was because I had added a huge amount of content to the site plus backlinks, today I am finally receiving traffic again, I do expect to bounce about for the next week or so though. Keep doing what you're doing, Google is finding a spot for you. Don't just give up now.

      Some say the google dance is a test to weed out spam sites, because the people who builds sites that are spammy aren't in it for the long haul and give up once they loose their initial position, I have no idea if this is true but the thought of my competitors giving up once they hit the google dance spurred me on to keep going.

      If you're still undecided whether you should keep going, give yourself a time frame (a least a month) where you'll continue to work on the site, if there's no improvement after that then cut your losses.
  • You can wait and hope the site returns or you can start to target a new set of keywords..
    • [1] reply
    • Build links from other sources than just that blog network for a few days and see if it has any effects. Some sites can dance around as strongly though you might indeed have received a penalty for something.

      You can use this tool to get nothing more but a really rough idea if you have been penalized or not: SEOMoves | Google Penalty Checker Tool

      If it shows a green checkmark, keep building links and you'll come back stronger.
      • [3] replies
  • Thanks for the advice. People often say in these threads that it's just temporary and the site will bounce back, but I never had the chance to test it out till now :/ Hope you're right! I have added some more, better content actually, so it's more than just some Xfactor job.

    Just think it's weird that it literally ended up at the very bottom of the SERPS! Almost like a message to me..!
  • Hi,

    I also think you should keep going, add in variation in your link building and keep adding back-links for 1-2 months.

    Report back how it goes, very interested in your findings
  • Hi markowe,

    You have not been penalized.

    What you described is exactly what any experience SEO would expect to see for a new web page. What you have experienced is a very common fluctuation that occurs on many, perhaps most new pages that are posted on the web.

    It's known as QDF (Query Deserves Freshness). It's a temporary boost in rankings for new content design to bring fresh results for searchers that may be looking for the latest information. After this temprary boost wears off your page will then sink to it's currently deserved ranking.
    • [1] reply
    • ...down to #500, ha ha! I don't think my site is quite that bad! It's well optimised for the keywords, EMD, varied content, images etc. There are many sites above it that have almost nothing to do with the subject. You know what I mean - it's just too big a drop.

      But sure, I hear people say all the time that this happens to new sites, it just never happened to me. Also, people usually say, 'oh, it will bounce back even higher', but it was at, like, #2, ABOVE the shopping results, and I can't really see it bouncing back even higher than that!

      I will certainly do a little backlinking and wait it out a little to see what happens and report back - I mean, it's not a disaster, I am just sort of interested in the end result and I will share it when and if I get it!

      Actually, I will tell you one thing I may have done 'wrong', thinking about it - I built about 30 backlinks (blog network) but was being lazy so just used the same anchor text for all of them. I mean, 30 links is not much, but then it's not high-competition either. It would be interesting if that had anything to do with it, but at the end of the day it's just impossible to know. I bet the Google people get a kick out of reading these threads..!
      • [1] reply
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    • [1] reply
    • Well, you seem like an expert on spam, so I will have to believe you!

      But I do not consider 30 good articles sent out to blog networks, with links in the article body to be 'spam', especially as compared to people out there posting THOUSANDS of links to forum profiles?!
      • [1] reply
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  • 28

    Is Google trying to tell me something?!

    Hmm, I know this type of question gets asked a lot round here, but it's the first time it's happened to me! A month-old mini-niche site went from it's initial ranking of about #75 to the #3 spot. Sat there on page one for a few days (made me some pennies) and then disappeared off the face of the earth, or rather to the very bottom spot in the SERPS - Google.co.uk only lists 500 sites for the keyword, and my pages are at, like 498, 499 and 500, apart from the legal page, which is at #250 somewhere! Been like that for about 5 days now.