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Penalty on main site due to over optimization?

by nolokimes
11 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hi everyone,

I noticed that the new niche sites I put up do not get a honey moon bonus anymore and that the sub pages rank better than the main domain. The main domain is still indexed, but the site does not show up in the top 100.

My thoughts on what could cause the problem:
- Over optimization: I normally have a keyword density of 2%, keyworld bold, underlined and italized and a link with the keyword to my main site. Could this be too much?
- I start linkbuilding after about 7 days could this be too early? It worked for me 1-2 month ago.
- I normally only use 3 articles with 500 words could this cause the trouble. (too less content)


I hope some of you have more ideas what I could do wrong so that I can test it out. Also maybe I'm not patient enough, but I have the same problem with 2 months old sites.
#due #main #optimization #penalty #site
  • Profile picture of the author BackLinkiT
    ads above the fold?

    i'd also stop the bolding and underlining of keywords.

    mix it up too. forget density % and go for natural content...

    ...and do not build more than 1 or 2 links per day, if any at all.
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    • Profile picture of the author nolokimes
      So far with backlinks I never had problems. I just build a handful of backlinks a day. There are two ads above the fold one in the content and one in the sidebar.

      Maybe I should consider waiting 2 weeks before building the first backlinks at all.
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  • Profile picture of the author jamesrich1
    You will get a much more detailed answer if you ask this question in the SEO section of the forum. 2% density is not too much its recommended in SEO Pressor. Underlining and italicizing your keyword is also what SEO Pressor does. I recommend you taking a reputable SEO training course like SEO Book to get all of the answers to your questions.
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    • Profile picture of the author nolokimes
      I actually use seo professor for 2 of the affected websites. Two month ago I had no problems doing things my way. The problem evolved just in the last two month and i have the same problem on 4-6 sites.

      I'm not sure if seo professor is updated on the new changes made by google
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  • Profile picture of the author nijinashok00
    Banned
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    • Profile picture of the author nolokimes
      The real question is, why are all other pages ranking? All pages have two ads above the fold and really don't think that causes the problem. The blog design works perfectly for a few other sites of mine.
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  • Profile picture of the author zaco
    I don't think high keyword density will let you lose the rankings, I used to have 2 sites and for 1 keyword it was 24%, I didn't do keyword stuffing but it was the navigation menu, I asked at the Google webmaster forum what should I do and they said remove it.

    I removed it from 1 site and I lost the high rankings, not even in the top 100, the inner pages are still ranking, on the other site I kept it as it is and it is still ranking good..

    Did you do any other changes to the site? any change would let Google think you are trying to play with the keywords and you lose the rankings for a month or two then they come back
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  • Profile picture of the author MikeWike
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    • Profile picture of the author Jason Matterson
      Have you considered your anchor text being a cause?

      For instance, I like to keep my keywords in the anchor text down to 10-15% of the total links, while the rest are made up of the site's url, or things like "read more" and "Click here."

      It's worth at least looking into.
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      • Profile picture of the author nolokimes
        Originally Posted by Jason Matterson View Post

        Have you considered your anchor text being a cause?

        For instance, I like to keep my keywords in the anchor text down to 10-15% of the total links, while the rest are made up of the site's url, or things like "read more" and "Click here."

        It's worth at least looking into.
        Yeah this could really be a mistake I made. I normally use the anchor text for about 80-90% of my links. If I think about it that's really high. I will start changing this.
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        • Profile picture of the author godoveryou
          Originally Posted by nolokimes View Post

          Yeah this could really be a mistake I made. I normally use the anchor text for about 80-90% of my links. If I think about it that's really high. I will start changing this.
          Yeah, then Jason had it right.

          Jason is one of my better new 'students' so I decided to chime in and just say good job to Jason for spotting the problem, and I hope you are able to resolve the issue.

          Remember, there's two issues with anchor text.

          1: How many backlinks actually use anchor text?
          >>>>> You said this was 80%+ which is very, very high. Definately back that down to the 20-30% range if possible. Once you've gotten back to that spot, begin to look at what has happened to your SERP's and decide if you should continue to drop or lower the overall percentage.

          2: How many of those anchor'ed backlinks are just one or two keywords with mixed variations.
          >>> You may want to consider throwing a lot more "click here's" and "read more's" in the mix.

          WORD OF CAUTION: Just because you have a direction to take now, don't forget to keep your link velocity and total volume under control. I've seen it happen time and time again where someone get's good direction then blows it out the back end with incredibly high velocity trying to over compensate for a pre-existing problem.

          Good luck my friend,
          GOY
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          Don't Know Me? - Read my interview at Matthewwoodward.co.uk
          http://www.godoveryou.com/
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          • Profile picture of the author nolokimes
            Originally Posted by godoveryou View Post

            Yeah, then Jason had it right.

            Jason is one of my better new 'students' so I decided to chime in and just say good job to Jason for spotting the problem, and I hope you are able to resolve the issue.

            Remember, there's two issues with anchor text.

            1: How many backlinks actually use anchor text?
            >>>>> You said this was 80%+ which is very, very high. Definately back that down to the 20-30% range if possible. Once you've gotten back to that spot, begin to look at what has happened to your SERP's and decide if you should continue to drop or lower the overall percentage.

            2: How many of those anchor'ed backlinks are just one or two keywords with mixed variations.
            >>> You may want to consider throwing a lot more "click here's" and "read more's" in the mix.

            WORD OF CAUTION: Just because you have a direction to take now, don't forget to keep your link velocity and total volume under control. I've seen it happen time and time again where someone get's good direction then blows it out the back end with incredibly high velocity trying to over compensate for a pre-existing problem.

            Good luck my friend,
            GOY
            By all respect, you can never know if that is the problem. It can be part of the problem, but could also be no problem at all. Like I said I have already many pages ranking very well with my strategy.

            What I will be trying:
            - reduce the onpage optimization and use the keyword more natural
            - i will make the images look more natural away from "buy house.jpg" title="buy house" alt="buy house" --> "image1.jpg" title="buy house" alt="my buy house image"
            - i will use more "click here", "here"... anchor texts
            - I'm going to expand the content
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  • Profile picture of the author nolokimes
    Did you do any other changes to the site? any change would let Google think you are trying to play with the keywords and you lose the rankings for a month or two then they come back
    No really, I normally finish up the whole page and then bookmark it to get the pages indexed.

    Are you sure it's not offsite issue? Maybe you have used too many same anchor texts in your backlinks? I had similar issue with one of my clickbank sites, I tried EVERYTHING (onpage and offpage) and nothing really seemed to help. My homepage was gone from SERPS, however the sub-pages ranked... It last almost 1,5 months, but the site came back (stronger ofcourse) and has been in first place for 2 months now..
    I'm not sure it could be that way. I use mostly only anchor texts links in my backlinks. The backlinks however are very diversified. The comeback sounds good because the sites are only about two month old. However, I first expected to have a honey moon period for a few days, but nothing. Maybe they will really come up in time.
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