I heard that Google is now treating Wordpress websites as Spam, is this true?

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I heard that Google is now treating Wordpress websites as Spam, is this true?
#google #heard #spam #treating #true #websites #wordpress
  • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
    You have a source?
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  • Profile picture of the author emailwiz
    A guy who is offering to do SEO for me said this, He said I would have to rebuild my website, but i get the feeling he is just trying to squeeze some web design money out of me
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    • I am researching this. With the crush of 'WP comment spamming' software, hackers gaining control and setting up EDITOR accounts in millions of 'abandoned' WP sites, with over 500 million WP sites now in existence, it is plausable and there is some indication that this may be the case.

      But I am not ready to throw the baby out with the bathwater just yet. Research and I mean deep research is required to really see what the true trend is.

      My own personal WP sites? Some have been hijacked, most are buried with "Comment Spam", and I have the plug in for mass delete.

      But what I have noticed is my sites with WP have dropped in ranking where as my sites without WP have not.

      My sites that dropped that I removed WP and replaced with an alternative returned to their former ranking.

      So researching this is very important. I have invested a lot into WP.
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      • Profile picture of the author dminorfmajor
        Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

        I am researching this. With the crush of 'WP comment spamming' software, hackers gaining control and setting up EDITOR accounts in millions of 'abandoned' WP sites, with over 500 million WP sites now in existence, it is plausable and there is some indication that this may be the case.
        I noticed this the other day. I logged into one of my old WP sites and noticed there had been pages and posts created by users who are not me. I have no idea how it happened or who did it but I deleted them. I had given my site's WP admin information to a web designer on Fiverr a few months before that but I had changed everything back to my original PW so who knows.
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      • Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

        I am researching this. With the crush of 'WP comment spamming' software, hackers gaining control and setting up EDITOR accounts in millions of 'abandoned' WP sites, with over 500 million WP sites now in existence, it is plausable and there is some indication that this may be the case.

        But I am not ready to throw the baby out with the bathwater just yet. Research and I mean deep research is required to really see what the true trend is.

        My own personal WP sites? Some have been hijacked, most are buried with "Comment Spam", and I have the plug in for mass delete.

        But what I have noticed is my sites with WP have dropped in ranking where as my sites without WP have not.

        My sites that dropped that I removed WP and replaced with an alternative returned to their former ranking.

        So researching this is very important. I have invested a lot into WP.
        Originally Posted by NY1 View Post

        I should have said insinuating very strongly.

        Conspiracy theory style. Set it up and then back off of it at the last second.

        The progression of several of your posts read like you are directly making that claim in the beginning of the post and then backing off it right at the end of the post.

        At least, to me they do. My bad if I am wrong.
        Is this considered INSINUATION? Your tactic to ridicule and accuse does not work with me.

        All I have been doing is asking questions and revealing research results I have been able to develop.

        There is an indication that WP blogs are being hijacked. There is some indication that many WP blogs have lost steam in their rankings.. Not all, but many of the ones I have researched.

        I am looking for the cause and possible solution. I did not come here and start this thread claiming that Google is sand boxing WP for spam.

        I came here looking for truth and evidence and other peoples input of what they have evidenced. Not looking for witty snipes and cute ridicules.
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    • Profile picture of the author UMS
      Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

      A guy who is offering to do SEO for me said this, He said I would have to rebuild my website, but i get the feeling he is just trying to squeeze some web design money out of me
      I got a bridge to sell to you.


      Seriously, shouldn't it be obvious what their motivation is?

      Google is going to place a blanket rule on any type of platform.

      Some WordPress sites are high quality and some are spammy.

      Same applies to Drupal sites, or Joomla sites, or hand built HTML sites or.........
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      • Profile picture of the author chas08
        Totally agree that WP is not going to punish the most popular platform in the world. My site has not been hurt at all by recent Google changes. As long as you keep up with their recent changes, like not too many ads above the fold, you shouldn't lose rank if you are providing good, original content.
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    • Profile picture of the author Andrew S
      Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

      A guy who is offering to do SEO for me said this, He said I would have to rebuild my website, but i get the feeling he is just trying to squeeze some web design money out of me
      Dump that snake oil salesman like a sack of potatoes.

      Like, immediately.

      If you continue on with a business relationship with him you're in for a world of hurt in one way or another.


      BTW: Ask him why then does Google's head of web spam have a Wordpress blog? Please post his response here, I want to lol.

      Originally Posted by NY1 View Post

      btw, Matt Cutts' blog uses WordPress as the CMS.

      Aw you beat me to it
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      • Originally Posted by Andrew S View Post

        BTW: Ask him why then does Google's head of web spam have a Wordpress blog? Please post his response here, I want to lol. Aw you beat me to it
        Rather arrogant to ridicule a possible trend with elementary assumptions. So a Google principle uses Word Press as Google goes out and wholesale begins to discount WP blogs.

        It is not impossible to embrace that possibility. However unlikely that, and skeptical you are, and many here are ridiculing the possibility that Google "may" be discounting WP blogs, does it not bear to do some research to see if in fact this may be true?

        I am building a database of the top 1000 WP blogs, then another 500 median WP blogs and then a random sampling of another 500 WP blogs and assessing their rankings.

        It seriously hurts WP credibility when software spamming systems like SENUKE are aggressively promoted especially here at the WF.

        Just Sayin. Now I am not crying the Sky is falling. I will do the research and that will reveal exactly what the trend is.

        Even a solid trend will "not" prove Google has decided to discount WP. How Google really works? Nobody knows.
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      • Profile picture of the author emailwiz
        Originally Posted by Andrew S View Post

        Dump that snake oil salesman like a sack of potatoes.

        Like, immediately.

        If you continue on with a business relationship with him you're in for a world of hurt in one way or another.


        BTW: Ask him why then does Google's head of web spam have a Wordpress blog? Please post his response here, I want to lol.




        Aw you beat me to it
        Thanks i am going to ask him that, from the responses I have seen, it seems like it is a rumor, I to feel that Google would not devalue a whole platform such as wordpress, especially when there are so many authoritative websites in key niches that use it. And there is spam on every platform as well
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    • Profile picture of the author Crimson Penguin
      Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

      A guy who is offering to do SEO for me said this, He said I would have to rebuild my website, but i get the feeling he is just trying to squeeze some web design money out of me
      I'm not sure about Wordpress but can I ask, is your site a .com? The reason I ask is that Google have just announced that their next update will be treating all .com websites as spam.

      Don't worry though, for a fee I can get you a safe .biz domain, hosting package and create a complete Google friendly redesigned site. There will also be a monthly fee just so I can make sure Google doesn't think your site is spammy.
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    • Profile picture of the author JoeUK
      Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

      A guy who is offering to do SEO for me said this, He said I would have to rebuild my website, but i get the feeling he is just trying to squeeze some web design money out of me
      Sounds like he's selling you a problem that only he can resolve
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  • Profile picture of the author domainarama
    Many WordPress sites treat Google like spam, so it's only fair ;-)
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  • It is being discussed over here.

    http://www.warriorforum.com/off-topi...ess-blogs.html

    And this is my research site in this regard. I just got it started.

    Wavefour Marketing :: Index
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  • Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

    I heard that Google is now treating Wordpress websites as Spam, is this true?
    I highly doubt this is true.
    Wordpress is one of the biggest website building platforms online, and they have nothing to do with a website being spammy or not.

    There are many Wordpress sites that are spammy, and many that are not.
    There are also many normal html sites that are spammy and many that are not.

    Bottom line is that spammy sites has no link to Wordpress as such.
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  • Profile picture of the author krishan1982
    Wordpress Drupal joomla and any other platform web site spam by Google i do not thing so yes some web site spam but not all i m sure about this
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  • This site is an example of the wholesale "SPAM" process by software like SENUKE does.

    http://netnewsads.net/?p=1#comments

    It is getting out of hand. It is entirely plausible that Google will discount a platform that is so easily rapped by SPAM bashing software like SENUKE does.

    But this is only anecdotal, not confirmed. Much research needs to be done.
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    • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
      Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

      This site is an example of the wholesale "SPAM" process by software like SENUKE does.

      Net News Report » Blog Archive » Hello world!

      It is getting out of hand. It is entirely plausible that Google will discount a platform that is so easily rapped by SPAM bashing software like SENUKE does.

      But this is only anecdotal, not confirmed. Much research needs to be done.
      If you ask me, your conclusion is ridiculous. They are going to have to discredit HTML sites too. Plenty of spam on those. And Drupal. Tons of spammy sites use Drupal. Same with Sitebuilder, and just about every other platform out there.

      Google can easily just discredit that site you linked to instead of the entire platform.
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      • Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

        If you ask me, your conclusion is ridiculous. They are going to have to discredit HTML sites too. Plenty of spam on those. And Drupal. Tons of spammy sites use Drupal. Same with Sitebuilder, and just about every other platform out there.

        Google can easily just discredit that site you linked to instead of the entire platform.
        Conclusion? Did I make a conclusion?

        But there is certainly a trend developing. But you are welcome to stick your head in the sand and ignore it, call those who recognize a possible trend and drawing attention to it "ridiculous.

        And yet this site promotes the very services that are in fact ruining WP blogs.
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        • Profile picture of the author paulgl
          While I don't believe google is treating wordpress as spam,
          but in the past when people would argue wordpress over
          blogspot, I always pointed out that google owns blogspot.

          So.....if one were to think logically about spam and junk
          sites, which blog platform might be on the chopping block
          in the near future....

          While google may trim blogspot, they have been known to
          cut a whole genre of sites.

          I would not doubt that google has already thought long and hard
          about de-valuing wordpress. Sort of the same thing as far
          as google+ goes. De-valuing meant in more of a scale. In other
          words, google would put blogspot over wordpress, google+ over
          other socials, and certainly youtube waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay over
          any other wannabe video sites.

          This only pertains to people who choose to live and die on
          what google does.

          Paul
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          • Profile picture of the author Rus Sells
            Should Google decide to do as you mentioned it would be a huge antitrust issue as far as I can see it.

            Really this whole thread is just silly.

            Google is going to evaluate each site independently when it come to such an important and prominent web site platform. They'd garner so much public angst it wouldn't be funny.



            Originally Posted by paulgl View Post

            While I don't believe google is treating wordpress as spam,
            but in the past when people would argue wordpress over
            blogspot, I always pointed out that google owns blogspot.

            So.....if one were to think logically about spam and junk
            sites, which blog platform might be on the chopping block
            in the near future....

            While google may trim blogspot, they have been known to
            cut a whole genre of sites.

            I would not doubt that google has already thought long and hard
            about de-valuing wordpress. Sort of the same thing as far
            as google+ goes. De-valuing meant in more of a scale. In other
            words, google would put blogspot over wordpress, google+ over
            other socials, and certainly youtube waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay over
            any other wannabe video sites.

            This only pertains to people who choose to live and die on
            what google does.

            Paul
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    • Profile picture of the author pwtmike
      Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

      This site is an example of the wholesale "SPAM" process by software like SENUKE does.

      Net News Report » Blog Archive » Hello world!

      It is getting out of hand. It is entirely plausible that Google will discount a platform that is so easily rapped by SPAM bashing software like SENUKE does.

      But this is only anecdotal, not confirmed. Much research needs to be done.
      What did senuke have to do with this website? I don't see where this site has anything to do with senuke...

      Would you blame an auto maker for making an engine with 8 cylinders? They could have "saved" the environment and went with 4 cylinders, to make it more fuel efficient, yet there are many 8 cylinder cars produced today.

      This is because people want to drive those 8 cylinder cars on public roads.

      Do you blame the auto manufacturer for every auto accident on the road? No.

      Same thing goes for any software. You can't blame the manufacturer of the software for the way the user chooses to use it.
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      • Profile picture of the author mosthost
        Originally Posted by pwtmike View Post

        What did senuke have to do with this website? I don't see where this site has anything to do with senuke...

        Would you blame an auto maker for making an engine with 8 cylinders? They could have "saved" the environment and went with 4 cylinders, to make it more fuel efficient, yet there are many 8 cylinder cars produced today.

        This is because people want to drive those 8 cylinder cars on public roads.

        Do you blame the auto manufacturer for every auto accident on the road? No.
        Do you blame Gaston Glock every time someone gets shot?
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        • Profile picture of the author pwtmike
          Originally Posted by mosthost View Post

          Do you blame Gaston Glock every time someone gets shot?
          You nailed it! That's pretty much where I was going with it...
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  • Profile picture of the author glock67
    its just a rumor as long as you write quality content you will be fine
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    • Profile picture of the author AZMD
      That's what it is all about... Quality will prevail. Google seems to be getting smart. Very smart. My thought is that no matter what the platform is, Google will soon (if they don't already) be able to completely understand what any webpage says. Spammers no matter what the platform should be eliminated as they bring no value to search engine users.

      Glock67 has the right idea and quality will prevail.
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  • Profile picture of the author domainarama
    I have been known in these parts to tout Blogger over WordPress, something Paulgl hints at. Blogger at least makes the appearance of being more selective than WordPress.

    But I have found many holes in Blogger's claim to virtue. I do not advocate trying to cheat on Blogger, and I will not instruct anyone on any of the holes I have found on Blogger. But the fact that I, an amateur, have found holes in Blogger's virtue shield says to me that Google's crusade for virtue can go only so far. IOW where there is a will to spam ways will be found to spam.
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  • Profile picture of the author kimfal
    I just can't picture Google just targeting WP as a platform for spam when there is spam on every platform? Not saying it can't be true, just saying it sounds weird!
    Sounds to me that your designer wants to do your site over and get paid...hehehe
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  • Profile picture of the author jefkas
    Oh how I wish. I would own the market for sure!
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  • Profile picture of the author SammyBlackstar
    LOL Spend less time reading rumors and more time grinding.
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  • Profile picture of the author milivojac
    Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

    I heard that Google is now treating Wordpress websites as Spam, is this true?
    I don't thinks so, no! Wordpress is the biggest website platform in the world, they can`t just ban all wordpress websites. There is so many wordpress websites that are high quality, why would google ban that site?! No sense, right?!

    I know Google has a strict rules, but i don`t think they would do something like that. Only if they tried to buy Wordpress, and Wordpress owner declined... so maybe Google is angry on them now I can`t see any other reason for that.

    I mean, you can built your website by yourself (not on wordpress platform) and if your site is spammy - Google will knock you down.
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  • Profile picture of the author OmarNegron
    Im not sure if they are treating as spam and how they even can if you are offering good unique content on your website.

    Of course some people don't so maybe these are the people who are feeling it? I doubt they will go after everyone who uses a wordpress....that's a lot of people!

    -Omar
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    • Profile picture of the author attorneydavid
      Google could disfavor incoming wordpress or any other platforms links as spam if they are an unnatural percentage. The overwhelming majority of blog networks and bmrs use wordpress.

      But disfavoring wordpress sites would be crazy , way too many legit sites.
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  • Profile picture of the author BenFromSoMo
    NFL.com and many other important websites use Wordpress.
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    • Originally Posted by Mike Grant View Post

      OK when did you sneak into my ranch and take my picture buster?
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  • Profile picture of the author godinu
    THere are many big company sites built on wordpress. Google couldn't just blanket an entire CMS like that, that would be ridiculous.
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  • Profile picture of the author patco
    Who did tell this?!? I am almost 99% sure that this is NOT right. Wordpress is the biggest platform for blogs worldwide and I don't think Google will mark them as SPAM.
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  • Profile picture of the author Paul Gram
    Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

    I heard that Google is now treating Wordpress websites as Spam, is this true?
    Lol, utterly ridiculous. Run away from the guy trying to sell you on that crap.
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  • Profile picture of the author bilal9999
    Not all wordpress sites are spam in Google eyes.
    but some wordpress are spam in Google eyes.
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  • I believe it is just a rumor. I have three sites that run on the WordPress platform and those are doing just fine. I also write for about 10 clients who use a WordPress platform. Just because it is WordPress does not mean it is going to be spammy - there are plenty of legit WordPress sites out there.
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  • Profile picture of the author theverysmartguy
    I heard that Google doesn't like peanut butter anymore, so if you eat peanut butter all your sites are going to get deindexed.



    -- Jeff

    P.S. You are only allowed to have Nutella. Eat Nutella and you will be fine.
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  • Profile picture of the author ThatAblaze
    Well, WP may not be spam.. but I do think it's generally too simple. There are a lot of other sites that drop a complicated structure of privacy policies and different ordering methods, and when these pages link back to your home page it makes your site look better to Google.

    So I could certainly see getting a better ranking with a more complicated platform.
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  • Profile picture of the author gearmonkey
    I think a lot of people are completely underestimating how advance Google really is. They don't need to blanket one software to catch the spammers, they can find the individuals abusing / gaming the system and ban them.

    If you are doing things the right way, you are safe... no matter what software you are using.
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    • Profile picture of the author markowe
      Originally Posted by gearmonkey View Post

      I think a lot of people are completely underestimating how advance Google really is. They don't need to blanket one software to catch the spammers, they can find the individuals abusing / gaming the system and ban them.

      If you are doing things the right way, you are safe... no matter what software you are using.
      Yeah, that's pretty much said it. It's absolute NONSENSE to suggest your site will somehow be under threat if you use Wordpress.

      Some of the biggest blogs and sites in the world run on Wordpress for GS!

      Google's ranking system is WAAAAY more advanced than a lot of people seem to give credit for. I can imagine that there MIGHT be a certain pattern detection algorithm which MIGHT work something like:

      - IF site has only 3 pages + privacy policy
      - and IF content fails a whole bunch of clever linguistic analyses
      - and IF site has poor bounce/time-on-site stats
      - and IF site has ugly, plain template that a million other sites run, MANY of them fitting the same description above, AND is running Wordpress

      THEN, maybe that site has a low value.

      Suggesting running Wordpress will harm your site and that Google is penalising that somehow is TWADDLE!
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  • Google is smarter than the developers that made it. It has developed Artificial Intelligence.
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  • Profile picture of the author seopratik
    that is fakes news because wordpress is a best opensource for seo..
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  • Profile picture of the author neil_patmore
    I heard Google was starting to treat HTML as spam too.
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    • Profile picture of the author dburk
      Originally Posted by neil_patmore View Post

      I heard Google was starting to treat HTML as spam too.
      Yes! This is true Google is now treating HTML as spam too.

      All of my competitors better switch to flash if they know what is good for them (and by "them" I mean "me" of course ).
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      • Profile picture of the author paulgl
        What I have said many times here, is that wordpress has
        made it possible for any knucklehead to buy a domain
        and create a website. This could only lead to letting
        any Joe Blow think he's a webmaster. Gone are the days
        when one had to learn html, php, some javascript, etc.

        That's why this forum sometimes looks like a fix-it-forum
        for wordpress. Everybody and their brother can get a website,
        but they have no idea how to tweak anything. They think
        they need a plugin for anything. Just point and click.

        This cannot possibly lead to anything except a bunch of
        sites made by people who have no clue. Sites that for
        the most part are just slapped together to either make
        a buck with adsense or something else. Programming and
        coding be damned.

        So junk sites using wordpress are like a plague. But that
        does not mean every wordpress is junk, nor every junk
        site uses wordpress.

        But then, not every .co.cc was a spam site, was it?
        But google banned them all. Wordpress has allowed
        many people to toss up spam sites.

        I don't have anything against wordpress, but do have
        a bone to pick with people who have no clue as
        to how to code a site, and could not exist online if
        it were not for wordpress and them being able to find
        plugins.

        Paul
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        • Profile picture of the author Fraggler
          Originally Posted by paulgl View Post

          What I have said many times here, is that wordpress has
          made it possible for any knucklehead to buy a domain
          and create a website. This could only lead to letting
          any Joe Blow think he's a webmaster. Gone are the days
          when one had to learn html, php, some javascript, etc.
          Communities like Geocities (and all those lovely 90's neighborhoods), Blogspot, Tumblr made making a website a lot simpler than trying to teach the computer illiterate to install and/or use Wordpress. And hackers have been targeting any CMS of the time for ages as well. It will always happen when there are smart kids out there with a lot of time and curiousity on their hands.

          This forum looks like a support forum for Wordpress because it is a forum about making money off websites. It's a biased sample.

          I can't see why Google has to even worry about targeting Wordpress when their algorthim keeps the rot out of the serps to begin with. A site that is seen as an authority on Dogs is no less authorative because it uses Wordpress. That's silly.
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        • Originally Posted by NY1 View Post

          Lol, I'm guessing you don't have many friends in the real world. You sound like the IT character that Jimmy Fallon did on Saturday Night Live.
          It amazes me when people are faced with facts, plausible trends, possible issues in a format open for mature discussion it just sinks into name calling and immature diatribe.

          If you do not have something constructive to contribute, why the ridiculing and name calling?
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          • Originally Posted by NY1 View Post

            Let's stick to the facts, then, shall we?

            You are making the extraordinary claim that Google is going to somehow treat all wordpress sites as spam. Without any evidence. Claiming to have compiled evidence is not the same as actually having it.

            Not only that, but you do realize that the majority of the mainstream blogosphere uses Wordpress as the CMS... that would cause major public relations blowback if Google were to do that.

            You do understand what blowback is in regards to public relations, right?

            Now, simple logic would say that you are just making claims that don't make any sense no matter how you look at it. From a technical standpoint, it does not make sense. From a PR standpoint it does not make sense.

            The benefits of flagging all WP site as spam does not outweigh the drawbacks by a LONG SHOT.

            So, yeah, I am having a little fun with it.
            I never made this claim

            You are making the extraordinary claim that Google is going to somehow treat all wordpress sites as spam.
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        • Profile picture of the author chas08
          Originally Posted by paulgl View Post

          What I have said many times here, is that wordpress has
          made it possible for any knucklehead to buy a domain
          and create a website. This could only lead to letting
          any Joe Blow think he's a webmaster. Gone are the days
          when one had to learn html, php, some javascript, etc.

          That's why this forum sometimes looks like a fix-it-forum
          for wordpress. Everybody and their brother can get a website,
          but they have no idea how to tweak anything. They think
          they need a plugin for anything. Just point and click.

          This cannot possibly lead to anything except a bunch of
          sites made by people who have no clue. Sites that for
          the most part are just slapped together to either make
          a buck with adsense or something else. Programming and
          coding be damned.

          So junk sites using wordpress are like a plague. But that
          does not mean every wordpress is junk, nor every junk
          site uses wordpress.

          But then, not every .co.cc was a spam site, was it?
          But google banned them all. Wordpress has allowed
          many people to toss up spam sites.

          I don't have anything against wordpress, but do have
          a bone to pick with people who have no clue as
          to how to code a site, and could not exist online if
          it were not for wordpress and them being able to find
          plugins.

          Paul
          I think that it just took the internet out of the hands of prpgrammers and opened it up to others. Yes, many have abused that. But others who have no understanding of HTML can now put up a web site based on great, original content. I'm sure some programmers look down on those of us who never learned HTML. But I am still very proud of my main authortiy site and the 10,000 visitors a month to my site, and at least some of them agree. Why should one have to understand HTML and other coding to be able to be express their views on the internet?
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          • Profile picture of the author paulgl
            Originally Posted by chas08 View Post

            I think that it just took the internet out of the hands of prpgrammers and opened it up to others. Yes, many have abused that. But others who have no understanding of HTML can now put up a web site based on great, original content. I'm sure some programmers look down on those of us who never learned HTML. But I am still very proud of my main authortiy site and the 10,000 visitors a month to my site, and at least some of them agree. Why should one have to understand HTML and other coding to be able to be express their views on the internet?
            It's not about that. You can open up a blog on a brazilian platforms across
            the web, free, and express your opinion. From twitter to facebook and
            everything in between.

            I'm talking spammers. I'm talking clowns. I'm talking about people who
            can now get a domain, build a website, put garbage up there, slap
            some adsense or other affiliate nonsense, and expect the riches to
            flow. Then when nothing works right, they come here whining about
            why an ad won't show or why this plugin sucks or that plugin won't
            work or any other stupid complaint because they can't just tweak
            the code. They are clueless on all fronts, but want to make a bunch
            from the internet riches that are just waiting for idiots to mine.

            That has nothing to do with publishing your opinion across the web.

            My sister has a blog, facebooks, etc. all about her hobbies. No
            spam, no get rich scheme, no adsense, no nothing. She does
            not worry about any such nonsense that goes into creating a
            website. She does not whine about a plugin. She does not whine
            about SERPs. She does not whine about why her blog dropped
            from panda. She gets her opinion on the web just fine. Ditto
            my wife. They don't worry about domain names, php, files, etc.

            It has nothing to do with platforms being spam. It's the people using
            them. Wordpress has made it possible for the clueless masses.

            If the clueless masses continue to make wordpress junk....well,
            more power to them.

            In fact, because it seems there is some silent majority here that
            insists on using wordpress, and the whining keeps flowing. I'm
            beginning to wonder if it's all related. People complain about panda,
            santa claus, and the easter bunny all taking down their sites. When
            it's probably the fact that people are clueless. Completely.

            I guess it's like the argument about gun control. Guns don't kill
            people, people do.

            Paul
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            • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
              How in the world did this subject get to three pages? Obviously we need a new panda update - people are getting much too bored.
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              • Profile picture of the author bizwebman
                Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

                How in the world did this subject get to three pages? Obviously we need a new panda update - people are getting much too bored.
                I can only agree - what the heck!!!, people are spending large amounts of their time researching this ridiculous rumour.

                Anyone who use Wordpress know the team behind the platform are very highly regarded by Google.

                Waste no more time on this for goodness sake
                As others have said run an ethical well structured site with good content and you will have no need to worry.

                Grahame
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                • Originally Posted by bizwebman View Post

                  Anyone who use Wordpress know the team behind the platform are very highly regarded by Google.
                  You actually know this is fact and can back this statement up with fact?
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                  • Profile picture of the author bizwebman
                    Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

                    You actually know this is fact and can back this statement up with fact?
                    You have done more research than most and should have already found this out as part of your due diligence.

                    http://www.wptavern.com/wordpress-matt-cutts-and-google just as a start there is plenty more if you choose to check it out.
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  • Profile picture of the author Oranges
    The biggest SEO "blah blah blah" from Google runs his blog on wordpress.
    Enough said.
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  • Profile picture of the author swpower
    I agree. I really doubt that Google would EVER punish a framework just because people spam it.
    However, it wouldn't surprise me if Google started to recognize the typical footprint of a spammer e.g. on sites like Wordpress, just to be able to ignore such links, but that's another thing (pure speculation!).
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  • Profile picture of the author EddieGee
    The idea that Google is going after WordPress sites is absurd.

    It's like saying that the FBI is going to start targeting people who drive Toyotas because some criminals have been known to drive them.

    WordPress is like Toyota. It's favored by a large segment of the population that tends toward the "middle of the road" but also encompasses the top end and the bottom end.

    Because it's such a powerful, easy to use, and free tool, millions of people use WordPress, including spammers. But as other posters have pointed out, if Google really did decide to take the ridiculous measure of punishing WordPress users, then everybody, including the spammers, would just go over to Joomla or Drupal or whatever, and the situation would be exactly the same as it is now, except that millions of people would have been forced to waste time and effort abandoning one useful platform for a slightly less useful one.
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    • Originally Posted by EddieGee View Post

      The idea that Google is going after WordPress sites is absurd.

      It's like saying that the FBI is going to start targeting people who drive Toyotas because some criminals have been known to drive them.

      WordPress is like Toyota. It's favored by a large segment of the population that tends toward the "middle of the road" but also encompasses the top end and the bottom end.

      Because it's such a powerful, easy to use, and free tool, millions of people use WordPress, including spammers. But as other posters have pointed out, if Google really did decide to take the ridiculous measure of punishing WordPress users, then everybody, including the spammers, would just go over to Joomla or Drupal or whatever, and the situation would be exactly the same as it is now, except that millions of people would have been forced to waste time and effort abandoning one useful platform for a slightly less useful one.
      Is COMCAST a spamming company? No! But people who use Comcast spam and spammers use Comcast as their spoof site.

      This gets Comcast blocked by many ISPs and black listing services.

      WP becoming a warning of possible spam is entirely plausible.
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    • Profile picture of the author lukemeister
      Originally Posted by EddieGee View Post

      It's like saying that the FBI is going to start targeting people who drive Toyotas because some criminals have been known to drive them.
      From what I've seen, the Feds aren't the best example of not blanket targeting people, but I'm just poking fun ha


      Regarding the original topic - All I know is the WordPress sites I've been running for a few years now are doing better than they ever have in the search engines. Google would be silly to discount the WordPress platform, or any others. They are trying to get better at deindexing spam, not platforms.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mantasmo
    I just took down all of my WP sites. Don't want Google to ban me from the internets.
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  • Profile picture of the author fus10n
    Banned
    [DELETED]
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  • The idea that Google has targeted WP for profiling as one of the worse offenders of content spamming, comment spamming, being hijacked and used for massive article submission is entirely plausible.

    Here are two WP sites that got hijacked. I have left them alone for my researching this possible issue.

    http://netnewsads.net/?p=1

    Pre Paid Legal Leads

    As I continue to acquire WP blog URLS from the top, in the middle and obscure a trend is starting to surface. A trend and if you do not pay attention to trends, they have a way of mowing you down.

    WP is being destroyed by automated article software, automated commenting software and "secret" methods to brut force a WP blog as well as profile a WP blog that has been abandoned.

    In fact there are offers on this forum selling the very submitting services (spamming services is more accurate) that is in fact destroying WP as a legitimate marketing tool.

    This is a trend. Ignor and continue to ridicule those who are beginning to notice it. Or make decisions with your emotion. But the bottom line, the winds are changing and WP is probably not going to be able to continue to deliver the same results it has been doing.

    Here is an example of the type of back links being found in hijacked WP blogs.

    http://www.commissionbreakthrough.com

    Go ahead, continue to laugh and ridicule those who are beginning to see this trend, but the trend is real.

    Am I going to abandon all my WP blogs? I have hundreds of them. No but I am watching them closer and most of them have recently been trending downward. The few that were diving in page rank reversed and started going back up when I removed WP.

    I am just reporting those results. So maybe you might want to pay attention. I think something is up.
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    • Profile picture of the author mosthost
      Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

      Am I going to abandon all my WP blogs? I have hundreds of them. No but I am watching them closer and most of them have recently been trending downward. The few that were diving in page rank reversed and started going back up when I removed WP.

      I am just reporting those results. So maybe you might want to pay attention. I think something is up.
      Let me guess, you have '100s' of high-quality WP blogs? You must have an army of college-educated authors on staff updating those!
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      • Originally Posted by mosthost View Post

        Let me guess, you have '100s' of high-quality WP blogs? You must have an army of college-educated authors on staff updating those!

        Actually I do, and your point is?
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        • Profile picture of the author mosthost
          Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

          Actually I do, and your point is?
          LOL. You don't have '100s' of 'high-quality' blogs.

          No one does. Not even AOL.

          Bottom line, you seem like an incredibly rich, powerful, and smart person. My advice is to switch off the Wordpress platform because you're so worried about the future.

          Make a custom CMS and get on with it. You clearly have the money and the expertise. No need to 'goof around' with Wordpress at your level of success.
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          • Originally Posted by mosthost View Post

            LOL. You don't have '100s' of 'high-quality' blogs.

            No one does. Not even AOL.

            Bottom line, you seem like an incredibly rich, powerful, and smart person. My advice is to switch off the Wordpress platform because you're so worried about the future.

            Make a custom CMS and get on with it. You clearly have the money and the expertise. No need to 'goof around' with Wordpress at your level of success.
            Why the arrogant condescending attitude?
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    • Profile picture of the author rapatterson
      You never know what Google will do, but this sounds way out there even for them. Disregarding sites with WP as the platform at the snap of a finger? Not likely, but need to be aware anyways.
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    • Profile picture of the author puneetkgarg
      I am posting my blogs to wordpress and I am getting two backlinks from there so I dont think that it is true. May be your content can be duplicate that is why are facing this kind of problem.
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  • Profile picture of the author Fixers
    Garbage, they are clearly just trying to get some more money off you.

    Clearly wp sites are used by millions so for them to do this it would be stupid
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  • Profile picture of the author Rough Outline
    Stupid thread is stupid thread.

    Google will devalue your site if it has malware or spreads spam. It does not completely devalue the most popular CMS because of a few hackers.
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  • Profile picture of the author mejohn
    Several years back, Matt Cutts said that Wordpress sites took care of pretty much all the SEO you need:

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  • Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

    I heard that Google is now treating Wordpress websites as Spam, is this true?
    Huh? That is interesting - Why would it single out Wordpress sites? We just ROCKED 4 sites to the top 3 spots in very competitive keyword market. (Powerpoint etc). If SPAM, they would surely be PUNISHED with the Google SMACK DOWN
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  • Excellent contribution. I also would mention that SpamAssasin will block any .biz domain for the same reason.
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  • I also submit a plausible scenario especially considering a large majority WP sites are produced by knuckleheads. Is it not a possible strategy for a group of smart blackhat engineers to create and distribute a massive amount of templates out there with the very purpose of tracking the WP blog they are on?

    In doing so, determine if that WP blog has been "abandoned" thereby giving the crime gang the green lite to HIJACK said site?

    Perhaps I should take the tinfoil off my head, by I have some pretty strong suspicions and evidence that this may by true.

    And Google may be perceiving this and may be profiling WP blogs to corral the majority that fit the Hi Jacked profile.

    But I am not always right with my suspicions, but almost always right.
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  • Profile picture of the author Edawg
    I recently bought a program called "Commission BlackOps", which sounds very similar to this program. I also received many emails about this one as well. I don't know about CB, but CBO is crap! There are MANY upsells, and for each "site" you have to set up, there's hosting and domain costs associated with it that they don't tell you about upfront as well. I've spent quite a bit of money trying and working this program, and found it to be crap. I've realized that I'm probably going to go back to old fashioned MLM/Network Marketing where there's a product that DOES helps people at least. So, if CB is anything like CBO, I'd say... stay away. Sounds too good to be true.. probably is.
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  • Profile picture of the author Edawg
    Sorry... this was supposed to be posted under a different forum, but it wouldn't let me. I apologize.
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  • Profile picture of the author komplex
    Banned
    Really hope not. I use Wordpress for everything, it's like the core software to build a website these days..
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    • Profile picture of the author paulgl
      Originally Posted by komplex View Post

      Really hope not. I use Wordpress for everything, it's like the core software to build a website these days..
      If it's the core software to build a website these days, then you prove my
      point. If it is, then man the internet has gone to the dogs...

      Thing about geocities, and others in the 90's, is that you did have
      to know some html and a little bit of what to do. Of course
      people abused that stupid blink tag... glad that's gone...

      As far as blogspot goes, google owns it and has a built-in way
      of deleting spammy blogs. If they choose.

      It's not really an argument about wordpress, but any way any
      knucklehead can create 100 sites in one day is a surefire way
      to bomb the net with junk. And wordpress makes this very
      easy.

      Maybe the WF is skewed now, as nobody really knows much anymore
      about how to create a website...and there in lies the problem.

      Toss in the adsense thing, and no wonder people here overwhelmingly
      complain about being banned. They make junk websites with wordpress,
      slap the adsense on, with a plugin no less, and wait for the riches.

      I have no stats of course, just a gut feeling. But I'll bet people
      here who get adsense banned are using wordpress in the majority.

      Paul
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      • Profile picture of the author Carl Brown
        Glad I've stuck with Dreamweaver and a couple others. My sites have been doing better lately and wondered about the spam thing. I've always disliked the look of wordpress as a foundation for a normal website.
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        • Profile picture of the author Jospeh31
          Originally Posted by Carl Brown View Post

          Glad I've stuck with Dreamweaver and a couple others. My sites have been doing better lately and wondered about the spam thing. I've always disliked the look of wordpress as a foundation for a normal website.
          There are wordpress sites with custom themes and you don't even notice they are on wordpress. If you use a default theme of course your site is gonna suck.
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      • Originally Posted by paulgl View Post


        Maybe the WF is skewed now, as nobody really knows much anymore
        about how to create a website...and there in lies the problem.

        Paul
        Sad actually to see this phenomena occur as the majority of sites slowly become homogenized and mediocre.
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  • Profile picture of the author kangenwater
    If not WordPress, then what? Joomla? Other content spammers and automated link builders have been migrating to Joomla for a while. Supposedly, the new SEO Link Monster blog network has aged authority sites that are Joomla based.
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  • Profile picture of the author friedman
    I am a google level 11 webmaster at their forum, so I've analyzed thousands of sites and answered thousands of questions.
    I see clear patterns:
    - link exchanges? penalty.
    - back link anchor over-optimization? penalty.
    - letting commenters spam your site? penalty.
    - buying links from front pages of domains? penalty.
    - interlinking front pages of domains you control? penalty.
    - a plugin you developed/distributed links back to your OWN site without nofollow? penalty.
    - your content found on many sites? penalty.
    - content farm (no clear focus)? penalty.
    - thin affiliate? penalty.
    - made for adsense? penalty.
    - let your site get hacked? penalty.
    - let your domain expire? penalty.
    - hosting downtime? penalty.
    - hidden div with links? penalty.
    - base64 encoding links? penalty.
    - platform? penalty? no.
    My own sites are wordpress and they are on page 1 or 2 for the desired keywords.
    And they use the DEFAULT twentyten or twentyeleven theme...
    One site I own gets 100,000 pageviews a month.
    All of my sites are on shared hosting (h0stg@tor)
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    • Originally Posted by friedman View Post

      - hidden div with links? penalty.
      Question, I have sites built using DIV hidden layers that display when certain links are clicked (javascript)

      If those layers have links do they get penalized?
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  • Profile picture of the author ilikakikien
    how ironic is this if this is true. Google is against Stop Internet Piracy Act (SOPA) but not they're basically doing the same thing. Instead of finding the bad apples, they decided to chop the whole tree down.
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  • Profile picture of the author studlee46
    I can't even believe this is being discussed... People really think Google would discredit an entire framework?
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    • Profile picture of the author Mantasmo
      Originally Posted by studlee46 View Post

      I can't even believe this is being discussed... People really think Google would discredit an entire framework?
      They already have, I've long moved away from using WP. This thread == eye opener. :rolleyes:
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    • Profile picture of the author mosthost
      Originally Posted by studlee46 View Post

      I can't even believe this is being discussed... People really think Google would discredit an entire framework?
      I don't. Do you?
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    • Profile picture of the author pwtmike
      Originally Posted by studlee46 View Post

      I can't even believe this is being discussed... People really think Google would discredit an entire framework?
      Exactly. It's like someone at google is standing around with a cup of joe and a cigarette, saying "God damn Junior, lets blast all them cakePHP sites today..." Click.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jeff Snyder
    Are we talking about Wordpress.com blogs or websites using Wordpress as a platform. Because there is a big difference.

    I could absolutely see Google limiting the visibility of Wordpress.com blogs in their organic results - as they have done with a lot of Web 2.0 properties since Panda.

    Perhaps your consultant knows this and assumed that Wordpress.com is the same as a website using Wordpress. Either way, he's misinformed and clearly doesn't think through things logically before making recommendations or blanket statements like "Google hates Wordpress"...so I would run fast in the other direction.

    The sites your sharing have been hacked and littered with spam. Fine. I'm sure you would have no problem digging up thousands of Joomla sites in the same situation. There are (hundreds of?) thousands of quality websites built on Wordpress. Based on the searches I've done for my clients today, all of which are on Wordpress, none are penalized and the top 10 results consist of primarily Wordpress-based websites.

    Google does prompt you to update Wordpress if you are using Webmaster Tools. I could see them implementing a penalty for websites refusing to update the software due to security flaws in previous versions. That makes sense. But simply demoting Wordpress-based websites all together, no.

    so...yeah, run.
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  • Profile picture of the author papamo44
    I highly doubt that is true.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jon Potts
    Bad WordPress Theme = SPAM ahahah thats my only addition to this convo. My WordPress websites are ranking well but then again I do not use a store bought template. Get rid of the junk code and hidden linking.
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  • Profile picture of the author guzpra
    I think its not the wordpress that spammy but its content
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  • Profile picture of the author tylerjaysen
    yea this sounds like your web guy is trying to squeeze more cash out of you....or doesn't know wordpress...hmmm. But I highly doubt that big G would crack down specifically on wordpress...
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  • Profile picture of the author giseo
    do you think they are going to ban ebay, wsj, yahoo and so on?

    21 Popular Brands That Are Using WordPress
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  • Profile picture of the author Walter Warner
    I am sure Google will not treat Wordpress sites as spam. Little by little their algorithms are learning what sites are considered legitimate.Google will become smart enough to tell which sites have reliable, trustworthy content and which ones are nothing but spam.
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  • Profile picture of the author stokz
    It can't be true
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  • Profile picture of the author carsonben
    Another fear tactic. Just keep adding keyword rich, fresh, original content.
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  • Profile picture of the author pwtmike
    Wordpress is a pretty powerful platform and I would argue that it has done much more good for the internet than bad. Think of all the people who use that platform for building their blogs and providing valuable content to an audience or readership. This is core building blocks for the blank canvas the internet presents to everyone.

    Awhile back I did this search, I was building alot of joomla sites for clients, joomla was a powerful cms from 2006 onward. But I started to notice the shift in cms vs blog platform... and I wanted hard data to validate what I was seeing, so as always you go to google...

    Google Trends: wordpress, drupal, joomla, mambo



    you see where mambo and joomla forked... then wordpress just killed joomla as being the all around platform, blogging and cms. this is some powerful stuff... for a major search engine to devalue a platform which has such clout among the designers (templates), developers (plugins), marketers, entire internet community, etc... to me it says that there is more strength in the platform than anything we've really seen before... look at that gap in search volume compared to joomla. it's just growing bigger. and wp is a very extensible platform... In the next two years I would only assume tht more and more people will be using wordpress... it easily provides people with "app store" like plug and play capabilities with a website.

    I think steve jobs would like what wordpress is doing for website owners similarly to what apple has done for the every day person who uses a telephone...

    in terms of how people sold things back in the early 1900's... the "website" is really just the next telephone...for the early 2000's. that's what we are looking at today. and it just looks like wordpress, who started back in 2004, is really going to play a big part in that moving forward... just my .02.
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    • Originally Posted by pwtmike View Post

      Wordpress is a pretty powerful platform and I would argue that it has done much more good for the internet than bad. Think of all the people who use that platform for building their blogs and providing valuable content to an audience or readership. This is core building blocks for the blank canvas the internet presents to everyone.

      Awhile back I did this search, I was building alot of joomla sites for clients, joomla was a powerful cms from 2006 onward. But I started to notice the shift in cms vs blog platform... and I wanted hard data to validate what I was seeing, so as always you go to google...

      Google Trends: wordpress, drupal, joomla, mambo



      you see where mambo and joomla forked... then wordpress just killed joomla as being the all around platform, blogging and cms. this is some powerful stuff... for a major search engine to devalue a platform which has such clout among the designers (templates), developers (plugins), marketers, entire internet community, etc... to me it says that there is more strength in the platform than anything we've really seen before... look at that gap in search volume compared to joomla. it's just growing bigger. and wp is a very extensible platform... In the next two years I would only assume tht more and more people will be using wordpress... it easily provides people with "app store" like plug and play capabilities with a website.

      I think steve jobs would like what wordpress is doing for website owners similarly to what apple has done for the every day person who uses a telephone...

      in terms of how people sold things back in the early 1900's... the "website" is really just the next telephone...for the early 2000's. that's what we are looking at today. and it just looks like wordpress, who started back in 2004, is really going to play a big part in that moving forward... just my .02.
      Excellent research. Thank you very much.
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  • Profile picture of the author richinca
    I'm glad someone started this thread.

    I have seen a trend across many (most) of my WP sites. Sites that used to rank pretty well on the home page for several keywords now do not.

    This is across may different types of sites. niches, themes, and monetarization methods.

    The issue is unique in that the home page of the site seems to have been removed from consideration for most (but not all) keywords. Replacing the home page in the rankings is an inner page that is not optimized for the home page keyword. Sometimes the home page ranks for a keyword that is really optimized on an inner page. Sometimes the privacy policy or about us page ranks for the keyword.

    I want to be clear, this seems to be happening on all of my WP sites (different hosts), but not on any of my other custom CMS or HTML based sites.

    For example (this is just an example).

    If I had a site called TopDogBreeders.c0m and it had a page in it called topdogbreeders.c0m/dalmatian and those two pages were keyword phrase optimized and anchor linked for "top dog breeders" and "top Dalmatian dog breeders" respectively, this is a typical senario:

    Before / Home page / Dalmatian page
    "top dog breeders" / google rank 7 /google rank - no rank
    "top Dalmatian dog breeders"/ google rank - no rank / google rank - 5

    Now
    "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank / google rank - 114
    "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
    or
    "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
    "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank / google rank - no rank
    "about us" / google rank - 76 /google rank - no rank

    It is really bizarre and only a function of WP sites, some of which I haven't done much on for a while. Backlinking doesn't seem to help the home page come back. I've changed themes, keyword densities, and changed the homepages from summary type of pages to dedicated article type pages but nothing has worked yet. I have not replace WP with HTML but am afraid that is next.

    I thought something is going on like the home page was penalized, but not the rest of the site. The sites are indexed and rank for some keywords but not well and certainly not for the way I designed and optimized the sites.

    Anyone else seeing this? It seems to have happened around Q3 of last year.
    Signature
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    • Profile picture of the author Rus Sells
      Some of these ranking issues are more likely due to site speed. Google will adjust your ranking based on how fast your site loads. Its because of user experience.

      If you site is ranked on the first page of Google and it begins to consistently load slow its wasting space in the rankings because people will just bounce right back to the search results.

      Heavy plugins and over used shared hosting are the major contributing factors for the making of a slow WP site.

      Originally Posted by richinca View Post

      I'm glad someone started this thread.

      I have seen a trend across many (most) of my WP sites. Sites that used to rank pretty well on the home page for several keywords now do not.

      This is across may different types of sites. niches, themes, and monetarization methods.

      The issue is unique in that the home page of the site seems to have been removed from consideration for most (but not all) keywords. Replacing the home page in the rankings is an inner page that is not optimized for the home page keyword. Sometimes the home page ranks for a keyword that is really optimized on an inner page. Sometimes the privacy policy or about us page ranks for the keyword.

      I want to be clear, this seems to be happening on all of my WP sites (different hosts), but not on any of my other custom CMS or HTML based sites.

      For example (this is just an example).

      If I had a site called TopDogBreeders.c0m and it had a page in it called topdogbreeders.c0m/dalmatian and those two pages were keyword phrase optimized and anchor linked for "top dog breeders" and "top Dalmatian dog breeders" respectively, this is a typical senario:

      Before / Home page / Dalmatian page
      "top dog breeders" / google rank 7 /google rank - no rank
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders"/ google rank - no rank / google rank - 5

      Now
      "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank / google rank - 114
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
      or
      "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank / google rank - no rank
      "about us" / google rank - 76 /google rank - no rank

      It is really bizarre and only a function of WP sites, some of which I haven't done much on for a while. Backlinking doesn't seem to help the home page come back. I've changed themes, keyword densities, and changed the homepages from summary type of pages to dedicated article type pages but nothing has worked yet. I have not replace WP with HTML but am afraid that is next.

      I thought something is going on like the home page was penalized, but not the rest of the site. The sites are indexed and rank for some keywords but not well and certainly not for the way I designed and optimized the sites.

      Anyone else seeing this? It seems to have happened around Q3 of last year.
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      • Profile picture of the author richinca
        Hi Rus Thanks. I run cache programs on all of the sites. Do you have numbers on load times? I'd like to find out how to quantify this. The HTML sites do load faster.
        Signature
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      • Profile picture of the author richinca
        I've now gone off and looked at this a bit more. I may have dismissed this comment too early. :confused:

        After testing with Google's Page Speed and Yahoo's YSlow, I think Rus may be correct that some of the effect is due to the fact that WP blogs are slower than other approaches.

        Recently, I've enabled compression on all sites (I can't believe I didn't have this already - I thought the cache plugin did it for me), and added the "Better WordPress Minify" plug-in.

        Generally speaking, compressing your sites will shrink them by 40%-70% in size which translates to a corresponding decrease in loading times. Another benefit here is that I also now use compression on my html and custom CMS sites as well.

        I went through and deleted unused WP plugins and removed all those that were not active. These can load down your system as they are checked.

        I also read the cache plugin options in detail and changed a few settings for greater speed.

        The result? The sites are definitely faster and some are beginning to Gdance. I need more time to really see if it affects rankings in a meaningful way, I think a month should tell the story as to the real effect..


        Originally Posted by Rus Sells View Post

        Some of these ranking issues are more likely due to site speed. Google will adjust your ranking based on how fast your site loads. Its because of user experience.

        If you site is ranked on the first page of Google and it begins to consistently load slow its wasting space in the rankings because people will just bounce right back to the search results.

        Heavy plugins and over used shared hosting are the major contributing factors for the making of a slow WP site.
        Signature
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        • Profile picture of the author thomaspaylor
          I've been following this thread with some interested and am amazed by how caught up some people are with it. Even as far as conducting research!

          As a web company who use Wordpress as a CMS system for many SME clients, I should be running for hills and hiding if some of this garbage were to be believed.

          The simple facts are that Google are starting to look very carefully at reducing web spam. And rightly so. I sit on both sides of the fence, and have IM based websites for my own personal gain, and I also run an offline web and SEO business. Google algorithm changes over the last few months have done an excellent job of reducing the visibility of terrible "thin" affiliate/adsense websites, whether they were built in Joomla, Wordpress, Drupal or hand coded in PHP & HTML.

          Just because a 10 page website with poor content and thousands of PR0 un-related forum, web 2.0, bookmarking and blog comment backlinks disappears out of Google results, doesn't mean it has anything to do with the platform it was built in.

          Google is doing an excellent job of reducing spam, whether we like it or not. It has NOTHING to do with the platform your sites are built in. It has EVERYTHING to do with the quality of sites we are building, and how useful they are to an end user.

          There are no shortcuts, just focus on building a great site, that has useful content to an end user, isn't crammed with adverts above the fold and try and build links from reliable, relevant high PR pages and your website will be fine, no matter what platform it was built in.
          Signature
          "Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up." - Thomas Edison
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        • Profile picture of the author richinca
          After spending way to much time on this, I think I've identified the "WP penalty" discussed in this thread.

          I believe it is not related to WP itself, but rather the penalties incurred from the effects and structures that WP sites generate in their raw form.

          Here are a few things I found:

          - Speed penalty - WP sites tend to be slower than HTML out of the box. We all know that G pays more attention to this these days as part of the customer experience. Compression, caching, attention to image size etc. can help alleviate this. WP sites tend to be bloated and sluggish and slower.

          - Duplicate content penalty (onsite) - WP sites tend to put copies of your posts in all sorts of places: category pages, tag pages, archive pages, etc. This seems to be affected in Q311 with some type of change. Structuring a website to deal with these can help.
          I found this is especially true with home page excerpts, I've just changed a home page from excerpts to a static page and improved ranking on a website that tanked last Q3 from a Google change. Note: the original excerpts on the home page didn't change in a year (so no dynamic effects here). The site just fell out of rankings in Q311, and now with a new home page, its coming back. BTW, both home pages had almost exactly the same KW density and LSI as well.
          - Silo structure - WP sites have a default structure. It varies with some themes being better than others, but more attention needs to be paid to this. It kind of effects the "duplicate content penalty" above and the "linking patterns" discussion below. If you want to learn about the importance and structure of silos and how to deal with them, read all you can here at by our WF member "Yukon".

          - Linking patterns - Another issue with WP sites is the internal page linking pattern which comes from default WP themes and many of the plug-ins that generate the page/post links for you. Study silo structures and their effect on page and post authority, and you will see the effect of bad internal linking and good internal linking. I believe I just happened to do a better job of this on HTML sites, but allowed WP do its thing on WP sites. That has to change.
          Think of these patterns as G trys to figure out what your site is really all about, I believe in Q311 G began to pay more attention to internal links as a way of determining post/page importance (authority) on a site.

          If your "about me" page had the exact same internal links to it as your post on "watermelons" with equivalent kw densities, etc they both had the same chances of ranking for "watermelons." In fact, with LSI and more words (to confuse and dilute) in a post, the G machine may have ranked the "about us" page higher for "watermelons." These are unintended consequences of algorithmic change.
          So, after much experimentation and time, my conclusions to date are these:

          1. Were WP sites affected by 2011Q3 G changes? Absolutely.

          2. Were all WP site's ranking effected? Yes and no, because some sites handled some of the things listed here better than others. That's why we don't all see the same, uniform results.

          3. Was Google targeting WP sites? Nope. I never really thought they would do this, it really didn't make any sense. It just seemed that way.

          As an unintended consequence, WP tends to produce sites that produce some of the effects that Google was targeting in the Q311 update and maybe even with the new Panda releases. The key is to think about what G is looking for and see if your site "produces" it. I believe on page seo, site architecture, and plug-ins effect what they are looking for more than we know. This is why WP took a hit.

          4. Does my ranking drop mean my site is spammy? Nope, not necessarily. Notice, I didn't comment on content. The reason I ignored all the comments in this thread on "spammy sites" etc is that I know of many duplicate content sites, 1 page junk sites, etc and they were not necessarily effected by the Q311 changes. My WP sites were pretty good looking with original content etc and they all took a big, uniform hit.

          That just smacked of algorithmic mischief.

          Good luck to all.


          Originally Posted by richinca View Post

          I've now gone off and looked at this a bit more. I may have dismissed this comment too early. :confused:

          After testing with Google's Page Speed and Yahoo's YSlow, I think Rus may be correct that some of the effect is due to the fact that WP blogs are slower than other approaches.

          Recently, I've enabled compression on all sites (I can't believe I didn't have this already - I thought the cache plugin did it for me), and added the "Better WordPress Minify" plug-in.

          Generally speaking, compressing your sites will shrink them by 40%-70% in size which translates to a corresponding decrease in loading times. Another benefit here is that I also now use compression on my html and custom CMS sites as well.

          I went through and deleted unused WP plugins and removed all those that were not active. These can load down your system as they are checked.

          I also read the cache plugin options in detail and changed a few settings for greater speed.

          The result? The sites are definitely faster and some are beginning to Gdance. I need more time to really see if it affects rankings in a meaningful way, I think a month should tell the story as to the real effect..
          Signature
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          • Profile picture of the author Dumkist
            Originally Posted by richinca View Post

            After spending way to much time on this, I think I've identified the "WP penalty" discussed in this thread.

            I believe it is not related to WP itself, but rather the penalties incurred from the effects and structures that WP sites generate in their raw form.

            Here are a few things I found:

            - Speed penalty - WP sites tend to be slower than HTML out of the box. We all know that G pays more attention to this these days as part of the customer experience. Compression, caching, attention to image size etc. can help alleviate this. WP sites tend to be bloated and sluggish and slower.

            - Duplicate content penalty (onsite) - WP sites tend to put copies of your posts in all sorts of places: category pages, tag pages, archive pages, etc. This seems to be affected in Q311 with some type of change. Structuring a website to deal with these can help.
            I found this is especially true with home page excerpts, I've just changed a home page from excerpts to a static page and improved ranking on a website that tanked last Q3 from a Google change. Note: the original excerpts on the home page didn't change in a year (so no dynamic effects here). The site just fell out of rankings in Q311, and now with a new home page, its coming back. BTW, both home pages had almost exactly the same KW density and LSI as well.
            - Silo structure - WP sites have a default structure. It varies with some themes being better than others, but more attention needs to be paid to this. It kind of effects the "duplicate content penalty" above and the "linking patterns" discussion below. If you want to learn about the importance and structure of silos and how to deal with them, read all you can here at by our WF member "Yukon".

            - Linking patterns - Another issue with WP sites is the internal page linking pattern which comes from default WP themes and many of the plug-ins that generate the page/post links for you. Study silo structures and their effect on page and post authority, and you will see the effect of bad internal linking and good internal linking. I believe I just happened to do a better job of this on HTML sites, but allowed WP do its thing on WP sites. That has to change.
            Think of these patterns as G trys to figure out what your site is really all about, I believe in Q311 G began to pay more attention to internal links as a way of determining post/page importance (authority) on a site.

            If your "about me" page had the exact same internal links to it as your post on "watermelons" with equivalent kw densities, etc they both had the same chances of ranking for "watermelons." In fact, with LSI and more words (to confuse and dilute) in a post, the G machine may have ranked the "about us" page higher for "watermelons." These are unintended consequences of algorithmic change.
            So, after much experimentation and time, my conclusions to date are these:

            1. Were WP sites affected by 2011Q3 G changes? Absolutely.

            2. Were all WP site's ranking effected? Yes and no, because some sites handled some of the things listed here better than others. That's why we don't all see the same, uniform results.

            3. Was Google targeting WP sites? Nope. I never really thought they would do this, it really didn't make any sense. It just seemed that way.

            As an unintended consequence, WP tends to produce sites that produce some of the effects that Google was targeting in the Q311 update and maybe even with the new Panda releases. The key is to think about what G is looking for and see if your site "produces" it. I believe on page seo, site architecture, and plug-ins effect what they are looking for more than we know. This is why WP took a hit.

            4. Does my ranking drop mean my site is spammy? Nope, not necessarily. Notice, I didn't comment on content. The reason I ignored all the comments in this thread on "spammy sites" etc is that I know of many duplicate content sites, 1 page junk sites, etc and they were not necessarily effected by the Q311 changes. My WP sites were pretty good looking with original content etc and they all took a big, uniform hit.

            That just smacked of algorithmic mischief.

            Good luck to all.

            The best way to fix all this is .....build pages..problem fixed !
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    • Originally Posted by richinca View Post

      I'm glad someone started this thread.

      I have seen a trend across many (most) of my WP sites. Sites that used to rank pretty well on the home page for several keywords now do not.

      This is across may different types of sites. niches, themes, and monetarization methods.

      The issue is unique in that the home page of the site seems to have been removed from consideration for most (but not all) keywords. Replacing the home page in the rankings is an inner page that is not optimized for the home page keyword. Sometimes the home page ranks for a keyword that is really optimized on an inner page. Sometimes the privacy policy or about us page ranks for the keyword.

      I want to be clear, this seems to be happening on all of my WP sites (different hosts), but not on any of my other custom CMS or HTML based sites.

      For example (this is just an example).

      If I had a site called TopDogBreeders.c0m and it had a page in it called topdogbreeders.c0m/dalmatian and those two pages were keyword phrase optimized and anchor linked for "top dog breeders" and "top Dalmatian dog breeders" respectively, this is a typical senario:

      Before / Home page / Dalmatian page
      "top dog breeders" / google rank 7 /google rank - no rank
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders"/ google rank - no rank / google rank - 5

      Now
      "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank / google rank - 114
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
      or
      "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank / google rank - no rank
      "about us" / google rank - 76 /google rank - no rank

      It is really bizarre and only a function of WP sites, some of which I haven't done much on for a while. Backlinking doesn't seem to help the home page come back. I've changed themes, keyword densities, and changed the homepages from summary type of pages to dedicated article type pages but nothing has worked yet. I have not replace WP with HTML but am afraid that is next.

      I thought something is going on like the home page was penalized, but not the rest of the site. The sites are indexed and rank for some keywords but not well and certainly not for the way I designed and optimized the sites.

      Anyone else seeing this? It seems to have happened around Q3 of last year.
      This is the phenomena many of my subscribers are illustrating as well as my own R&D sites have been evidencing since about late 3rd quarter last year.

      Thank you for reporting
      Signature

      I have been around a long time on the Internet. You can usually find me @ Twitter and Instagram. I can be contacted on Telegram @ https://t.me/hivekeep

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      • Profile picture of the author richinca
        Hi Thomas,

        It is very strange. It must have been caused by a Google update but I haven't been able to isolate the variable that is causing this. Please be sure to post any progress as will I.

        Originally Posted by Thomas Prendergast View Post

        This is the phenomena many of my subscribers are illustrating as well as my own R&D sites have been evidencing since about late 3rd quarter last year.

        Thank you for reporting
        Signature
        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[5623015].message }}
        • Originally Posted by richinca View Post

          Hi Thomas,

          It is very strange. It must have been caused by a Google update but I haven't been able to isolate the variable that is causing this. Please be sure to post any progress as will I.
          I own a small subscriber based Social Internet Marketing service that includes hosting.

          So I have many subscribers. Many host with us as well as 3rd party hosting as do I. I actually have 3 different hosting solutions.

          We have been very busy tooling up for a huge release of a lot of new services one being a portfolio of WP plugins and templates customized for our subscribers.

          I love WP, I know WP and we develop for WP.

          About a month ago I had some subscribers share some concern that their WP sites started to drop. It had been a few months since I had even looked at mine (I have several 100 of them all used for research and development).

          Several had been hijacked with one having over 175,000 new EDITOR accounts. All had started to drop in rankings.

          I deleted the WP on a few of them and put Veretekk CMS systems on them. They immediately turned around and started improving.

          All of my subscribers that had expressed this issue with me also removed most of their WP blogs replacing them with other solutions and they all reported ranks returning and improving again.

          So I started researching this. That's my job, market research. I grind myself into delirium researching.

          I am discovering a trend that a large population of WP blogs that I have added into my research are losing rankings (not all but most of the ones I have researched so far).

          The ones that I control and those people I have communicated that removed them and replaced with some option have experienced a positive result.

          Some of my subscribers have become extremely anti WP. I think they are reacting illogically. There is a teend, but exactly what is casuing it is yet to be significantly identified.

          But there is a trend that is negatively impacting a large population of WP blogs.
          Signature

          I have been around a long time on the Internet. You can usually find me @ Twitter and Instagram. I can be contacted on Telegram @ https://t.me/hivekeep

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    • Profile picture of the author dburk
      Originally Posted by richinca View Post

      I'm glad someone started this thread.

      I have seen a trend across many (most) of my WP sites. Sites that used to rank pretty well on the home page for several keywords now do not.

      This is across may different types of sites. niches, themes, and monetarization methods.

      The issue is unique in that the home page of the site seems to have been removed from consideration for most (but not all) keywords. Replacing the home page in the rankings is an inner page that is not optimized for the home page keyword. Sometimes the home page ranks for a keyword that is really optimized on an inner page. Sometimes the privacy policy or about us page ranks for the keyword.

      I want to be clear, this seems to be happening on all of my WP sites (different hosts), but not on any of my other custom CMS or HTML based sites.

      For example (this is just an example).

      If I had a site called TopDogBreeders.c0m and it had a page in it called topdogbreeders.c0m/dalmatian and those two pages were keyword phrase optimized and anchor linked for "top dog breeders" and "top Dalmatian dog breeders" respectively, this is a typical senario:

      Before / Home page / Dalmatian page
      "top dog breeders" / google rank 7 /google rank - no rank
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders"/ google rank - no rank / google rank - 5

      Now
      "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank / google rank - 114
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
      or
      "top dog breeders" / google rank - no rank/ google rank - no rank
      "top Dalmatian dog breeders" /google rank - no rank / google rank - no rank
      "about us" / google rank - 76 /google rank - no rank

      It is really bizarre and only a function of WP sites, some of which I haven't done much on for a while. Backlinking doesn't seem to help the home page come back. I've changed themes, keyword densities, and changed the homepages from summary type of pages to dedicated article type pages but nothing has worked yet. I have not replace WP with HTML but am afraid that is next.

      I thought something is going on like the home page was penalized, but not the rest of the site. The sites are indexed and rank for some keywords but not well and certainly not for the way I designed and optimized the sites.

      Anyone else seeing this? It seems to have happened around Q3 of last year.

      Hi richinca,

      Your issue is most likely due to how you are structuring your website and/or the SEO and promotional strategy that you are pursuing.

      If you are using WP in the default blog platform configuration and promoting you homepage instead of your Permalinks, then you are working against yourself. The solution is to use a blog configuration that matches your promotional strategy, or alter your promotional strategy to match you blog configuration.

      The default WP blog configuration uses your post page as the homepage. That means the content on the homepage will constantly change with each new blog post. The on-page content that your rankings are based on will eventually roll off of the homepage and change the basis for your rankings.

      If you are using a promotional strategy designed for a static website, on a blog you will see the kind of results you described. Make sure your promotional strategy matches your blog or reconfigure you blog to match your promotional strategy.
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      • Profile picture of the author richinca
        Hi dburk,

        I don't think this is the issue because most of the sites have static home pages either by design or the fact that the 7 excerpts on the home page don't move (sticky).
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  • Profile picture of the author embrace1
    Google treating Wordpress as spam? That's very unlikely
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  • Profile picture of the author gameutopia
    There is no doubt there are a lot of spamy wordpress sites, but that is because it is a popular platform. Any time you have something popular it will see a lot of spam. Plenty of top notch sites use it as well, so I don't think it can be labeled as spam for everyone.
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  • Profile picture of the author marieluy143
    Originally Posted by emailwiz View Post

    I heard that Google is now treating Wordpress websites as Spam, is this true?
    I guess it won't happen.. Why? most websites/blogs are using the said software.. and it is easy to use(user friendly)..
    Signature

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  • Profile picture of the author mosthost
    Phrase-based penalties/over-optimized exact match anchor text/slow loading times.

    Look for all three of those in isolation from the CMS being used.
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  • Profile picture of the author IMCanuck
    Since the panda update one of my old wp blogs that I hadn't updated in over a year jumped on the first page for the keyword that I named it after. I saw this and said wow, I better start updating this sucker.

    I have and am now backlining it also. It's doing a Google dance now and keeps fluctuating between #1 and #8. My conclusion from this, if you have unique relevant content wp is not treated as spam. Use wp as a spam tool and it will most likely be treated as such.
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  • Profile picture of the author tech84
    I highly doubt this, it does not matter what platform, it still depends on the content. Blogspot and WP site are both used by many spammer, may it be 50/50% 40/60% 60/40% who knows? I would still depend on the creator of the website and not on the platform.
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  • Profile picture of the author GeorgR.
    Disable all comments, trackbacks etc....i am quite often contemplating whether all those spam comments have a negative effect, even if they are all "no follow". Disable user accounts etc..etc.. it's all doable. I am pretty sure IF there is something like a penalization of WP blogs its related to such things (settings!)..and not WP itself.
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  • Profile picture of the author irfanmeo
    i thinks this is just an romur and nothing else because many WordPress sites are very high quality as some fellows said.
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  • Profile picture of the author GeorgR.
    Here is another thing:

    There is no question that WP is *the* most widely known CMS/platform used.
    Daily, i see total cr@p sites made by some "SEO guys" who think all it needs for rankings is an EMD, a "sniper site" and a "pseudo review".

    Especially in IM there are MANY of such awful sites.

    What i am saying, it's a fact that MANY people do use WP, but many people might not have an idea of site quality or SEO even, they use some hardcore approaches to rank (EMDs, aggressive linking etc.) - but NOW are facing the reality it is not that easy any more to rank crappy sites.

    And especially when it comes to SEO and "properly" doing it, i dont want to sound like an ahole..but MANY people have no clue.

    And the people who might lose significantly might (MIGHT!) be some of those with crappy sites or who do other, significant mistakes.

    You cannot make a general statement like "WP is losing ranking" or "why is my site not ranking"...."i dont understand why i dont rank"..."help me ranking" etc...and then checking their particular site and just SHAKE YOUR HEAD because you see a pathetic, thin site and a person who has delusional ideas, THINKING they have the greatest site but in reality they don't.

    Result is so bizarre things like a client wants his site ranked for his "dream keywords"...he wants a "guarantee" for the rankings.....you check their site...and it's literally EMPTY, there is no content.

    Now try to explain such people who have such "delusions" why a site might not rank as they want or why it might drop in rankings etc... just an example how some people simply have no idea.

    And it's also fact that Google is always evolving and you cannot do the same things anymore you did maybe 6 months ago or a year ago. You need to adapt..and this means MAINLY quality.
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  • Profile picture of the author coolash
    Quite scary.... I have loads of unique content on a WP blog....hope all's well!!
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  • Profile picture of the author Stevemartin619
    Indeed good research on Wordpress and other platforms. I am glad to found your research
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  • Profile picture of the author Ant B
    I can't believe that this thread has more than one reply. It amazes me how little people realise about google and the way it ranks pages and I have only been in this business for 6 months. Google crawls, reads and determines if your content is good, readable and relevant and ranks you. Simple. They dont care what platform you use, they are clever enough to look beyond that and do a pretty good job at getting it right most of the time. WordPress or not doesn't matter.

    And for those of you saying your sites have been hijacked or over run with spam comments or trackbacks I think you need to look at your management of wordpress and updates and not blame wordpress for being spammy. Frustrating how much junk floats around the forum, sorry for the rant.
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  • Profile picture of the author sethczerepak
    Google hates spam, everyone does. Spammers are usually people who have little or no money to build a site, many of them use Wordpress because it's free. Everyone once in a while, Google makes a massive update as their technology becomes more advanced and spammers get spanked. They complain about it, but I've yet to hear one say:

    "Google penalized me for being a spammer!"

    No, they blame it on the platform they're using, they blame it on Google or they blame it on the rise of social media or some other exterior cause. It's all just excuses. If you're not a spammer, don't pay attention to the chicken littles out there. Just give people what they want. Give them valuable content and the rest will take care of itself.
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  • Like I have been saying.......

    I own a small subscriber based Social Internet Marketing service that includes hosting.

    So I have many subscribers. Many host with us as well as 3rd party hosting as do I. I actually have 3 different hosting solutions.

    We have been very busy tooling up for a huge release of a lot of new services one being a portfolio of WP plugins and templates customized for our subscribers.

    I love WP, I know WP and we develop for WP.

    About a month ago I had some subscribers share some concern that their WP sites started to drop. It had been a few months since I had even looked at mine (I have several 100 of them all used for research and development).

    Several had been hijacked with one having over 175,000 new EDITOR accounts. All had started to drop in rankings.

    I deleted the WP on a few of them and put Veretekk CMS systems on them. They immediately turned around and started improving.

    All of my subscribers that had expressed this issue with me also removed most of their WP blogs replacing them with other solutions and they all reported ranks returning and improving again.

    So I started researching this. That's my job, market research. I grind myself into delirium researching.

    I am discovering a trend that a large population of WP blogs that I have added into my research are losing rankings (not all but most of the ones I have researched so far).

    The ones that I control and those people I have communicated that removed them and replaced with some option have experienced a positive result.

    Some of my subscribers have become extremely anti WP. I think they are reacting illogically. There is a teend, but exactly what is casuing it is yet to be significantly identified.

    But there is a trend that is negatively impacting a large population of WP blogs.
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  • Profile picture of the author shuttercraft
    My website is a wordpress built site. I got indexed my first day of the site being live. The first month I dominated some medium keywords. Now three months later it is steadily climbing through the rankings. Besides the regular Google dance I have not lost any rankings.

    I call bulls%it on this. Wordpress Rocks.
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  • Profile picture of the author neil_patmore
    I just read that sites with animated gifs are now being flagged as spam by google due to the inherent file download size. Probably best to boycott all gifs in future to be safe.
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  • Profile picture of the author sunray
    Just having WordPress is clearly not enough to treat a website as spam, but since 99.99% of spammy sites use WordPress and nothing else, it is very possible (and logical) that it may be considered as a red flag. One red flag is nothing, two still not a problem, but if three red flags are up, ratings drop.

    You know, using Drupal is not that much more difficult. At least as far as a simple "out of the box" website goes.
    And, with Drupal, you couldn't get into the wrong boat, as a really large number of high ranking and very important authority sites are built on it. Newspapers, magazines, museums and government websites run on Drupal. Even Whitehouse.gov. So why not switch over?
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  • Profile picture of the author stephenwaldo
    if, by your own argument, WordPress is only being penalized for the ease with which it is attacked and abused by spammers, then my question to you is this…

    What is going to keep the spammers from just developing tools to use HTML? And Drupal? And every single other CMS?

    The fact of the matter is that you are exactly right… The reason that WordPress is popular among spammers is the same reason it's popular among everyone else… It's easy to use. It makes zero sense that a search engine would make a broad generalization of a CMS.

    Unless you honestly think that by taking away WP you would simultaneously eliminate web spammers?

    Spam is made by the people, not by the CMS. I know that, Google knows that, and you should know that, too.
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    • Profile picture of the author sunray
      Originally Posted by stephenwaldo View Post

      What is going to keep the spammers from just developing tools to use HTML? And Drupal? And every single other CMS?
      You're right, nothing. But even if they did it overnight, Google wouldn't be able to use the same red flag meaning on Drupal, since SO MANY really important websites use it.

      Just think logically. At this very moment, if we look at how different CMSs are generally used: Drupal - big authority sites, community sites, government websites, company websites; Joomla - smaller online business websites, small online shops, company websites; WordPress - personal blogs, affiliate businesses, Adsense websites. Get the picture? WordPress sites, even if not spammy, in Google's eyes, are not that important! To get rid of the spammers, a few innocent sites may be sacrificed, they don't care. No searcher misses them. It is very, very logical to somehow use CMS on SERP. I'd be really surprised if they didn't do it.
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  • Profile picture of the author HKSEO Rotzee
    I've never heard of this
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  • Profile picture of the author HKSEO Rotzee
    ...I did hear that Japan might accidentally of made their worst nightmare....a giant nuclear, radioactive lizard....GODZILLA>
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  • Profile picture of the author IndianGal
    to me this is scary news -
    that means one day i may have 50 WP sites -
    and G will do something bad??
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    • Profile picture of the author HKSEO Rotzee
      Originally Posted by IndianGal View Post

      to me this is scary news -
      that means one day i may have 50 WP sites -
      and G will do something bad??
      Its not true, don't worry about it.
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      • Profile picture of the author sunray
        Originally Posted by HKSEO Rotzee View Post

        Its not true, don't worry about it.
        Right. We shouldn't worry about anything. We must evaluate the situation, calculate the risks and take action--this way or the other.
        Most people wouldn't bother to learn a totally new thing if not already absolutely necessary, and it's totally understandable.
        But designers and developers should prepare and stand by to process MASSIVE amount of orders to transform WordPress sites into something else. Just in case.
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        • Profile picture of the author Jonathon S
          Matt Cutts runs his site on wordpress using the thesis theme.

          enough said
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  • Profile picture of the author martworld
    It is not true. Top quality wordpress sites are enjoyinh no.1 rankings for millions of keywords.
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  • Profile picture of the author lapeoro
    Hope its not true but i agree to all of them who said that some of the wordpress sites with lots of comments on them is treated as spammy and some of the wordpress sites which has a reasonable number of comments doesn't.According to me its not easy for google to treat wordpress sites as spam.Lets see what happens.
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  • Profile picture of the author J0hnnycl1ckz
    I have full faith in the major search engines ability to differentiate between spammy sites and well structured sites without the need to discount an entire platform. If that logic were true then every platform would be discounted to a certain degree. Pure rumor BS.
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  • Profile picture of the author ebuyer123
    It is the content and activity of website that differential between a spamming and genuine website.

    - Link Building Activity: fully automative vs. manually
    - Site Content: Duplicated vs. Unique contents.

    Most of the spammy wp sites are hosted on wordpress.org.
    So I can't see the logic why the big G should take on those self-hosted wp sites.

    Just my 2 cents
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  • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
    NEWSFLASH! - The other shoe has dropped. Google now will consdier HTML, Javascript, PHP and ASP.net as spam. Only youtube videos will rank.
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    • Profile picture of the author yukon
      Banned
      Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

      NEWSFLASH! - The other shoe has dropped. Google now will consdier HTML, Javascript, PHP and ASP.net as spam. Only youtube videos will rank.
      Lol, PHP

      Google went server side on our assets!
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      • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
        Originally Posted by yukon View Post

        Lol, PHP

        Google went server side on our assets!
        Google has hundreds of millions of employees and some of the most advanced programmers in the world. If you sell cookies on the internet they know the secret ingredients. They can change the memory in your system and adjust your monitors resolution. In fact they know its you placing the backlinks to your site because they can see your face through your computer monitor. WITHOUT A WEBCAM!! (people think professional SEOs wear ski masks because of the money they charge but little do they know)

        Go ahead and laugh all you want Yukon. Google has already made contact with extraterrestials in order to become the UNIVERSE's most powerful search engine. The earth just was not enough for them anymore. Matt Cutt's is a love child from that encounter. Larry Page IS The Googlebot. You guys have no idea how advanced Google is and what the name really means. them knowing when a link is bought no matter what the page looks like is just the tip of the iceberg. Being able to see behind the html that wordpress outputs to the real php is nothing.














        ROFL
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        • Profile picture of the author pwtmike
          haha that just made my night... being able to see through the html to the php, lol that's Big G for ya...
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  • Profile picture of the author Mantasmo
    Woah!! This thread is still alive.
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  • Profile picture of the author cashtree
    The attack is affecting web sites using an old version (3.2.1) of Wordpress, according to M86 Security Labs. The web sites have been injected with code that redirects the user to an exploit web site.

    Source: The Inquirer (Hundreds of Wordpress web sites get hacked - The Inquirer)
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  • Profile picture of the author temlawn
    Nope... not true...
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